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- This is /home/riscos/gcc33/!gcc/docs/cpp, produced by makeinfo version
- 4.7 from cpp.texi.
-
- Copyright (C) 1987, 1989, 1991, 1992, 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996, 1997,
- 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
-
- Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document
- under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.1 or
- any later version published by the Free Software Foundation. A copy of
- the license is included in the section entitled "GNU Free Documentation
- License".
-
- This manual contains no Invariant Sections. The Front-Cover Texts
- are (a) (see below), and the Back-Cover Texts are (b) (see below).
-
- (a) The FSF's Front-Cover Text is:
-
- A GNU Manual
-
- (b) The FSF's Back-Cover Text is:
-
- You have freedom to copy and modify this GNU Manual, like GNU
- software. Copies published by the Free Software Foundation raise
- funds for GNU development. man end
-
- INFO-DIR-SECTION Programming
- START-INFO-DIR-ENTRY
- * Cpp: (cpp). The GNU C preprocessor.
- END-INFO-DIR-ENTRY
-
- File: cpp, Node: Top, Next: Overview, Up: (dir)
-
- The C Preprocessor
- ******************
-
- The C preprocessor implements the macro language used to transform C,
- C++, and Objective-C programs before they are compiled. It can also be
- useful on its own.
-
- * Menu:
-
- * Overview::
- * Header Files::
- * Macros::
- * Conditionals::
- * Diagnostics::
- * Line Control::
- * Pragmas::
- * Other Directives::
- * Preprocessor Output::
- * Traditional Mode::
- * Implementation Details::
- * Invocation::
- * Environment Variables::
- * GNU Free Documentation License::
- * Index of Directives::
- * Option Index::
- * Concept Index::
-
- --- The Detailed Node Listing ---
-
- Overview
-
- * Character sets::
- * Initial processing::
- * Tokenization::
- * The preprocessing language::
-
- Header Files
-
- * Include Syntax::
- * Include Operation::
- * Search Path::
- * Once-Only Headers::
- * Computed Includes::
- * Wrapper Headers::
- * System Headers::
-
- Macros
-
- * Object-like Macros::
- * Function-like Macros::
- * Macro Arguments::
- * Stringification::
- * Concatenation::
- * Variadic Macros::
- * Predefined Macros::
- * Undefining and Redefining Macros::
- * Directives Within Macro Arguments::
- * Macro Pitfalls::
-
- Predefined Macros
-
- * Standard Predefined Macros::
- * Common Predefined Macros::
- * System-specific Predefined Macros::
- * C++ Named Operators::
-
- Macro Pitfalls
-
- * Misnesting::
- * Operator Precedence Problems::
- * Swallowing the Semicolon::
- * Duplication of Side Effects::
- * Self-Referential Macros::
- * Argument Prescan::
- * Newlines in Arguments::
-
- Conditionals
-
- * Conditional Uses::
- * Conditional Syntax::
- * Deleted Code::
-
- Conditional Syntax
-
- * Ifdef::
- * If::
- * Defined::
- * Else::
- * Elif::
-
- Implementation Details
-
- * Implementation-defined behavior::
- * Implementation limits::
- * Obsolete Features::
- * Differences from previous versions::
-
- Obsolete Features
-
- * Assertions::
- * Obsolete once-only headers::
-
- Copyright (C) 1987, 1989, 1991, 1992, 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996, 1997,
- 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
-
- Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document
- under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.1 or
- any later version published by the Free Software Foundation. A copy of
- the license is included in the section entitled "GNU Free Documentation
- License".
-
- This manual contains no Invariant Sections. The Front-Cover Texts
- are (a) (see below), and the Back-Cover Texts are (b) (see below).
-
- (a) The FSF's Front-Cover Text is:
-
- A GNU Manual
-
- (b) The FSF's Back-Cover Text is:
-
- You have freedom to copy and modify this GNU Manual, like GNU
- software. Copies published by the Free Software Foundation raise
- funds for GNU development. man end
-
- File: cpp, Node: Overview, Next: Header Files, Prev: Top, Up: Top
-
- 1 Overview
- **********
-
- The C preprocessor, often known as "cpp", is a "macro processor" that
- is used automatically by the C compiler to transform your program
- before compilation. It is called a macro processor because it allows
- you to define "macros", which are brief abbreviations for longer
- constructs.
-
- The C preprocessor is intended to be used only with C, C++, and
- Objective-C source code. In the past, it has been abused as a general
- text processor. It will choke on input which does not obey C's lexical
- rules. For example, apostrophes will be interpreted as the beginning of
- character constants, and cause errors. Also, you cannot rely on it
- preserving characteristics of the input which are not significant to
- C-family languages. If a Makefile is preprocessed, all the hard tabs
- will be removed, and the Makefile will not work.
-
- Having said that, you can often get away with using cpp on things
- which are not C. Other Algol-ish programming languages are often safe
- (Pascal, Ada, etc.) So is assembly, with caution. `-traditional-cpp'
- mode preserves more white space, and is otherwise more permissive. Many
- of the problems can be avoided by writing C or C++ style comments
- instead of native language comments, and keeping macros simple.
-
- Wherever possible, you should use a preprocessor geared to the
- language you are writing in. Modern versions of the GNU assembler have
- macro facilities. Most high level programming languages have their own
- conditional compilation and inclusion mechanism. If all else fails,
- try a true general text processor, such as GNU M4.
-
- C preprocessors vary in some details. This manual discusses the GNU
- C preprocessor, which provides a small superset of the features of ISO
- Standard C. In its default mode, the GNU C preprocessor does not do a
- few things required by the standard. These are features which are
- rarely, if ever, used, and may cause surprising changes to the meaning
- of a program which does not expect them. To get strict ISO Standard C,
- you should use the `-std=c89' or `-std=c99' options, depending on which
- version of the standard you want. To get all the mandatory
- diagnostics, you must also use `-pedantic'. *Note Invocation::.
-
- This manual describes the behavior of the ISO preprocessor. To
- minimize gratuitous differences, where the ISO preprocessor's behavior
- does not conflict with traditional semantics, the traditional
- preprocessor should behave the same way. The various differences that
- do exist are detailed in the section *Note Traditional Mode::.
-
- For clarity, unless noted otherwise, references to `CPP' in this
- manual refer to GNU CPP.
-
- * Menu:
-
- * Character sets::
- * Initial processing::
- * Tokenization::
- * The preprocessing language::
-
- File: cpp, Node: Character sets, Next: Initial processing, Up: Overview
-
- 1.1 Character sets
- ==================
-
- Source code character set processing in C and related languages is
- rather complicated. The C standard discusses two character sets, but
- there are really at least four.
-
- The files input to CPP might be in any character set at all. CPP's
- very first action, before it even looks for line boundaries, is to
- convert the file into the character set it uses for internal
- processing. That set is what the C standard calls the "source"
- character set. It must be isomorphic with ISO 10646, also known as
- Unicode. CPP uses the UTF-8 encoding of Unicode.
-
- At present, GNU CPP does not implement conversion from arbitrary file
- encodings to the source character set. Use of any encoding other than
- plain ASCII or UTF-8, except in comments, will cause errors. Use of
- encodings that are not strict supersets of ASCII, such as Shift JIS,
- may cause errors even if non-ASCII characters appear only in comments.
