comment style

[Ron Irvine]

A need for // (real) comments:


#include <stdio.h>
void main() {
	int *p;
	int a;
	int f = 10;
	int n = 5;

	p = &f;

	a = 100/*p	/* calculate first factor */
	    + 25/n;	/* and second factor */

	printf("The answer is %d, %s\n", a, (a==15)?"OK":"BAD");
}


The actual program that contained this problem was very complex.
It took two of us a day to figure out what had happened.

Flame On:

It is incredibly STUPID to have the start of comment token the same
as a LEGAL combination of other language tokens.
I have run this program on 4 different C compilers and none of them
even warned of a potential problem (nested comments).
Comments are part of the syntax of the language and should never
have been left to the EVIL pre-processor to "handle".

Flame Off:

The // comment style should have been adopted by the ANSI committee
if for no other reason that to reduce the likelihood of a programmer
falling into this horrendous trap. If // style comments had been
used in the above program the compile would have failed.

Ron Irvine, ron at sco.com