Re: Implementing C/C++ style #include...

["Phaedrus" <phaedrusalt@hotmail.com>]

Funny, I thought that C++ was the "worst form of evil imaginable".
No, scratch that...  Our software management is the worst form of evil
imaginable,
C++ is just number two.  Or maybe three, after taxes.  But it's a close race.

Pestilence?  Isn't that the same thing as C++?

Phaedrus

"Andrew Berg" <andrewb@votehere.net> wrote in message
news:3AC002AA.73118A89@votehere.net...
>
> Robert A Duff wrote:
> >
> > Pascal Obry <p.obry@wanadoo.fr> writes:
> >
> > > I agree with you that in such a case a preprocessor could be usefull.
Anothe
> > > way to handle this is by writing a template and have the right spec
generated
> > > by a script.
> > >
> > >    function Ada_Size_Of_Input is new
> > >       Interfaces_C_More.Storage_Unit_Size_Of (Input_Type);
> > >    pragma Export (<OS_CONVENTION>, Ada_Size_Of_Input,
> > >                   "ball_ct633_ada_size_of_input",
> > >                   "ball_ct633_ada_size_of_input");
> >
> > Your "script" is, in fact, a macro preprocessor.
> >
> > Are macros more or less evil than #if things?
> > I've heard both opinions in this thread.  ;-)
>
> As a full time C++ programmer, I'm going to have to side with Pascal
> here.  Textual macros are dangerous, but a limited form of dangerous.
>
> #if's on the other hand are quite possibly the worst form of evil
> imaginable, in that it is never really possible to know exactly what is
> going on.  Even in simple cases it is bad, because when maintenance
> happens they always get worse.  I suppose that if you are writing code
> that will never get looked at they might not be so bad, but I have never
> had that luxury.
>
> Probably the only decent application of #if is '#if 0' as a way to
> comment out multiple lines of code at once.  C's /* */ comments cannot
> be nested and it gets really tedious to put //'s everywhere, so #if 0 is
> a useful construct.
>
> If you want an example of the kind of hell I am thinking of, go download
> 'stlport', a reasonably portable, reasonably compliant version of C++'s
> STL.  Look at those header files for a while...
>
> -andrew
>