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From: conor@lion.inmos.co.uk (Conor O'Neill)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.c
Subject: Re: lint (was: Funny mistake)
Message-ID: <15168@ganymede.inmos.co.uk>
Date: 2 Apr 91 12:17:20 GMT
References: <1991Mar22.055335.23091@athena.mit.edu> <13619@helios.TAMU.EDU> <13627@helios.TAMU.EDU> <5043@goanna.cs.rmit.oz.au>
Sender: news@inmos.co.uk
Reply-To: conor@inmos.co.uk (Conor O'Neill)
Organization: INMOS Limited, Bristol, UK.
Lines: 17

In article <5043@goanna.cs.rmit.oz.au> ok@goanna.cs.rmit.oz.au (Richard A. O'Keefe) writes:
>But how do you check that the prototypes used in file FOO.C agree with
>the function definitions in file BAZ.C?  If the programmer makes a habit
>of #including the header files with the prototypes _both_ in the files
>that use things _and_ in the files that provide them, all is well.  If
>not, and there is nothing in ANSI C to require it, we're back in the
>realm of Pascal, i.e. up the well known creek without a paddle.

The INMOS ANSI C compiler has a command line switch
("software quality policing") which will warn if an externally visible
function is detected which was not preceded by a prototype.
If prototypes are only ever written in header files, this provides
the required security.
---
Conor O'Neill, Software Group, INMOS Ltd., UK.
UK: conor@inmos.co.uk		US: conor@inmos.com
"It's state-of-the-art" "But it doesn't work!" "That is the state-of-the-art".