- We plan to fix this in the near future.
-
- All preprocessing work (the subject of the rest of this manual) is
- carried out in the source character set. If you request textual output
- from the preprocessor with the `-E' option, it will be in UTF-8.
-
- After preprocessing is complete, string and character constants are
- converted again, into the "execution" character set. This character
- set is under control of the user; the default is UTF-8, matching the
- source character set. Wide string and character constants have their
- own character set, which is not called out specifically in the
- standard. Again, it is under control of the user. The default is
- UTF-16 or UTF-32, whichever fits in the target's `wchar_t' type, in the
- target machine's byte order.(1) Octal and hexadecimal escape sequences
- do not undergo conversion; '\x12' has the value 0x12 regardless of the
- currently selected execution character set. All other escapes are
- replaced by the character in the source character set that they
- represent, then converted to the execution character set, just like
- unescaped characters.
-
- GCC does not permit the use of characters outside the ASCII range,
- nor `\u' and `\U' escapes, in identifiers. We hope this will change
- eventually, but there are problems with the standard semantics of such
- "extended identifiers" which must be resolved through the ISO C and C++
- committees first.
-
- ---------- Footnotes ----------
-
- (1) UTF-16 does not meet the requirements of the C standard for a
- wide character set, but the choice of 16-bit `wchar_t' is enshrined in
- some system ABIs so we cannot fix this.
-
- File: cpp, Node: Initial processing, Next: Tokenization, Prev: Character sets, Up: Overview
-
- 1.2 Initial processing
- ======================
-
- The preprocessor performs a series of textual transformations on its
- input. These happen before all other processing. Conceptually, they
- happen in a rigid order, and the entire file is run through each
- transformation before the next one begins. CPP actually does them all
- at once, for performance reasons. These transformations correspond
- roughly to the first three "phases of translation" described in the C
- standard.
-
- 1. The input file is read into memory and broken into lines.
-
- Different systems use different conventions to indicate the end of
- a line. GCC accepts the ASCII control sequences `LF', `CR LF' and
- `CR' as end-of-line markers. These are the canonical sequences
- used by Unix, DOS and VMS, and the classic Mac OS (before OSX)
- respectively. You may therefore safely copy source code written
- on any of those systems to a different one and use it without
- conversion. (GCC may lose track of the current line number if a
- file doesn't consistently use one convention, as sometimes happens
- when it is edited on computers with different conventions that
- share a network file system.)
-
- If the last line of any input file lacks an end-of-line marker,
- the end of the file is considered to implicitly supply one. The C
- standard says that this condition provokes undefined behavior, so
- GCC will emit a warning message.
-
- 2. If trigraphs are enabled, they are replaced by their corresponding
- single characters. By default GCC ignores trigraphs, but if you
- request a strictly conforming mode with the `-std' option, or you
- specify the `-trigraphs' option, then it converts them.
-
- These are nine three-character sequences, all starting with `??',
- that are defined by ISO C to stand for single characters. They
- permit obsolete systems that lack some of C's punctuation to use
- C. For example, `??/' stands for `\', so '??/n' is a character
- constant for a newline.
-
- Trigraphs are not popular and many compilers implement them
- incorrectly. Portable code should not rely on trigraphs being
- either converted or ignored. With `-Wtrigraphs' GCC will warn you
- when a trigraph may change the meaning of your program if it were
- converted. *Note Wtrigraphs::.
-
- In a string constant, you can prevent a sequence of question marks
- from being confused with a trigraph by inserting a backslash
- between the question marks, or by separating the string literal at
- the trigraph and making use of string literal concatenation.
- "(??\?)" is the string `(???)', not `(?]'. Traditional C
- compilers do not recognize these idioms.
-
- The nine trigraphs and their replacements are
-
- Trigraph: ??( ??) ??< ??> ??= ??/ ??' ??! ??-
- Replacement: [ ] { } # \ ^ | ~
-
- 3. Continued lines are merged into one long line.
-
- A continued line is a line which ends with a backslash, `\'. The
- backslash is removed and the following line is joined with the
- current one. No space is inserted, so you may split a line
- anywhere, even in the middle of a word. (It is generally more
- readable to split lines only at white space.)
-
- The trailing backslash on a continued line is commonly referred to
- as a "backslash-newline".
-
- If there is white space between a backslash and the end of a line,
- that is still a continued line. However, as this is usually the
- result of an editing mistake, and many compilers will not accept
- it as a continued line, GCC will warn you about it.
-
- 4. All comments are replaced with single spaces.
-
- There are two kinds of comments. "Block comments" begin with `/*'
- and continue until the next `*/'. Block comments do not nest:
-
- /* this is /* one comment */ text outside comment
-
- "Line comments" begin with `//' and continue to the end of the
- current line. Line comments do not nest either, but it does not
- matter, because they would end in the same place anyway.
-
- // this is // one comment
- text outside comment
-
- It is safe to put line comments inside block comments, or vice versa.
-
- /* block comment
- // contains line comment
- yet more comment
- */ outside comment
-
- // line comment /* contains block comment */
-
- But beware of commenting out one end of a block comment with a line
- comment.
-
- // l.c. /* block comment begins
- oops! this isn't a comment anymore */
-
- Comments are not recognized within string literals. "/* blah */" is
- the string constant `/* blah */', not an empty string.
-
- Line comments are not in the 1989 edition of the C standard, but they
- are recognized by GCC as an extension. In C++ and in the 1999 edition
- of the C standard, they are an official part of the language.
-
- Since these transformations happen before all other processing, you
- can split a line mechanically with backslash-newline anywhere. You can
- comment out the end of a line. You can continue a line comment onto the
- next line with backslash-newline. You can even split `/*', `*/', and
- `//' onto multiple lines with backslash-newline. For example:
-
- /\
- *
- */ # /*
- */ defi\
- ne FO\
- O 10\
- 20
-
- is equivalent to `#define FOO 1020'. All these tricks are extremely
- confusing and should not be used in code intended to be readable.
-
- There is no way to prevent a backslash at the end of a line from
- being interpreted as a backslash-newline. This cannot affect any
- correct program, however.
-
- File: cpp, Node: Tokenization, Next: The preprocessing language, Prev: Initial processing, Up: Overview
-
- 1.3 Tokenization
- ================
-
- After the textual transformations are finished, the input file is
- converted into a sequence of "preprocessing tokens". These mostly
- correspond to the syntactic tokens used by the C compiler, but there are
- a few differences. White space separates tokens; it is not itself a
- token of any kind. Tokens do not have to be separated by white space,
- but it is often necessary to avoid ambiguities.
-
- When faced with a sequence of characters that has more than one
- possible tokenization, the preprocessor is greedy. It always makes
- each token, starting from the left, as big as possible before moving on
- to the next token. For instance, `a+++++b' is interpreted as
- `a ++ ++ + b', not as `a ++ + ++ b', even though the latter
- tokenization could be part of a valid C program and the former could
- not.
-
- Once the input file is broken into tokens, the token boundaries never
- change, except when the `##' preprocessing operator is used to paste
- tokens together. *Note Concatenation::. For example,
-
- #define foo() bar
- foo()baz
- ==> bar baz
- _not_
- ==> barbaz
-
- The compiler does not re-tokenize the preprocessor's output. Each
- preprocessing token becomes one compiler token.
