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From: atc@ut-sally.UUCP (Alvin T. Campbell III)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.c
Subject: help with declaration
Message-ID: <8286@ut-sally.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 17-Jun-87 16:30:14 EDT
Article-I.D.: ut-sally.8286
Posted: Wed Jun 17 16:30:14 1987
Date-Received: Sun, 21-Jun-87 10:24:44 EDT
Organization: U. Texas CS Dept., Austin, Texas
Lines: 45
Keywords: function pointer


	I have a question for all you C wizards out there. I want to write 
a function which returns a pointer to another function. I checked Kernighan
& Ritchie and Harbison & Steele, but found no solution.

	My specific application is that I am writing a program which uses 
menus. Each menu item has an associated function which should be called 
when that item is selected. I want to write a function which puts a menu
on the screen, lets the user select an item, and then returns the appropriate
function.

	I want to structure the code as follows:

#define TRUE	1
main()
{
	int	(*func)();

	while(TRUE)
	{
		func = getmenu();
		(*func)();
	}
}

	So how do I declare getmenu() ?

	I am writing the code on a Silicon Graphics, Inc. IRIS 2400,
whose flavor of UNIX is System V with Berkeley Enhancements. The vendor
has a hotline for questions, so I called there first. I was referred to 
someone in their compiler group. He told me to just declare getmenu()
as an integer function, since it would work in this case. I am a 
purist, so I found this suggestion disgusting.

	By the way, please don't suggest that I restructure my code
to avoid the problem. I know there are many ways to do this, and in
fact I have done so already. I am just curious to see how to do it
right.

	Thanks for the help.

				A. T. Campbell
				University of Texas at Austin
				Computer Graphics Lab
				atc@sally.CS.UTEXAS.EDU