Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!bellcore!rutgers!rochester!cornell!uw-beaver!tektronix!percival!parsely!agora!rickc
From: rickc@agora.UUCP (Rick Coates)
Newsgroups: comp.std.c
Subject: Re: function returning pointer to itself
Message-ID: <1067@agora.UUCP>
Date: 24 Jul 88 14:03:19 GMT
References: <1065@agora.UUCP> <672@goofy.megatest.UUCP>
Organization: Advanced Solutions, Hillsboro, OR
Lines: 72

In article <672@goofy.megatest.UUCP>, djones@megatest.UUCP (Dave Jones) writes:

    (deleted)
>   (Some wierd architectures use different formats for data pointers 
>   and function pointers, which again proves that most hardware 
        ^
  This occurred to me, then I thought, nooooo, no one would do that.

>   designers should be in jail.   I'm sure _you_ never did anything like
>   that when you were in the hardware game, right?)

    Heavens, no! I had a group of software (well, firmware) folks to
    keep me on track!

    (deleted)
>   be done.  You can, however, return a structure which contains a
>   field pointing to the function, as a couple of correspondants have
>   demonstrated.
> 
	Cute. (I haven't seen these responses)
> > Microsoft C 5.1 for IBM pc's 
> 
    (deleted)
> 
> 
> I think your compiler is broke.  It is my understanding that it

  No surprises here!

> should warn you that the "return test_func" line does not return a void*.
> Here's what the Sun3 compiler says:

   Now - my question: (disclaimer first: I am not trying to start a
   'compiler wars' here -  compilers are not standards.  They are,
   however, - in theory - based on standards, and, more importantly,
   they are the only way to _test_ (as opposed to talking about and
   interpreting) standards.  They are also what we have to work with
   every day.)

	As far as I know, Sun does not claim to support the dpANSI
standard, and in fact has not even made any official committment to 
supporting it ever.  Has AT&T said when, if ever, they will support
ANSI C? Any other Unix supplier? Anyone besides the PC world?
Yes, I know that Sun supports many features of dpANSI, but not all
(like function prototyping).

> 
> P.S.
> 
>     I didn't really mean it about the hardware designers belonging in
> jail.  I think that a comprehensive work-furlow program with adequate
> counciling and group programming support sessions should be the norm
> in a modern society.
> 
> 
> 		D.J.

My candidate for Hardware Out Of Control is the IBM EGA/VGA 'standard'.
I can understand ugly choices to keep costs low, but the EGA has lots
of silicon implementing useless functions!  But no support for
drawing lines! Argh.

Just so that Things don't get too out of hand, here: I have plenty of
stories about Software Out Of Control, too.


Rick Coates
Consulting Engineer

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