Reserved names in ANSI C

[Steve Hosgood]

In article <2619 at yunexus.UUCP>, davecb at yunexus.UUCP (David Collier-Brown) writes:
> jeffrey at algor2.uu.net (Jeffrey Kegler) writes:
> | The amount of effort that some projects are going to have to go
> | through to obey the 6 character limit will rewrite many a linker.
> 
>   This discussion comes around about every six months.  Ahem:
> 
> 0) 6 characters is a lower limit of significance. You're allowed to use more.

Yeah, but though you may be able to use more, a 'strictly conforming' program
can't, otherwise it won't port to sites with 6-character linkers. In other
words 6 characters *is* the real limit.

> 3) Almost everyone will have to fix their linkers for Ada, or not be
> able to get US (and some Canadian/NATO) government contracts.
> 

Can't some use be made of that fact? If Ada becomes important due to the
military backing, can't 'C' ride its wake (so to speak) and insist on a
linker with sensible namewidth? Surely, most manufacturers (even the most
stubborn) will upgrade the linkers if several much-wanted languages require
such upgrades?

I suppose the *real* trick is to persuade the FORTRAN committee to want a
wider namespace from now onwards. Chances are that they're considering this
already, otherwise FORTRAN won't be able to interface to Ada reliably, and
there *must* be *some* requirement for that?

Steve
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