-
- Preprocessing tokens fall into five broad classes: identifiers,
- preprocessing numbers, string literals, punctuators, and other. An
- "identifier" is the same as an identifier in C: any sequence of
- letters, digits, or underscores, which begins with a letter or
- underscore. Keywords of C have no significance to the preprocessor;
- they are ordinary identifiers. You can define a macro whose name is a
- keyword, for instance. The only identifier which can be considered a
- preprocessing keyword is `defined'. *Note Defined::.
-
- This is mostly true of other languages which use the C preprocessor.
- However, a few of the keywords of C++ are significant even in the
- preprocessor. *Note C++ Named Operators::.
-
- In the 1999 C standard, identifiers may contain letters which are not
- part of the "basic source character set," at the implementation's
- discretion (such as accented Latin letters, Greek letters, or Chinese
- ideograms). This may be done with an extended character set, or the
- `\u' and `\U' escape sequences. GCC does not presently implement
- either feature in the preprocessor or the compiler.
-
- As an extension, GCC treats `$' as a letter. This is for
- compatibility with some systems, such as VMS, where `$' is commonly
- used in system-defined function and object names. `$' is not a letter
- in strictly conforming mode, or if you specify the `-$' option. *Note
- Invocation::.
-
- A "preprocessing number" has a rather bizarre definition. The
- category includes all the normal integer and floating point constants
- one expects of C, but also a number of other things one might not
- initially recognize as a number. Formally, preprocessing numbers begin
- with an optional period, a required decimal digit, and then continue
- with any sequence of letters, digits, underscores, periods, and
- exponents. Exponents are the two-character sequences `e+', `e-', `E+',
- `E-', `p+', `p-', `P+', and `P-'. (The exponents that begin with `p'
- or `P' are new to C99. They are used for hexadecimal floating-point
- constants.)
-
- The purpose of this unusual definition is to isolate the preprocessor
- from the full complexity of numeric constants. It does not have to
- distinguish between lexically valid and invalid floating-point numbers,
- which is complicated. The definition also permits you to split an
- identifier at any position and get exactly two tokens, which can then be
- pasted back together with the `##' operator.
-
- It's possible for preprocessing numbers to cause programs to be
- misinterpreted. For example, `0xE+12' is a preprocessing number which
- does not translate to any valid numeric constant, therefore a syntax
- error. It does not mean `0xE + 12', which is what you might have
- intended.
-
- "String literals" are string constants, character constants, and
- header file names (the argument of `#include').(1) String constants
- and character constants are straightforward: "..." or '...'. In either
- case embedded quotes should be escaped with a backslash: '\'' is the
- character constant for `''. There is no limit on the length of a
- character constant, but the value of a character constant that contains
- more than one character is implementation-defined. *Note
- Implementation Details::.
-
- Header file names either look like string constants, "...", or are
- written with angle brackets instead, <...>. In either case, backslash
- is an ordinary character. There is no way to escape the closing quote
- or angle bracket. The preprocessor looks for the header file in
- different places depending on which form you use. *Note Include
- Operation::.
-
- No string literal may extend past the end of a line. Older versions
- of GCC accepted multi-line string constants. You may use continued
- lines instead, or string constant concatenation. *Note Differences
- from previous versions::.
-
- "Punctuators" are all the usual bits of punctuation which are
- meaningful to C and C++. All but three of the punctuation characters in
- ASCII are C punctuators. The exceptions are `@', `$', and ``'. In
- addition, all the two- and three-character operators are punctuators.
- There are also six "digraphs", which the C++ standard calls
- "alternative tokens", which are merely alternate ways to spell other
- punctuators. This is a second attempt to work around missing
- punctuation in obsolete systems. It has no negative side effects,
- unlike trigraphs, but does not cover as much ground. The digraphs and
- their corresponding normal punctuators are:
-
- Digraph: <% %> <: :> %: %:%:
- Punctuator: { } [ ] # ##
-
- Any other single character is considered "other." It is passed on to
- the preprocessor's output unmolested. The C compiler will almost
- certainly reject source code containing "other" tokens. In ASCII, the
- only other characters are `@', `$', ``', and control characters other
- than NUL (all bits zero). (Note that `$' is normally considered a
- letter.) All characters with the high bit set (numeric range
- 0x7F-0xFF) are also "other" in the present implementation. This will
- change when proper support for international character sets is added to
- GCC.
-
- NUL is a special case because of the high probability that its
- appearance is accidental, and because it may be invisible to the user
- (many terminals do not display NUL at all). Within comments, NULs are
- silently ignored, just as any other character would be. In running
- text, NUL is considered white space. For example, these two directives
- have the same meaning.
-
- #define X^@1
- #define X 1
-
- (where `^@' is ASCII NUL). Within string or character constants, NULs
- are preserved. In the latter two cases the preprocessor emits a
- warning message.
-
- ---------- Footnotes ----------
-
- (1) The C standard uses the term "string literal" to refer only to
- what we are calling "string constants".
-
- File: cpp, Node: The preprocessing language, Prev: Tokenization, Up: Overview
-
- 1.4 The preprocessing language
- ==============================
-
- After tokenization, the stream of tokens may simply be passed straight
- to the compiler's parser. However, if it contains any operations in the
- "preprocessing language", it will be transformed first. This stage
- corresponds roughly to the standard's "translation phase 4" and is what
- most people think of as the preprocessor's job.
-
- The preprocessing language consists of "directives" to be executed
- and "macros" to be expanded. Its primary capabilities are:
-
- * Inclusion of header files. These are files of declarations that
- can be substituted into your program.
-
- * Macro expansion. You can define "macros", which are abbreviations
- for arbitrary fragments of C code. The preprocessor will replace
- the macros with their definitions throughout the program. Some
- macros are automatically defined for you.
-
- * Conditional compilation. You can include or exclude parts of the
- program according to various conditions.
-
- * Line control. If you use a program to combine or rearrange source
- files into an intermediate file which is then compiled, you can
- use line control to inform the compiler where each source line
- originally came from.
-
- * Diagnostics. You can detect problems at compile time and issue
- errors or warnings.
-
- There are a few more, less useful, features.
-
- Except for expansion of predefined macros, all these operations are
- triggered with "preprocessing directives". Preprocessing directives
- are lines in your program that start with `#'. Whitespace is allowed
- before and after the `#'. The `#' is followed by an identifier, the
- "directive name". It specifies the operation to perform. Directives
- are commonly referred to as `#NAME' where NAME is the directive name.
- For example, `#define' is the directive that defines a macro.
-
- The `#' which begins a directive cannot come from a macro expansion.
- Also, the directive name is not macro expanded. Thus, if `foo' is
- defined as a macro expanding to `define', that does not make `#foo' a
- valid preprocessing directive.
-
- The set of valid directive names is fixed. Programs cannot define
- new preprocessing directives.
-
- Some directives require arguments; these make up the rest of the
- directive line and must be separated from the directive name by
- whitespace. For example, `#define' must be followed by a macro name
- and the intended expansion of the macro.
-
- A preprocessing directive cannot cover more than one line. The line
- may, however, be continued with backslash-newline, or by a block comment
- which extends past the end of the line. In either case, when the
- directive is processed, the continuations have already been merged with
- the first line to make one long line.
