Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!usc!wuarchive!uunet!mcsun!ukc!edcastle!aiai!richard
From: richard@aiai.ed.ac.uk (Richard Tobin)
Newsgroups: comp.arch
Subject: Re: new instructions
Message-ID: <4861@skye.ed.ac.uk>
Date: 30 May 91 16:16:11 GMT
References: <9105200213.AA05095@ucbvax.Berkeley.EDU> <12526@mentor.cc.purdue.edu> <4711.2843a523@iccgcc.decnet.ab.com>
Reply-To: richard@aiai.UUCP (Richard Tobin)
Organization: AIAI, University of Edinburgh, Scotland
Lines: 22

In article <4711.2843a523@iccgcc.decnet.ab.com> herrickd@iccgcc.decnet.ab.com writes:
>> There are provisions for octal and hex
>> integers [in c],

>I thought so too, and one day I tried to write an integer constant
>in octal.  The compiler said, "Nuts to you!"  It took some hours,
>but I finally convinced myself that the compiler manual and then
>Kernigan and Ritchie provide octal notation for CHARACTERS.  Nothing
>else!  I thought it was a major design flaw and was no accident.

But you were mistaken.  Octal constants are written by putting a
leading zero on the number (a horrid convention).  Check out "octal
constant" in the index of K&R (either edition).

   Example:    printf("%d\n", 01234);

-- Richard

-- 
Richard Tobin,                       JANET: R.Tobin@uk.ac.ed             
AI Applications Institute,           ARPA:  R.Tobin%uk.ac.ed@nsfnet-relay.ac.uk
Edinburgh University.                UUCP:  ...!ukc!ed.ac.uk!R.Tobin