Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!cbosgd!ihnp4!ihlpg!tainter
From: tainter@ihlpg.ATT.COM (Tainter)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.c
Subject: Re: extern
Keywords: extern
Message-ID: <4694@ihlpg.ATT.COM>
Date: 24 Jan 88 04:30:51 GMT
References: <17428@topaz.rutgers.edu> <7123@brl-smoke.ARPA> <4405@garfield.UUCP> <7150@brl-smoke.ARPA>
Distribution: na
Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories - Naperville, Illinois
Lines: 23

In article <7150@brl-smoke.ARPA>, gwyn@brl-smoke.ARPA (Doug Gwyn ) writes:
> In article <4405@garfield.UUCP> john13@garfield.UUCP (John Russell) writes:
> -file 1 -
> int fou;
> [I assume "foo" was intended]
I assume your assumption also.
> -file 2 -
> extern int foo;
> foo = 1;

I assume this last line was supposed to be a static initialization.

No C compiler accepts this.  If you have something, supposedly a C compiler,
that accepts this then you have been lied to.  Clearly, that compiler is for
some language very similar to C, but not C.

> PLEASE don't do this.  A compiler is not obliged to make this example
> "work".

In fact, C compilers should be obliged to complain about this as it does not
conform to the syntax of C.

--j.a.tainter