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From: henry@utzoo.UUCP (Henry Spencer)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.c
Subject: Re: Structure constants
Message-ID: <8677@utzoo.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 29-Sep-87 12:55:59 EDT
Article-I.D.: utzoo.8677
Posted: Tue Sep 29 12:55:59 1987
Date-Received: Tue, 29-Sep-87 12:55:59 EDT
References: <843@usfvax2.UUCP>
Organization: U of Toronto Zoology
Lines: 19

>		b = add_complex(a, (COMPLEX){1.0, 1.0} );

What is the type of the second argument if you omit the cast?  If the cast
is mandatory, then all of a sudden it isn't a cast any more, it's a new
kind of animal that happens to resemble a cast.  (Speaking as an implementor,
if it's going to make casts any more messy to parse, I don't want to hear
about it!)

I suspect the answer from X3J11 (which has surely seen proposals along these
lines several times in the last couple of years) would be the standard one:
"no experience with this feature in real implementations; existing features
can be used to similar effect; no convincing demonstration of need".

Personally, I think it would be a useful thing, if you revised the syntax a
bit so the first part didn't look like a cast, but I am against adding it
to X3J11 in the absence of dire need.
-- 
"There's a lot more to do in space   |  Henry Spencer @ U of Toronto Zoology
than sending people to Mars." --Bova | {allegra,ihnp4,decvax,utai}!utzoo!henry