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Path: utzoo!utgpu!utcsri!flaps
From: flaps@utcsri.UUCP
Newsgroups: comp.lang.c
Subject: Re: Portability of C
Message-ID: <4607@utcsri.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 17-Apr-87 00:21:30 EST
Article-I.D.: utcsri.4607
Posted: Fri Apr 17 00:21:30 1987
Date-Received: Sat, 18-Apr-87 00:08:25 EST
References: <213@pyuxe.UUCP> <710@brl-sem.ARPA> <422@ivax.doc.ic.ac.uk>
Reply-To: flaps@utcsri.UUCP (Alan J Rosenthal)
Organization: University of Toronto
Lines: 28
Keywords: portability, short, data types
Summary: 


In article <422@ivax.doc.ic.ac.uk> dcw@doc.ic.ac.uk (Duncan C White) writes:
>So, what earthly USE is the current definition of 'short', 'int' and 'long' ?
>Are there cases (the simpler the better :-) when the existing method is
>useful ?

ya, how about
    int i;
    for(i = 0; i < 10; i++)

:-)s aside, the point is, if you want to count from 1 to 10 you don't care
too much about the size of the integer (so long as it's not 3 bits or shorter,
I suppose), but it would be stupid to use a 16-bit integer on a 32-bit
machine or vice versa.

'int' is how you say "I don't care exactly how big this is."  Good style in C
involves using this approach as much as possible!  Just like not specifying
evaluation order, actually.

-- 

Alan J Rosenthal

flaps@csri.toronto.edu, {seismo!utai or utzoo}!utcsri!flaps,
flaps@toronto on csnet, flaps at utorgpu on bitnet.

"Probably the best operating system in the world is the [operating system]
made for the PDP-11 by Bell Laboratories." - Ted Nelson, October 1977