Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!lll-winken!lll-tis!ames!haven!ncifcrf!nlm-mcs!adm!smoke!gwyn From: gwyn@smoke.ARPA (Doug Gwyn ) Newsgroups: comp.lang.c Subject: Re: const comparison in C and C++ Message-ID: <8549@smoke.ARPA> Date: 20 Sep 88 21:27:20 GMT References: <709@paris.ICS.UCI.EDU> <8500@smoke.ARPA> <1411@solo3.cs.vu.nl> <782@proxftl.UUCP> <12184@steinmetz.ge.com> Reply-To: gwyn@brl.arpa (Doug Gwyn (VLD/VMB)) Organization: Ballistic Research Lab (BRL), APG, MD. Lines: 9 In article <12184@steinmetz.ge.com> davidsen@crdos1.UUCP (bill davidsen) writes: > Am I misreading the standard? My interpretation was that uninitialized >global storage was set to *all bit zero* and that there was something >that mentioned this might not be zero for types other than integral >types. Other way around. When initializers aren't specified for data having static storage duration, the initial contents are zero (of the appropriate type), not 0-bit patterns. On several architectures this distinction has no practical significance, but on some it does.