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From: throopw@dg_rtp.UUCP (Wayne Throop)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.wizards,comp.lang.c
Subject: Re: bitfields
Message-ID: <722@dg_rtp.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 1-Dec-86 11:18:09 EST
Article-I.D.: dg_rtp.722
Posted: Mon Dec  1 11:18:09 1986
Date-Received: Tue, 2-Dec-86 03:34:17 EST
References: <844@sphinx.UChicago.UUCP>
Followup-To: comp.lang.c
Lines: 24
Summary: what? what? where do K&R say arrays of bitfields are allowed?
Xref: mnetor comp.unix.wizards:212 comp.lang.c:199

(Note that this discussion in more properly a language discussion, not
 an OS discussion.  I've therefore cross-posted, and set the followup to
 comp.lang.c.)

> wmam@sphinx.UChicago.UUCP (tony mason)
> [...] how are bit fields in C dealt with?  As I read K&R arrays of bit
> fields are allowed [...].  Has X3J11 come up with anything regarding
> this? [...]

Since K&R define array subscripting in terms of pointer arithmetic, and
since taking the address of a bitfield is not allowed by K&R, how can
you possibly conclude that bitfield arrays are allowed?  Breifly,
paraphrasing a lof of what I find in X3J11, bitfield definitions are
legal only on struct members of integral type.  Harbison and Steele warn
that some compilers only allow bitfield modifiers on *unsigned* integral
typed struct members.  K&R say similar things.  So again... what passage
in K&R led you to think that arrays of bitfields were sensible in C?

--
Sometimes I think the only universal in the computing field is the
fetch-execute cycle.
                                --- Alan J. Perlis
-- 
Wayne Throop      <the-known-world>!mcnc!rti-sel!dg_rtp!throopw