C and ANSI Standard

[Henry Spencer]

> I want flexnames (arbitrary-length identifiers) everywhere you can use
> an identifier in C, particularly external names.  I would settle for
> some large length, like 80.  I WON'T settle for 6 or 8, and I don't
> care how many linkers will have to be rewritten to accomodate it.

This has already been discussed to death.  Flexnames, no.  Longer limits,
where practical, yes.

> If this isn't done, then the standard will be a joke, and no piece of
> VAX 4.2 or Sun code will ever run anywhere else.

I don't know about the first part, but <FLAME ON> the second part is
probably true already <FLAME OFF>.

> Also, if anybody is contemplating making structure member names be
> unique (that is,
> 
> struct foo {
>     int a;
> };
> 
> struct bar {
>     int a;
> };
> 
> being illegal) please stop them from doing so.  Please don't let the
> ANSI standard be a mediocre version of V7 Unix C!

The draft says, I believe, that member names are local to the structure
they are declared in.  So the above is legal.  Note that it's legal in
V7 C too, but for different and much sleazier reasons.
-- 
				Henry Spencer @ U of Toronto Zoology
				{allegra,ihnp4,linus,decvax}!utzoo!henry