-
- File: cpp, Node: Header Files, Next: Macros, Prev: Overview, Up: Top
-
- 2 Header Files
- **************
-
- A header file is a file containing C declarations and macro definitions
- (*note Macros::) to be shared between several source files. You request
- the use of a header file in your program by "including" it, with the C
- preprocessing directive `#include'.
-
- Header files serve two purposes.
-
- * System header files declare the interfaces to parts of the
- operating system. You include them in your program to supply the
- definitions and declarations you need to invoke system calls and
- libraries.
-
- * Your own header files contain declarations for interfaces between
- the source files of your program. Each time you have a group of
- related declarations and macro definitions all or most of which
- are needed in several different source files, it is a good idea to
- create a header file for them.
-
- Including a header file produces the same results as copying the
- header file into each source file that needs it. Such copying would be
- time-consuming and error-prone. With a header file, the related
- declarations appear in only one place. If they need to be changed, they
- can be changed in one place, and programs that include the header file
- will automatically use the new version when next recompiled. The header
- file eliminates the labor of finding and changing all the copies as well
- as the risk that a failure to find one copy will result in
- inconsistencies within a program.
-
- In C, the usual convention is to give header files names that end
- with `.h'. It is most portable to use only letters, digits, dashes, and
- underscores in header file names, and at most one dot.
-
- * Menu:
-
- * Include Syntax::
- * Include Operation::
- * Search Path::
- * Once-Only Headers::
- * Computed Includes::
- * Wrapper Headers::
- * System Headers::
-
- File: cpp, Node: Include Syntax, Next: Include Operation, Up: Header Files
-
- 2.1 Include Syntax
- ==================
-
- Both user and system header files are included using the preprocessing
- directive `#include'. It has two variants:
-
- `#include <FILE>'
- This variant is used for system header files. It searches for a
- file named FILE in a standard list of system directories. You can
- prepend directories to this list with the `-I' option (*note
- Invocation::).
-
- `#include "FILE"'
- This variant is used for header files of your own program. It
- searches for a file named FILE first in the directory containing
- the current file, then in the same directories used for `<FILE>'.
-
- The argument of `#include', whether delimited with quote marks or
- angle brackets, behaves like a string constant in that comments are not
- recognized, and macro names are not expanded. Thus, `#include <x/*y>'
- specifies inclusion of a system header file named `x/*y'.
-
- However, if backslashes occur within FILE, they are considered
- ordinary text characters, not escape characters. None of the character
- escape sequences appropriate to string constants in C are processed.
- Thus, `#include "x\n\\y"' specifies a filename containing three
- backslashes. (Some systems interpret `\' as a pathname separator. All
- of these also interpret `/' the same way. It is most portable to use
- only `/'.)
-
- It is an error if there is anything (other than comments) on the line
- after the file name.
-
- File: cpp, Node: Include Operation, Next: Search Path, Prev: Include Syntax, Up: Header Files
-
- 2.2 Include Operation
- =====================
-
- The `#include' directive works by directing the C preprocessor to scan
- the specified file as input before continuing with the rest of the
- current file. The output from the preprocessor contains the output
- already generated, followed by the output resulting from the included
- file, followed by the output that comes from the text after the
- `#include' directive. For example, if you have a header file
- `header.h' as follows,
-
- char *test (void);
-
- and a main program called `program.c' that uses the header file, like
- this,
-
- int x;
- #include "header.h"
-
- int
- main (void)
- {
- puts (test ());
- }
-
- the compiler will see the same token stream as it would if `program.c'
- read
-
- int x;
- char *test (void);
-
- int
- main (void)
- {
- puts (test ());
- }
-
- Included files are not limited to declarations and macro definitions;
- those are merely the typical uses. Any fragment of a C program can be
- included from another file. The include file could even contain the
- beginning of a statement that is concluded in the containing file, or
- the end of a statement that was started in the including file. However,
- an included file must consist of complete tokens. Comments and string
- literals which have not been closed by the end of an included file are
- invalid. For error recovery, they are considered to end at the end of
- the file.
-
- To avoid confusion, it is best if header files contain only complete
- syntactic units--function declarations or definitions, type
- declarations, etc.
-
- The line following the `#include' directive is always treated as a
- separate line by the C preprocessor, even if the included file lacks a
- final newline.
-
- File: cpp, Node: Search Path, Next: Once-Only Headers, Prev: Include Operation, Up: Header Files
-
- 2.3 Search Path
- ===============
-
- GCC looks in several different places for headers. On a normal Unix
- system, if you do not instruct it otherwise, it will look for headers
- requested with `#include <FILE>' in:
-
- /usr/local/include
- LIBDIR/gcc/TARGET/VERSION/include
- /usr/TARGET/include
- /usr/include
-
- For C++ programs, it will also look in `/usr/include/g++-v3', first.
- In the above, TARGET is the canonical name of the system GCC was
- configured to compile code for; often but not always the same as the
- canonical name of the system it runs on. VERSION is the version of GCC
- in use.
-
- You can add to this list with the `-IDIR' command line option. All
- the directories named by `-I' are searched, in left-to-right order,
- _before_ the default directories. The only exception is when `dir' is
- already searched by default. In this case, the option is ignored and
- the search order for system directories remains unchanged.
-
- Duplicate directories are removed from the quote and bracket search
- chains before the two chains are merged to make the final search chain.
- Thus, it is possible for a directory to occur twice in the final search
- chain if it was specified in both the quote and bracket chains.
-
- You can prevent GCC from searching any of the default directories
- with the `-nostdinc' option. This is useful when you are compiling an
- operating system kernel or some other program that does not use the
- standard C library facilities, or the standard C library itself. `-I'
- options are not ignored as described above when `-nostdinc' is in
- effect.
-
- GCC looks for headers requested with `#include "FILE"' first in the
- directory containing the current file, then in the same places it would
- have looked for a header requested with angle brackets. For example,
- if `/usr/include/sys/stat.h' contains `#include "types.h"', GCC looks
- for `types.h' first in `/usr/include/sys', then in its usual search
- path.
-
- `#line' (*note Line Control::) does not change GCC's idea of the
- directory containing the current file.
-
- You may put `-I-' at any point in your list of `-I' options. This
- has two effects. First, directories appearing before the `-I-' in the
- list are searched only for headers requested with quote marks.
- Directories after `-I-' are searched for all headers. Second, the
- directory containing the current file is not searched for anything,
- unless it happens to be one of the directories named by an `-I' switch.
-
- `-I. -I-' is not the same as no `-I' options at all, and does not
- cause the same behavior for `<>' includes that `""' includes get with
- no special options. `-I.' searches the compiler's current working
- directory for header files. That may or may not be the same as the
- directory containing the current file.
-
- If you need to look for headers in a directory named `-', write
- `-I./-'.
-
- There are several more ways to adjust the header search path. They
- are generally less useful. *Note Invocation::.
-
- File: cpp, Node: Once-Only Headers, Next: Computed Includes, Prev: Search Path, Up: Header Files
-
- 2.4 Once-Only Headers
- =====================
-
- If a header file happens to be included twice, the compiler will process
- its contents twice. This is very likely to cause an error, e.g. when
- the compiler sees the same structure definition twice. Even if it does
- not, it will certainly waste time.
