Path: news.eternal-september.org!eternal-september.org!.POSTED!not-for-mail
From: David Brown <david.brown@hesbynett.no>
Newsgroups: comp.lang.c
Subject: Re: Loops (was Re: do { quit; } else { })
Date: Mon, 12 May 2025 17:18:06 +0200
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On 12/05/2025 11:27, Keith Thompson wrote:
> Tim Rentsch <tr.17687@z991.linuxsc.com> writes:
> [...]
>> It isn't just that checking the condition cannot be done in general.
>> To be reliable the parameter length information would need to be
>> part of the function's type.  That has implications for type
>> compatibility and also for the types of pointers-to-function.  And
>> it would mean that removing a 'static' array length specification on
>> a function definition would necessitate also changing the functions
>> declarations, plus any affected pointers-to-function.  Not worth it,
>> even if in theory it were doable.
> [...]
> 
> In my opinion, keeping a function's definition and declarations
> consistent is absolutely worth it, even if the language might not
> require it.
> 

Sure.  If gcc had a warning enforcing such consistency, I would 
definitely use it.

But not all C programmers are as pedantic about consistency between a 
function declaration and definition.  It is not uncommon to be 
inconsistent about the names of parameters (or even if the parameters 
have names at all), or mixing array-style parameters and pointer-style 
parameters.