Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!lll-winken!lll-tis!ames!mailrus!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!lvc
From: lvc@tut.cis.ohio-state.edu (Lawrence V. Cipriani)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.c
Subject: On writing programs that do not contain noalias
Message-ID: <10834@tut.cis.ohio-state.edu>
Date: 18 Apr 88 01:25:17 GMT
Organization: Ohio State Computer & Info Science
Lines: 41
Keywords: #define noalias kludge

rns@se-sd.sandiego.NCR.COM (Rick Schubert) writes:
-I was responding to your claim that you would use ANSI C if it didn't
-contain "noalias" but you would not use it if it did; I did and do maintain
-that if the presence of "noalias" was the determining factor for you, that
-you could program in ANSI C--, which would be ANSI C - "noalias".  I think
-that dealing with other programmers' code containing "noalias" confuses the
-issue.

Confusing or not, the issue is not only whether or not the programs that
I write originally will contain noalias.  The issue of what I have to do
when I inherit a piece of code that uses noalias is important as is the
fact that the current definition of the headers and libraries use it nearly
everywhere.

-When you say that you will refuse to use ANSI C if it contains
-"noalias", what do you plan to do?  Use existing C compilers? or use
-another language?

Oh I'll probably put up with whatever my employer uses,
I have expenses you know, I'll just get more crotchety.
I'll switch to C++ sooned than I planned.  If C++ gets ruined
too, I'll stop programming altogether.  There are other areas
in computing I'm interested in working in too.

-That wouldn't address the issue of what you do with other people's
-ANSI C programs.  Do you avoid them altogether?  I guess so, if you do not
-plan on using ANSI C.  But if you're going to avoid them altogether, you
-still have an independent choice to make for your own programs.  And for
-this choice I say: "feel free to write programs that do not contain the
-token 'noalias'."

If all I have to do is build and run them, I don't care if they're are
written in Yugoslavian (maybe I would make an exception for Yugoslavian).
If I have to read or change them, they better be in a language that I
understand.  My experience in maintaining code in languages I don't fully
comprehend has been painful.  I don't need this hassle in ANSI-C,
and neither do the rest of the C programmers that can't figure out noalias.

-- 
Larry Cipriani, AT&T Network Systems and Ohio State University
Domain: lvc@tut.cis.ohio-state.edu
Path: ...!cbosgd!osu-cis!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!lvc (weird but right)