Questions on X3J11 draft

[Mark Biggar]

In article <775 at axis.UUCP> philip at axis.UUCP (Philip Peake) writes:
>In article <3800 at watmath.UUCP> rbutterworth at watmath.UUCP writes:
>>I can think of a perfectly conforming ANSI compiler that will break
>>almost any existing C code.  Imagine a piece of code such as the following:
>>    #include <stdio.h>
>>    {
>>        extern int getchar();
>>        auto int c;
>>        c=getchar();
>>At the moment, this will blow up on (all?) existing C compilers since
>>"getchar" is a macro.  Of course everyone KNOWS this and so never puts
>>such things into their code.  But under ANSI, almost any function can
>>be defined as a macro in the header files.  That means that almost
>>any program that contains an "extern type libCfunc();" in it can
>>potentially break under a conforming ANSI compiler.
>How can I know, when trying to write portable code, if the 'library'
>function I am going to use is a real function or a macro ?

Easy, you say (using the above example):

#ifndef getchar
extern int getchar();
#endif

Mark Biggar
{allegra,burdvax,cbosgd,hplabs,ihnp4,akgua,sdcsvax}!sdcrdcf!markb