Xref: utzoo comp.std.c:3547 comp.lang.c:31669
Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!yale!cmcl2!adm!smoke!gwyn
From: gwyn@smoke.BRL.MIL (Doug Gwyn)
Newsgroups: comp.std.c,comp.lang.c
Subject: Re: May prototypes be required for lib functs
Message-ID: <13773@smoke.BRL.MIL>
Date: 7 Sep 90 17:17:41 GMT
References: <478@hitachi.uucp> <13759@smoke.BRL.MIL> <1990Sep7.114544@osf.org>
Followup-To: comp.std.c
Organization: U.S. Army Ballistic Research Laboratory, APG, MD.
Lines: 13

In article <1990Sep7.114544@osf.org> dbrooks@osf.org (David Brooks) writes:
>This loses some of the benefits of prototypes.

Well, yes, but there was that mountain of already-written code that was
correct by previous (K&R) criteria that we wanted to "grandfather in".

>Build a library using prototypes and narrow parameters, ...

I don't recommend excessive use of narrow parameter types, but certainly
if you're going to use them (or even if not!) there should be an associated
header that properly declares them.  A conforming compiler will flag any
type error in the function implementation if the implementation includes
the header.  Otherwise, some form of "lint" should be used by the developer.