Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!att!osu-cis!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!mailrus!cornell!batcomputer!itsgw!steinmetz!uunet!auspex!guy
From: guy@auspex.UUCP (Guy Harris)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.c
Subject: Re: On Portability
Message-ID: <311@auspex.UUCP>
Date: 26 Oct 88 20:23:44 GMT
References: <4700026@m.cs.uiuc.edu>
Reply-To: guy@auspex.UUCP (Guy Harris)
Organization: Auspex Systems, Santa Clara
Lines: 19

>Someone posted that we're dealing with two different definitions of
>portability here.  Yes, one could, in theory, expect that all
>compilers will comply with some standard, either the _de facto_ one
>presented in K&R, or the dpANS.  The fact remains that some do *not*,
>and there are a few easily identified areas where a *number* of
>compilers have trouble.

Let's hope here will be ANSI C test suites when the standard comes out,
so that in the future compilers that have trouble on these things will
be caught and, hopefully, fixed....

>	- It is unwise to depend on integer+pointer and its friends
>working correctly.  K&R is clear on this, if you read carefully;
>several compiler writers have not been so careful.

Do you mean "interger+pointer" as opposed to "pointer+integer"? 
Addition is generally commutative, and if a compiler can't handle
"pointer+integer", it is unwise to purchase that compiler;
"pointer+integer" is a quite widespread construct in C code.