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From: jeffa@hpmwtd.HP.COM (Jeff Aguilera)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.c
Subject: Re: A question of style
Message-ID: <680014@hpmwjaa.HP.COM>
Date: 1 Dec 89 22:52:53 GMT
References: <1989Nov23.170838.10376@phri.nyu.edu>
Organization: HP Microwave Tech. - Santa Rosa, Ca.
Lines: 29

>>while (c = getchar(), c != EOF)

Too much annoying white space, conveying no information or structure.  Try

    while (c=getchar(), c!=EOF)

instead.  Pull atomic concepts and actions together.

>The standard C idiom for this is
>    while ( (c = getchar()) != EOF )

Gee.  I prefer the first construct.  Indeed, it is the only one I dare use, 
because it is so much clearer.  But I understand (and accept) that most 
programmers are compelled to use the K&R form, following their masters' dogma
blindly, criticizing all others.

>and experienced C programmers are likely to read the standard idiom
>with greater facility than your proposed use of a comma operator for this.

I hope an experienced programmer is capable of understanding both expressions.
His mental algorithmic model should be independent of the implementation and
its expression.  
-----
jeffa

    Mathematicians are like Frenchmen: whatever you say to them they
    translate into their own language, and forthwith it is something
    entirely different.
            -- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe