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From: gmaranca@cipc1.Dayton.NCR.COM (Gabriel Maranca)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.c
Subject: Type-independent absolute value
Keywords: abs, labs
Message-ID: <1389@cipc1.Dayton.NCR.COM>
Date: 4 Oct 89 11:23:18 GMT
Reply-To: gmaranca@cipc1.Dayton.NCR.COM (Gabriel Maranca)
Organization: NCR Controller's Division - F*A*S*T - Dayton, OH
Lines: 21

Does anybody know why the abs() math function is not type independent? 
Or has this been changed in ANSI "C"?

I use the following macro instead of the standard library function:

#define ABS(x) (((long)(x) < 0L)? -(x) : (x))

This works for ints and longs, by casting the argument to a long for the
comparison, and then returning the absolute value of the argument with
its original type.

Is this non-ANSI or unportable? It works for me.

---
#Gabriel Maranca
#Gabriel.Maranca@cipc1.Dayton.NCR.COM
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#Gabriel Maranca
#Gabriel.Maranca@cipc1.Dayton.NCR.COM
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