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Subject:  Re: sizeof(char)

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From:         Doug Gwyn <gwyn at brl-smoke.arpa>
Subject:      Re: sizeof(char)
Comments: To: info-c at brl-smoke.arpa
To:           Vic Kapella <SXJVK at ALASKA>

In article <17395 at watmath.waterloo.edu> rbutterworth at watmath.waterloo.edu (Ray
 Butterworth) writes:
>If C left the units of sizeof up to the implementor it would solve
>a lot of problems (e.g. none of the multi-byte character mess that
>is now in the proposed standard, and the problems of having to have
>functions that know about the two different types of strings).

>Other than allowing sloppily written code to continue to be written,
>I can see no reason whatsoever for requiring that sizeof(char) be 1.
>In Japan it could be 2, while on machines that do a lot of bit
>manipulation it could be 16.  Both are appropriate for their needs.

Yes!  I would appreciate it if you would send in a comment suggesting
that the approach in X3J11/86-205 (my sizeof(short char)==1 proposal)
should be considered in place of the proposed multi-byte character
support.  That is somewhat more ambitious than your sizeof(char)>=1
proposal, in that it provides an extra data type, so if that bothers
you you could suggest merely that the requirement sizeof(char)==1 be
dropped (which would leave the door open for later adoption of
something ling X3J11/86-205, but unfortunately would not eliminate
the proposed multi-byte character features).