Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!lll-winken!lll-lcc!mordor!sri-spam!ames!elroy!cit-vax!andy
From: andy@cit-vax.Caltech.Edu (Andy Fyfe)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.c
Subject: const void *
Message-ID: <6214@cit-vax.Caltech.Edu>
Date: 21 Apr 88 07:14:49 GMT
Reply-To: andy@cit-vax.UUCP (Andy Fyfe)
Distribution: na
Organization: California Institute of Technology
Lines: 27

What does (or should?) the ANSI standard say about const void *?

My intuition says that, so far as conversions without an explicit
cast go, the following should be legal:

	any *		<-->	void *
	const any *	<-->	const void *
	any *		 -->	const void *
	const any *	<--	void *

Or, void * is the generic pointer, and const is treated separately
as an attribute that can be added but not taken away (without an
explicit cast).  Is this the way it is supposed to work?

If plain "void *" is to be the generic pointer, is K&R 2 correct
in defining memcmp as
	int memcmp(const void *, const void *, size_t)
or fwrite as
	size_t fwrite(const void *, size_t, size_t, FILE *)
for example?

Also, should "const any * --> void *" be allowed, since "void *"
is the generic pointer?
-- 
Andy Fyfe
            andy@csvax.caltech.edu
            wjafyfe@caltech.bitnet
            andy@cit-vax.UUCP	(...!ames!elroy!cit-vax!andy)