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Path: utzoo!linus!security!genrad!grkermit!masscomp!clyde!floyd!vax135!cornell!uw-beaver!tektronix!orca!hammer!bradn
From: bradn@hammer.UUCP (Brad Needham)
Newsgroups: net.unix
Subject: Re: functions returning pointers to functions
Message-ID: <416@hammer.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 13-Dec-83 17:13:37 EST
Article-I.D.: hammer.416
Posted: Tue Dec 13 17:13:37 1983
Date-Received: Fri, 16-Dec-83 02:06:54 EST
References: <2430@azure.UUCP>
Organization: Tektronix, Wilsonville OR.
Lines: 32

I think your confusion comes from the two ways of declaring a function:
	1) with other declarations
	2) with the function definition (i.e. the code for the function).
Formal parameters do not appear when you declare a function separately
from its definition, e.g.
	int *a();
vs
	int *a(x)
	int x;
	{
		...
	}
If you want a function returning a pointer to a function returning an int,
you can say it two ways:
	1) as a declaration:
		int (*getroutine())();
	2) or as a declaration and definition:
		int (*getroutine(name,table))()
		char *name;
		struct atable *table;
		{
			...
		}

Because the declaration of functions is so confusing, Graham Ross of Tektronix,
MDP wrote a program to convert between English and C declarations.  He posted
it to net.sources quite a while ago, but I'm sure he can get a copy to you.
He is tektronix!tekmdp!grahamr.

Brad Needham
Tektronix, ECS.
..decvax!tektronix!tekecs!bradn