-
- The standard way to prevent this is to enclose the entire real
- contents of the file in a conditional, like this:
-
- /* File foo. */
- #ifndef FILE_FOO_SEEN
- #define FILE_FOO_SEEN
-
- THE ENTIRE FILE
-
- #endif /* !FILE_FOO_SEEN */
-
- This construct is commonly known as a "wrapper #ifndef". When the
- header is included again, the conditional will be false, because
- `FILE_FOO_SEEN' is defined. The preprocessor will skip over the entire
- contents of the file, and the compiler will not see it twice.
-
- CPP optimizes even further. It remembers when a header file has a
- wrapper `#ifndef'. If a subsequent `#include' specifies that header,
- and the macro in the `#ifndef' is still defined, it does not bother to
- rescan the file at all.
-
- You can put comments outside the wrapper. They will not interfere
- with this optimization.
-
- The macro `FILE_FOO_SEEN' is called the "controlling macro" or
- "guard macro". In a user header file, the macro name should not begin
- with `_'. In a system header file, it should begin with `__' to avoid
- conflicts with user programs. In any kind of header file, the macro
- name should contain the name of the file and some additional text, to
- avoid conflicts with other header files.
-
- File: cpp, Node: Computed Includes, Next: Wrapper Headers, Prev: Once-Only Headers, Up: Header Files
-
- 2.5 Computed Includes
- =====================
-
- Sometimes it is necessary to select one of several different header
- files to be included into your program. They might specify
- configuration parameters to be used on different sorts of operating
- systems, for instance. You could do this with a series of conditionals,
-
- #if SYSTEM_1
- # include "system_1.h"
- #elif SYSTEM_2
- # include "system_2.h"
- #elif SYSTEM_3
- ...
- #endif
-
- That rapidly becomes tedious. Instead, the preprocessor offers the
- ability to use a macro for the header name. This is called a "computed
- include". Instead of writing a header name as the direct argument of
- `#include', you simply put a macro name there instead:
-
- #define SYSTEM_H "system_1.h"
- ...
- #include SYSTEM_H
-
- `SYSTEM_H' will be expanded, and the preprocessor will look for
- `system_1.h' as if the `#include' had been written that way originally.
- `SYSTEM_H' could be defined by your Makefile with a `-D' option.
-
- You must be careful when you define the macro. `#define' saves
- tokens, not text. The preprocessor has no way of knowing that the macro
- will be used as the argument of `#include', so it generates ordinary
- tokens, not a header name. This is unlikely to cause problems if you
- use double-quote includes, which are close enough to string constants.
- If you use angle brackets, however, you may have trouble.
-
- The syntax of a computed include is actually a bit more general than
- the above. If the first non-whitespace character after `#include' is
- not `"' or `<', then the entire line is macro-expanded like running
- text would be.
-
- If the line expands to a single string constant, the contents of that
- string constant are the file to be included. CPP does not re-examine
- the string for embedded quotes, but neither does it process backslash
- escapes in the string. Therefore
-
- #define HEADER "a\"b"
- #include HEADER
-
- looks for a file named `a\"b'. CPP searches for the file according to
- the rules for double-quoted includes.
-
- If the line expands to a token stream beginning with a `<' token and
- including a `>' token, then the tokens between the `<' and the first
- `>' are combined to form the filename to be included. Any whitespace
- between tokens is reduced to a single space; then any space after the
- initial `<' is retained, but a trailing space before the closing `>' is
- ignored. CPP searches for the file according to the rules for
- angle-bracket includes.
-
- In either case, if there are any tokens on the line after the file
- name, an error occurs and the directive is not processed. It is also
- an error if the result of expansion does not match either of the two
- expected forms.
-
- These rules are implementation-defined behavior according to the C
- standard. To minimize the risk of different compilers interpreting your
- computed includes differently, we recommend you use only a single
- object-like macro which expands to a string constant. This will also
- minimize confusion for people reading your program.
-
- File: cpp, Node: Wrapper Headers, Next: System Headers, Prev: Computed Includes, Up: Header Files
-
- 2.6 Wrapper Headers
- ===================
-
- Sometimes it is necessary to adjust the contents of a system-provided
- header file without editing it directly. GCC's `fixincludes' operation
- does this, for example. One way to do that would be to create a new
- header file with the same name and insert it in the search path before
- the original header. That works fine as long as you're willing to
- replace the old header entirely. But what if you want to refer to the
- old header from the new one?
-
- You cannot simply include the old header with `#include'. That will
- start from the beginning, and find your new header again. If your
- header is not protected from multiple inclusion (*note Once-Only
- Headers::), it will recurse infinitely and cause a fatal error.
-
- You could include the old header with an absolute pathname:
- #include "/usr/include/old-header.h"
- This works, but is not clean; should the system headers ever move,
- you would have to edit the new headers to match.
-
- There is no way to solve this problem within the C standard, but you
- can use the GNU extension `#include_next'. It means, "Include the
- _next_ file with this name." This directive works like `#include'
- except in searching for the specified file: it starts searching the
- list of header file directories _after_ the directory in which the
- current file was found.
-
- Suppose you specify `-I /usr/local/include', and the list of
- directories to search also includes `/usr/include'; and suppose both
- directories contain `signal.h'. Ordinary `#include <signal.h>' finds
- the file under `/usr/local/include'. If that file contains
- `#include_next <signal.h>', it starts searching after that directory,
- and finds the file in `/usr/include'.
-
- `#include_next' does not distinguish between `<FILE>' and `"FILE"'
- inclusion, nor does it check that the file you specify has the same
- name as the current file. It simply looks for the file named, starting
- with the directory in the search path after the one where the current
- file was found.
-
- The use of `#include_next' can lead to great confusion. We
- recommend it be used only when there is no other alternative. In
- particular, it should not be used in the headers belonging to a specific
- program; it should be used only to make global corrections along the
- lines of `fixincludes'.
-
- File: cpp, Node: System Headers, Prev: Wrapper Headers, Up: Header Files
-
- 2.7 System Headers
- ==================
-
- The header files declaring interfaces to the operating system and
- runtime libraries often cannot be written in strictly conforming C.
- Therefore, GCC gives code found in "system headers" special treatment.
- All warnings, other than those generated by `#warning' (*note
- Diagnostics::), are suppressed while GCC is processing a system header.
- Macros defined in a system header are immune to a few warnings
- wherever they are expanded. This immunity is granted on an ad-hoc
- basis, when we find that a warning generates lots of false positives
- because of code in macros defined in system headers.
-
- Normally, only the headers found in specific directories are
- considered system headers. These directories are determined when GCC
- is compiled. There are, however, two ways to make normal headers into
- system headers.
-
- The `-isystem' command line option adds its argument to the list of
- directories to search for headers, just like `-I'. Any headers found
- in that directory will be considered system headers.
-
- All directories named by `-isystem' are searched _after_ all
- directories named by `-I', no matter what their order was on the
- command line. If the same directory is named by both `-I' and
- `-isystem', the `-I' option is ignored. GCC provides an informative
- message when this occurs if `-v' is used.
-
- There is also a directive, `#pragma GCC system_header', which tells
- GCC to consider the rest of the current include file a system header,
- no matter where it was found. Code that comes before the `#pragma' in
- the file will not be affected. `#pragma GCC system_header' has no
- effect in the primary source file.
