Xref: utzoo gnu.gcc.bug:2039 comp.std.c:2524
Newsgroups: gnu.gcc.bug,comp.std.c
Path: utzoo!henry
From: henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer)
Subject: Re: function prototype syntax
Message-ID: <1990Feb28.191914.29297@utzoo.uucp>
Organization: U of Toronto Zoology
References: <9002270016.AA02978@yamada-sun.UUCP> <25EB0435.3408@paris.ics.uci.edu>
Date: Wed, 28 Feb 90 19:19:14 GMT

In article <25EB0435.3408@paris.ics.uci.edu> rfg@ics.uci.edu (Ronald Guilmette) writes:
>In article <9002270016.AA02978@yamada-sun.UUCP> yamada-sun!eric@nosun.west.sun.com (Eric Hanchrow) writes:
>>I promptly got on the phone to Microsoft to chew them out about this
>>obvious ANSI non-compatibility.  The fella on the phone said, "No, the
>>ANSI standard requires that you either name all the arguments in a
>>function prototype, or none of them"...
>
>You had better call back that guy at Microsoft and insist that he cite
>chapter and verse from the standard to back up his assertion.

I see nothing in ANSI C (Oct 88 draft) that would support such an assertion.
Unless I've missed something subtle, in a function declaration (as opposed
to a definition), the names are optional on a parameter-by-parameter basis.
Given that Microsoft -- as well as everybody else -- has been claiming
"ANSI C compatibility" based on drafts rather than a final standard, it's
possible that he and/or Microslop as a whole may have gotten this idea
from an earlier draft and missed the liberalization of the rules.  I
don't remember the history of function declarations very well, but there
may have been such a restriction at one point.
-- 
"The N in NFS stands for Not, |     Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology
or Need, or perhaps Nightmare"| uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry henry@zoo.toronto.edu