Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!cbosgd!gatech!seismo!brl-smoke!gwyn
From: gwyn@brl-smoke.ARPA (Doug Gwyn )
Newsgroups: net.lang.c
Subject: Re: exit() on VMS
Message-ID: <984@brl-smoke.ARPA>
Date: Sun, 16-Feb-86 02:26:44 EST
Article-I.D.: brl-smok.984
Posted: Sun Feb 16 02:26:44 1986
Date-Received: Tue, 18-Feb-86 04:23:15 EST
References: <1046@decwrl.DEC.COM> <3174@umcp-cs.UUCP> <178@decvax.UUCP>
Reply-To: gwyn@brl.ARPA
Organization: /usr/local/lib/news/organization
Lines: 25

In article <178@decvax.UUCP> minow@decvax.UUCP (Martin minow) writes:
>
> Unfortunately, on VMS, status code 1 means "success", thus the
> Unix exit(1) usage to indicate errors fails.

Therefore VMS has incorrectly implemented the exit() function.
Early Whitesmiths C systems tried to pull this switch, too.

VMS could very easily correctly implement exit() using something like:
	void exit( status ) /* agrees with the rest of the world */
		{
		extern void _vms_exit(); /* previously named "exit" */
		_vms_exit( !status );
		}
I get the impression that VMS C was implemented by people who did
not have much practical experience with C programming.

The fact is, correctly-written C applications from non-VMS systems
are most unlikely to be coded as you suggested "for portability";
they invariably return a hard-wired 0 status to indicate success.

Quoting from X3J11 section D.10.4.2: "Finally, control is returned
to the host environment.  If the value of `status' is zero, the status
returned is *successful termination*; otherwise an implementation-
defined form of the status *unsuccessful termination* is returned.