-
- On very old systems, some of the pre-defined system header
- directories get even more special treatment. GNU C++ considers code in
- headers found in those directories to be surrounded by an `extern "C"'
- block. There is no way to request this behavior with a `#pragma', or
- from the command line.
-
- File: cpp, Node: Macros, Next: Conditionals, Prev: Header Files, Up: Top
-
- 3 Macros
- ********
-
- A "macro" is a fragment of code which has been given a name. Whenever
- the name is used, it is replaced by the contents of the macro. There
- are two kinds of macros. They differ mostly in what they look like
- when they are used. "Object-like" macros resemble data objects when
- used, "function-like" macros resemble function calls.
-
- You may define any valid identifier as a macro, even if it is a C
- keyword. The preprocessor does not know anything about keywords. This
- can be useful if you wish to hide a keyword such as `const' from an
- older compiler that does not understand it. However, the preprocessor
- operator `defined' (*note Defined::) can never be defined as a macro,
- and C++'s named operators (*note C++ Named Operators::) cannot be
- macros when you are compiling C++.
-
- * Menu:
-
- * Object-like Macros::
- * Function-like Macros::
- * Macro Arguments::
- * Stringification::
- * Concatenation::
- * Variadic Macros::
- * Predefined Macros::
- * Undefining and Redefining Macros::
- * Directives Within Macro Arguments::
- * Macro Pitfalls::
-
- File: cpp, Node: Object-like Macros, Next: Function-like Macros, Up: Macros
-
- 3.1 Object-like Macros
- ======================
-
- An "object-like macro" is a simple identifier which will be replaced by
- a code fragment. It is called object-like because it looks like a data
- object in code that uses it. They are most commonly used to give
- symbolic names to numeric constants.
-
- You create macros with the `#define' directive. `#define' is
- followed by the name of the macro and then the token sequence it should
- be an abbreviation for, which is variously referred to as the macro's
- "body", "expansion" or "replacement list". For example,
-
- #define BUFFER_SIZE 1024
-
- defines a macro named `BUFFER_SIZE' as an abbreviation for the token
- `1024'. If somewhere after this `#define' directive there comes a C
- statement of the form
-
- foo = (char *) malloc (BUFFER_SIZE);
-
- then the C preprocessor will recognize and "expand" the macro
- `BUFFER_SIZE'. The C compiler will see the same tokens as it would if
- you had written
-
- foo = (char *) malloc (1024);
-
- By convention, macro names are written in uppercase. Programs are
- easier to read when it is possible to tell at a glance which names are
- macros.
-
- The macro's body ends at the end of the `#define' line. You may
- continue the definition onto multiple lines, if necessary, using
- backslash-newline. When the macro is expanded, however, it will all
- come out on one line. For example,
-
- #define NUMBERS 1, \
- 2, \
- 3
- int x[] = { NUMBERS };
- ==> int x[] = { 1, 2, 3 };
-
- The most common visible consequence of this is surprising line numbers
- in error messages.
-
- There is no restriction on what can go in a macro body provided it
- decomposes into valid preprocessing tokens. Parentheses need not
- balance, and the body need not resemble valid C code. (If it does not,
- you may get error messages from the C compiler when you use the macro.)
-
- The C preprocessor scans your program sequentially. Macro
- definitions take effect at the place you write them. Therefore, the
- following input to the C preprocessor
-
- foo = X;
- #define X 4
- bar = X;
-
- produces
-
- foo = X;
- bar = 4;
-
- When the preprocessor expands a macro name, the macro's expansion
- replaces the macro invocation, then the expansion is examined for more
- macros to expand. For example,
-
- #define TABLESIZE BUFSIZE
- #define BUFSIZE 1024
- TABLESIZE
- ==> BUFSIZE
- ==> 1024
-
- `TABLESIZE' is expanded first to produce `BUFSIZE', then that macro is
- expanded to produce the final result, `1024'.
-
- Notice that `BUFSIZE' was not defined when `TABLESIZE' was defined.
- The `#define' for `TABLESIZE' uses exactly the expansion you
- specify--in this case, `BUFSIZE'--and does not check to see whether it
- too contains macro names. Only when you _use_ `TABLESIZE' is the
- result of its expansion scanned for more macro names.
-
- This makes a difference if you change the definition of `BUFSIZE' at
- some point in the source file. `TABLESIZE', defined as shown, will
- always expand using the definition of `BUFSIZE' that is currently in
- effect:
-
- #define BUFSIZE 1020
- #define TABLESIZE BUFSIZE
- #undef BUFSIZE
- #define BUFSIZE 37
-
- Now `TABLESIZE' expands (in two stages) to `37'.
-
- If the expansion of a macro contains its own name, either directly or
- via intermediate macros, it is not expanded again when the expansion is
- examined for more macros. This prevents infinite recursion. *Note
- Self-Referential Macros::, for the precise details.
-
- File: cpp, Node: Function-like Macros, Next: Macro Arguments, Prev: Object-like Macros, Up: Macros
-
- 3.2 Function-like Macros
- ========================
-
- You can also define macros whose use looks like a function call. These
- are called "function-like macros". To define a function-like macro,
- you use the same `#define' directive, but you put a pair of parentheses
- immediately after the macro name. For example,
-
- #define lang_init() c_init()
- lang_init()
- ==> c_init()
-
- A function-like macro is only expanded if its name appears with a
- pair of parentheses after it. If you write just the name, it is left
- alone. This can be useful when you have a function and a macro of the
- same name, and you wish to use the function sometimes.
-
- extern void foo(void);
- #define foo() /* optimized inline version */
- ...
- foo();
- funcptr = foo;
-
- Here the call to `foo()' will use the macro, but the function
- pointer will get the address of the real function. If the macro were to
- be expanded, it would cause a syntax error.
-
- If you put spaces between the macro name and the parentheses in the
- macro definition, that does not define a function-like macro, it defines
- an object-like macro whose expansion happens to begin with a pair of
- parentheses.
-
- #define lang_init () c_init()
- lang_init()
- ==> () c_init()()
-
- The first two pairs of parentheses in this expansion come from the
- macro. The third is the pair that was originally after the macro
- invocation. Since `lang_init' is an object-like macro, it does not
- consume those parentheses.
-
- File: cpp, Node: Macro Arguments, Next: Stringification, Prev: Function-like Macros, Up: Macros
-
- 3.3 Macro Arguments
- ===================
-
- Function-like macros can take "arguments", just like true functions.
- To define a macro that uses arguments, you insert "parameters" between
- the pair of parentheses in the macro definition that make the macro
- function-like. The parameters must be valid C identifiers, separated
- by commas and optionally whitespace.
-
- To invoke a macro that takes arguments, you write the name of the
- macro followed by a list of "actual arguments" in parentheses, separated
- by commas. The invocation of the macro need not be restricted to a
- single logical line--it can cross as many lines in the source file as
- you wish. The number of arguments you give must match the number of
- parameters in the macro definition. When the macro is expanded, each
- use of a parameter in its body is replaced by the tokens of the
- corresponding argument. (You need not use all of the parameters in the
- macro body.)
-
- As an example, here is a macro that computes the minimum of two
- numeric values, as it is defined in many C programs, and some uses.
