Re: What attributes of a programming language simplify its use?

Hans-Peter Diettrich <DrDiettrich1@netscape.net> writes:
> IMO C basic syntax is a bad base. As long as declarations and
> expressions can be distinguished only by the type of an identifier (type
> name or variable name) it's not a good idea to add new keywords that can
> be confused with variable or type names. Instead weird constructs like
> "long long" for int64_t have been introduced, while "int int" stays
> equivalent to "int".


long long and int64_t are not the same (though int64_t may be the same
type as long long in a given implementation). long long is *at least* 64
bits. int64_t is *exactly* 64 bits, and must have a 2's-complement
representation and no padding bits. "int int" is a syntax error.


(I'm not arguing that C's integer type system isn't overly complicated.)


--
Keith Thompson (The_Other_Keith) Keith.S.Thompson+u@gmail.com
Working, but not speaking, for XCOM Labs
void Void(void) { Void(); } /* The recursive call of the void */

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