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From: davidsen@crdos1.crd.ge.COM (Wm E Davidsen Jr)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.c
Subject: Re: offsetof() macro
Summary: What good is it?
Message-ID: <175@crdos1.crd.ge.COM>
Date: 25 Aug 89 16:04:55 GMT
References: <70@motto.UUCP>
Organization: GE Corp R&D Center
Lines: 19


  I think I asked this before, but I didn't see any answers. If you wish
feel free to mail instead of post.

  What good is offsetof? What wonderful things can I do with it that I
can't do without it, and are they things the average system hacker would
want to do. The only use for it which comes to mind is playing with
individual fields in a file  of structs, hardly common enough to justify
mandating a feature in the language.

  I read 4.1.5 and there is no info on what great things this does for
me. I have great respect for the committee and I'm sure there's a reason
why this was added, but it escapes me.

-- 
bill davidsen	(davidsen@crdos1.crd.GE.COM -or- uunet!crdgw1!crdos1!davidsen)
"The world is filled with fools. They blindly follow their so-called
'reason' in the face of the church and common sense. Any fool can see
that the world is flat!" - anon