6 char externs and the ANSI standard
warren
warren at tikal.UUCP
Fri Oct 5 05:08:08 AEST 1984
[This is not a sentence]
Six character identifiers are much too short for significant
software. There is much to be gained by defining a larger
minimum, we all know the benefits. The worst single result is
unintented synonyms created when the first 6 letters in an
identifier match, as in
int record_count;
int record_type;
The worst error in the C language was in allowing identifier names to
be longer than the number of significant characters. This is an
invitation to disaster. If possible the ANSI commitee should remove
this "feature". Compilers should be forced to at least produce
warnings. Although if a compiler can produce warnings, it can handle
longer names...
If a minimum must be specified, let it be 16 or 20, at least.
teltone!warren
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