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From: meissner@dg_rtp.UUCP (Michael Meissner)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.c
Subject: Re: draft ANSI standard: needs your tomatoes
Message-ID: <753@dg_rtp.UUCP>
Date: Sat, 13-Dec-86 13:11:28 EST
Article-I.D.: dg_rtp.753
Posted: Sat Dec 13 13:11:28 1986
Date-Received: Tue, 16-Dec-86 01:04:29 EST
References: <1384@hoptoad.uucp> <5421@brl-smoke.ARPA> <1155@ucbcad.BERKELEY.EDU> <7375@utzoo.UUCP> <738@dg_rtp.UUCP>
Reply-To: meissner@dg_rtp.UUCP (Michael Meissner)
Organization: Data General (Languages @ Research Triangle Park, NC.)
Lines: 21

In article <738@dg_rtp.UUCP> throopw@dg_rtp.UUCP (Wayne Throop) writes:
>> henry@utzoo.UUCP (Henry Spencer)
>
>>> ... The constants EXTERNAL_NAME_LENGTH (6), INCLUDE_FILES_NEST
>>> (4), and SOURCE_LINE_LENGTH (509) in particular seem to be very
>>> inadequate...
>> SOURCE_LINE_LENGTH is a bit curious, and the choice
>> of minimum value for it is truly bizarre.
>
>"Bizarre?" Really?  Isn't that the longest ANSI varying length format
>record which will fit into a 512-byte block?  Oops, no that would be
>508... hmmmmmmmm... where DOES that limit come from?
>
>Wayne Throop      !mcnc!rti-sel!dg_rtp!throopw

As I remember it, it came from a record oriented system, that stored a length
word (2 bytes) at the front, and some sort of trailer at the end.  The last
byte (trailer) may have been the fortran carriage control character (0, 1, +,
etc.) that is prepended.

Michael Meissner   !mcnc!rti-sel!dg_rtp!meissner