-
- #define min(X, Y) ((X) < (Y) ? (X) : (Y))
- x = min(a, b); ==> x = ((a) < (b) ? (a) : (b));
- y = min(1, 2); ==> y = ((1) < (2) ? (1) : (2));
- z = min(a + 28, *p); ==> z = ((a + 28) < (*p) ? (a + 28) : (*p));
-
- (In this small example you can already see several of the dangers of
- macro arguments. *Note Macro Pitfalls::, for detailed explanations.)
-
- Leading and trailing whitespace in each argument is dropped, and all
- whitespace between the tokens of an argument is reduced to a single
- space. Parentheses within each argument must balance; a comma within
- such parentheses does not end the argument. However, there is no
- requirement for square brackets or braces to balance, and they do not
- prevent a comma from separating arguments. Thus,
-
- macro (array[x = y, x + 1])
-
- passes two arguments to `macro': `array[x = y' and `x + 1]'. If you
- want to supply `array[x = y, x + 1]' as an argument, you can write it
- as `array[(x = y, x + 1)]', which is equivalent C code.
-
- All arguments to a macro are completely macro-expanded before they
- are substituted into the macro body. After substitution, the complete
- text is scanned again for macros to expand, including the arguments.
- This rule may seem strange, but it is carefully designed so you need
- not worry about whether any function call is actually a macro
- invocation. You can run into trouble if you try to be too clever,
- though. *Note Argument Prescan::, for detailed discussion.
-
- For example, `min (min (a, b), c)' is first expanded to
-
- min (((a) < (b) ? (a) : (b)), (c))
-
- and then to
-
- ((((a) < (b) ? (a) : (b))) < (c)
- ? (((a) < (b) ? (a) : (b)))
- : (c))
-
- (Line breaks shown here for clarity would not actually be generated.)
-
- You can leave macro arguments empty; this is not an error to the
- preprocessor (but many macros will then expand to invalid code). You
- cannot leave out arguments entirely; if a macro takes two arguments,
- there must be exactly one comma at the top level of its argument list.
- Here are some silly examples using `min':
-
- min(, b) ==> (( ) < (b) ? ( ) : (b))
- min(a, ) ==> ((a ) < ( ) ? (a ) : ( ))
- min(,) ==> (( ) < ( ) ? ( ) : ( ))
- min((,),) ==> (((,)) < ( ) ? ((,)) : ( ))
-
- min() error--> macro "min" requires 2 arguments, but only 1 given
- min(,,) error--> macro "min" passed 3 arguments, but takes just 2
-
- Whitespace is not a preprocessing token, so if a macro `foo' takes
- one argument, `foo ()' and `foo ( )' both supply it an empty argument.
- Previous GNU preprocessor implementations and documentation were
- incorrect on this point, insisting that a function-like macro that
- takes a single argument be passed a space if an empty argument was
- required.
-
- Macro parameters appearing inside string literals are not replaced by
- their corresponding actual arguments.
-
- #define foo(x) x, "x"
- foo(bar) ==> bar, "x"
-
- File: cpp, Node: Stringification, Next: Concatenation, Prev: Macro Arguments, Up: Macros
-
- 3.4 Stringification
- ===================
-
- Sometimes you may want to convert a macro argument into a string
- constant. Parameters are not replaced inside string constants, but you
- can use the `#' preprocessing operator instead. When a macro parameter
- is used with a leading `#', the preprocessor replaces it with the
- literal text of the actual argument, converted to a string constant.
- Unlike normal parameter replacement, the argument is not macro-expanded
- first. This is called "stringification".
-
- There is no way to combine an argument with surrounding text and
- stringify it all together. Instead, you can write a series of adjacent
- string constants and stringified arguments. The preprocessor will
- replace the stringified arguments with string constants. The C
- compiler will then combine all the adjacent string constants into one
- long string.
-
- Here is an example of a macro definition that uses stringification:
-
- #define WARN_IF(EXP) \
- do { if (EXP) \
- fprintf (stderr, "Warning: " #EXP "\n"); } \
- while (0)
- WARN_IF (x == 0);
- ==> do { if (x == 0)
- fprintf (stderr, "Warning: " "x == 0" "\n"); } while (0);
-
- The argument for `EXP' is substituted once, as-is, into the `if'
- statement, and once, stringified, into the argument to `fprintf'. If
- `x' were a macro, it would be expanded in the `if' statement, but not
- in the string.
-
- The `do' and `while (0)' are a kludge to make it possible to write
- `WARN_IF (ARG);', which the resemblance of `WARN_IF' to a function
- would make C programmers want to do; see *Note Swallowing the
- Semicolon::.
-
- Stringification in C involves more than putting double-quote
- characters around the fragment. The preprocessor backslash-escapes the
- quotes surrounding embedded string constants, and all backslashes
- within string and character constants, in order to get a valid C string
- constant with the proper contents. Thus, stringifying `p = "foo\n";'
- results in "p = \"foo\\n\";". However, backslashes that are not inside
- string or character constants are not duplicated: `\n' by itself
- stringifies to "\n".
-
- All leading and trailing whitespace in text being stringified is
- ignored. Any sequence of whitespace in the middle of the text is
- converted to a single space in the stringified result. Comments are
- replaced by whitespace long before stringification happens, so they
- never appear in stringified text.
-
- There is no way to convert a macro argument into a character
- constant.
-
- If you want to stringify the result of expansion of a macro argument,
- you have to use two levels of macros.
-
- #define xstr(s) str(s)
- #define str(s) #s
- #define foo 4
- str (foo)
- ==> "foo"
- xstr (foo)
- ==> xstr (4)
- ==> str (4)
- ==> "4"
-
- `s' is stringified when it is used in `str', so it is not
- macro-expanded first. But `s' is an ordinary argument to `xstr', so it
- is completely macro-expanded before `xstr' itself is expanded (*note
- Argument Prescan::). Therefore, by the time `str' gets to its
- argument, it has already been macro-expanded.
-
- File: cpp, Node: Concatenation, Next: Variadic Macros, Prev: Stringification, Up: Macros
-
- 3.5 Concatenation
- =================
-
- It is often useful to merge two tokens into one while expanding macros.
- This is called "token pasting" or "token concatenation". The `##'
- preprocessing operator performs token pasting. When a macro is
- expanded, the two tokens on either side of each `##' operator are
- combined into a single token, which then replaces the `##' and the two
- original tokens in the macro expansion. Usually both will be
- identifiers, or one will be an identifier and the other a preprocessing
- number. When pasted, they make a longer identifier. This isn't the
- only valid case. It is also possible to concatenate two numbers (or a
- number and a name, such as `1.5' and `e3') into a number. Also,
- multi-character operators such as `+=' can be formed by token pasting.
-
- However, two tokens that don't together form a valid token cannot be
- pasted together. For example, you cannot concatenate `x' with `+' in
- either order. If you try, the preprocessor issues a warning and emits
- the two tokens. Whether it puts white space between the tokens is
- undefined. It is common to find unnecessary uses of `##' in complex
- macros. If you get this warning, it is likely that you can simply
- remove the `##'.
-
- Both the tokens combined by `##' could come from the macro body, but
- you could just as well write them as one token in the first place.
