Re: Conditional Compilation

[dvdeug@x8b4e53cd.dhcp.okstate.edu (David Starner)]

On Tue, 19 Sep 2000 20:06:32 +0000, E. Robert Tisdale <edwin@netwood.net> wrote:
>The C macro preprocessor wasn't originally part
>of the C computer programming language.

You sure? It was definetly a part of K&R C, and it would be almost
impossible to build a C program without it.

>but you can still use the C macro preprocessor
>on Ada source files as long as the translation unit
>is an acceptable Ada program.
>Try it.  It works.

Maybe. cpp will emit errors about unterminted character constants,
it will chop up C comments, and do other unfriendly things. It
can work, but I'm not sure it's a great idea.

>Now, professional programmers almost never write
>programs in Ada, C, C++ or any other standard
>computer programming language directly.
>They usually use perl, the m4 macro preprocessor,
>the sed stream editor or some combination of tools
>to write programs for them from "prototype files"

Not that I've seen. For example, GCC and GNAT use prototype files
for machine descriptions, but for pretty much everything else
it's just straight code. moc (QT's preprocessor) is about the only 
largescale example of that I've seen.

-- 
David Starner - dstarner98@aasaa.ofe.org
http/ftp: dvdeug.dhis.org
And crawling, on the planet's face, some insects called the human race.
Lost in space, lost in time, and meaning.
	-- RHPS