Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!snorkelwacker!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!abvax!iccgcc!browns
From: browns@iccgcc.decnet.ab.com (Stan Brown, Oak Road Systems)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.c
Subject: Re: Seven Original Sins of K&R (Long)
Message-ID: <1283.270b385a@iccgcc.decnet.ab.com>
Date: 4 Oct 90 18:25:43 GMT
References: <12780@sdcc6.ucsd.edu> <1990Sep26.163927.26084@dg-rtp.dg.com> <1990Sep26.193626.721@phri.nyu.edu> <1990Sep27.073730.26575@warwick.ac.uk> <1990Sep27.131329.26616@phri.nyu.edu> <1990Sep28.144753.23727@zoo.toronto.edu> <3945@se-sd.SanDiego.NCR.CO
Lines: 34

M>
Followup-To: >

Lines: 29

WARNING:  Nit about to be picked.

In <1990Sep28.144753.23727@zoo.toronto.edu> 
henry@zoo.toronto.edu (Henry Spencer) writes:
>>In article <1990Sep27.131329.26616@phri.nyu.edu> 
  roy@phri.nyu.edu (Roy Smith) writes:
>>>... I meant to
>>>write:
>>>
>>>#define NULL (""[0])
> 
>Roy, apart from not being a compile-time value, which limits its use,
>this is exactly and precisely equivalent to
> 
>#define	NULL	0

Not exactly or precisely.  Every time the first version is invoked, it
creates a separate instance of a one-byte string.  So you chew up static
data storage.  Depending on how your compiler does alignmnet, it may be
two or four bytes each time--or more.  And in large model with Microsoft
C, some combinations of options could put each "" in its own data
segment!

Is that horse dead yet?  Lord knows I've been beating it enough! :-)


The above is my own opinion and not attributable to any other person or
organization.                        email: browns@iccgcc.decnet.ab.com
Stan Brown, Oak Road Systems, Cleveland, Ohio, U.S.A.    (216) 371-0043