🚀 go-pugleaf

Jens M Andreasen <jens-and@dsv.su.se> wrote:
>On Fri, 20 Oct 1995, Thad Smith wrote:
>> The comp.std.c newsgroup is for the discussion of the ISO/ANSI
>> standard for C.  As such, it is important to consider the literal
>> meaning of the words.  If there is an apparent problem, we attempt to
>> get the standard corrected, clarified, or at least understood better.
>
>Great, but please don't interprete the chapters & verses in a way that is 
>not in the spirit of 'C'.
>
>// Jens M Andreasen (pretty tired of obfuscated constants and bailing out.)

Excuse me, but developers of Standard C tools MUST be concerned with EXACTLY
what the Standard says. Anything less, and the result is an implementation that
is probably not conforming, often in subtle but significant ways. If all
vendors had license to freely (mis)interpreted the Standard as you suggest
(well, more so than they presently do :-) ), the market would be full of
implementations that are not conforming and not compatible with each other, and
programmers would have an even harder time porting their code than they already
have. This the whole point of having a standard. A language standard is not a
set of suggested guidelines for tool developers--it is a very exact,
necessarily legalistic contract between the consumers and producers of these
tools. As consumers, we should settle for no less.

If you are just concerned with the "spirit of 'C'," you have LOTS of company in
comp.lang.c.

-- 
Paul Long                               45:29:14N 122:48:09W
plong@perf.com                          http://www.teleport.com/~pciwww/
    "Where time or intelligence are lacking, a goto may do the job."
        - M.E. Hopkins, "A Case for the GOTO," 1972.