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From: marcus@pyuxt.UUCP (M. G. Hand)
Newsgroups: net.sources,net.unix,net.lang.c,net.unix-wizards
Subject: Re: QUERY: Coding convention
Message-ID: <142@pyuxt.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 5-Jul-84 17:50:02 EDT
Article-I.D.: pyuxt.142
Posted: Thu Jul  5 17:50:02 1984
Date-Received: Fri, 6-Jul-84 01:01:32 EDT
References: <2065@rlgvax.UUCP>
Organization: Bell Communications Research, Piscataway N.J.
Lines: 19

Connected with this (the machine type defines), I encountered the following
problem a couple of weeks ago:

	Between USG 5.2 and 5.3 (sic) - these are S5 releases for the 3B5 -
	the defined constant _u3b disappeared from the system with the
	consequence that one of my programs stopped compiling.  Now I have
	to:
	#if	defined(_3b) || defined(_3b5)
	(Not too painful admittedly, but all I wanted to know was whether
	it was a generic 3b system.)

What this does is to underline the need for a series of standard names which
covers Unix versions and the hardware on which it runs; and, when I say
*standard* I mean well known, well documented, and universally adhered-to.
(fat chance!).

I add my voice in support of Mark Horton's proposal.

		Marcus Hand	(pyuxt!marcus)