Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!cbatt!ihnp4!inuxc!pur-ee!j.cc.purdue.edu!k.cc.purdue.edu!l.cc.purdue.edu!roz From: roz@l.cc.purdue.edu.UUCP Newsgroups: comp.lang.c,comp.std.internat Subject: Re: draft ANSI standard: are chars signed? Message-ID: <475@l.cc.purdue.edu> Date: Fri, 12-Dec-86 01:09:28 EST Article-I.D.: l.475 Posted: Fri Dec 12 01:09:28 1986 Date-Received: Mon, 15-Dec-86 06:49:45 EST References: <1382@hoptoad.uucp> <8322@lll-crg.ARpA> <783@nscpdc.NSC.COM> <1462@hoptoad.uucp> Reply-To: roz@l.cc.purdue.edu.UUCP (Vu Qui Hao-Nhien) Organization: Purdue U. Dept. of Mathematics Lines: 30 Xref: watmath comp.lang.c:368 comp.std.internat:43 In article <1462@hoptoad.uucp> gnu@hoptoad.uucp (John Gilmore) writes: >In article <783@nscpdc.NSC.COM>, joemu@nscpdc.NSC.COM (Joe Mueller) writes: >> The committee wanted to "fix" the question of signedness of a char >> [....] >> We ended up >> adopting the compromise of: >> char - signed or unsigned, implementation defined >> unsigned char >> signed char > >Of course, this compromise breaks all the code that depends on chars >being EITHER signed OR unsigned! To be portable and "strictly >conforming", you can't depend on =chars having signs= or =chars having no >signs=, you just can't depend. Now I'm not claiming to be a C expert, but isn't it what's going on now, that you "just can't depend" ? Isn't it the current state of affairs that char's are either signed or unsigned, implementation defined ? If your codes *are* depending on one or the other, then they are not at all portable. >I would rather they had broken half the code that makes assumptions, >rather than all of it. Of course, unless I'm wrong, they're not breaking ANY code, since all they did was adding two more types -- signed char and unsigned char -- , not changing any current type. So apparently *no* code is broken. -- Hao-Nhien Q. Vu (pur-ee!l.cc.purdue.edu!vu) (vu@l.cc.purdue.edu) [That's "ell", not "one"]