- Token pasting is most useful when one or both of the tokens comes from a
- macro argument. If either of the tokens next to an `##' is a parameter
- name, it is replaced by its actual argument before `##' executes. As
- with stringification, the actual argument is not macro-expanded first.
- If the argument is empty, that `##' has no effect.
-
- Keep in mind that the C preprocessor converts comments to whitespace
- before macros are even considered. Therefore, you cannot create a
- comment by concatenating `/' and `*'. You can put as much whitespace
- between `##' and its operands as you like, including comments, and you
- can put comments in arguments that will be concatenated. However, it
- is an error if `##' appears at either end of a macro body.
-
- Consider a C program that interprets named commands. There probably
- needs to be a table of commands, perhaps an array of structures declared
- as follows:
-
- struct command
- {
- char *name;
- void (*function) (void);
- };
-
- struct command commands[] =
- {
- { "quit", quit_command },
- { "help", help_command },
- ...
- };
-
- It would be cleaner not to have to give each command name twice,
- once in the string constant and once in the function name. A macro
- which takes the name of a command as an argument can make this
- unnecessary. The string constant can be created with stringification,
- and the function name by concatenating the argument with `_command'.
- Here is how it is done:
-
- #define COMMAND(NAME) { #NAME, NAME ## _command }
-
- struct command commands[] =
- {
- COMMAND (quit),
- COMMAND (help),
- ...
- };
-
- File: cpp, Node: Variadic Macros, Next: Predefined Macros, Prev: Concatenation, Up: Macros
-
- 3.6 Variadic Macros
- ===================
-
- A macro can be declared to accept a variable number of arguments much as
- a function can. The syntax for defining the macro is similar to that of
- a function. Here is an example:
-
- #define eprintf(...) fprintf (stderr, __VA_ARGS__)
-
- This kind of macro is called "variadic". When the macro is invoked,
- all the tokens in its argument list after the last named argument (this
- macro has none), including any commas, become the "variable argument".
- This sequence of tokens replaces the identifier `__VA_ARGS__' in the
- macro body wherever it appears. Thus, we have this expansion:
-
- eprintf ("%s:%d: ", input_file, lineno)
- ==> fprintf (stderr, "%s:%d: ", input_file, lineno)
-
- The variable argument is completely macro-expanded before it is
- inserted into the macro expansion, just like an ordinary argument. You
- may use the `#' and `##' operators to stringify the variable argument
- or to paste its leading or trailing token with another token. (But see
- below for an important special case for `##'.)
-
- If your macro is complicated, you may want a more descriptive name
- for the variable argument than `__VA_ARGS__'. CPP permits this, as an
- extension. You may write an argument name immediately before the
- `...'; that name is used for the variable argument. The `eprintf'
- macro above could be written
-
- #define eprintf(args...) fprintf (stderr, args)
-
- using this extension. You cannot use `__VA_ARGS__' and this extension
- in the same macro.
-
- You can have named arguments as well as variable arguments in a
- variadic macro. We could define `eprintf' like this, instead:
-
- #define eprintf(format, ...) fprintf (stderr, format, __VA_ARGS__)
-
- This formulation looks more descriptive, but unfortunately it is less
- flexible: you must now supply at least one argument after the format
- string. In standard C, you cannot omit the comma separating the named
- argument from the variable arguments. Furthermore, if you leave the
- variable argument empty, you will get a syntax error, because there
- will be an extra comma after the format string.
-
- eprintf("success!\n", );
- ==> fprintf(stderr, "success!\n", );
-
- GNU CPP has a pair of extensions which deal with this problem.
- First, you are allowed to leave the variable argument out entirely:
-
- eprintf ("success!\n")
- ==> fprintf(stderr, "success!\n", );
-
- Second, the `##' token paste operator has a special meaning when placed
- between a comma and a variable argument. If you write
-
- #define eprintf(format, ...) fprintf (stderr, format, ##__VA_ARGS__)
-
- and the variable argument is left out when the `eprintf' macro is used,
- then the comma before the `##' will be deleted. This does _not_ happen
- if you pass an empty argument, nor does it happen if the token
- preceding `##' is anything other than a comma.
-
- eprintf ("success!\n")
- ==> fprintf(stderr, "success!\n");
-
- The above explanation is ambiguous about the case where the only macro
- parameter is a variable arguments parameter, as it is meaningless to
- try to distinguish whether no argument at all is an empty argument or a
- missing argument. In this case the C99 standard is clear that the
- comma must remain, however the existing GCC extension used to swallow
- the comma. So CPP retains the comma when conforming to a specific C
- standard, and drops it otherwise.
-
- C99 mandates that the only place the identifier `__VA_ARGS__' can
- appear is in the replacement list of a variadic macro. It may not be
- used as a macro name, macro argument name, or within a different type
- of macro. It may also be forbidden in open text; the standard is
- ambiguous. We recommend you avoid using it except for its defined
- purpose.
-
- Variadic macros are a new feature in C99. GNU CPP has supported them
- for a long time, but only with a named variable argument (`args...',
- not `...' and `__VA_ARGS__'). If you are concerned with portability to
- previous versions of GCC, you should use only named variable arguments.
- On the other hand, if you are concerned with portability to other
- conforming implementations of C99, you should use only `__VA_ARGS__'.
-
- Previous versions of CPP implemented the comma-deletion extension
- much more generally. We have restricted it in this release to minimize
- the differences from C99. To get the same effect with both this and
- previous versions of GCC, the token preceding the special `##' must be
- a comma, and there must be white space between that comma and whatever
- comes immediately before it:
-
- #define eprintf(format, args...) fprintf (stderr, format , ##args)
-
- *Note Differences from previous versions::, for the gory details.
-
- File: cpp, Node: Predefined Macros, Next: Undefining and Redefining Macros, Prev: Variadic Macros, Up: Macros
-
- 3.7 Predefined Macros
- =====================
-
- Several object-like macros are predefined; you use them without
- supplying their definitions. They fall into three classes: standard,
- common, and system-specific.
-
- In C++, there is a fourth category, the named operators. They act
- like predefined macros, but you cannot undefine them.
-
- * Menu:
-
- * Standard Predefined Macros::
- * Common Predefined Macros::
- * System-specific Predefined Macros::
- * C++ Named Operators::
-
- File: cpp, Node: Standard Predefined Macros, Next: Common Predefined Macros, Up: Predefined Macros
-
- 3.7.1 Standard Predefined Macros
- --------------------------------
-
- The standard predefined macros are specified by the relevant language
- standards, so they are available with all compilers that implement
- those standards. Older compilers may not provide all of them. Their
- names all start with double underscores.
-
- `__FILE__'
- This macro expands to the name of the current input file, in the
- form of a C string constant. This is the path by which the
- preprocessor opened the file, not the short name specified in
- `#include' or as the input file name argument. For example,
- `"/usr/local/include/myheader.h"' is a possible expansion of this
- macro.
-
- `__LINE__'
- This macro expands to the current input line number, in the form
- of a decimal integer constant. While we call it a predefined
- macro, it's a pretty strange macro, since its "definition" changes
- with each new line of source code.
-
- `__FILE__' and `__LINE__' are useful in generating an error message
- to report an inconsistency detected by the program; the message can
- state the source line at which the inconsistency was detected. For
- example,
-
- fprintf (stderr, "Internal error: "
- "negative string length "
- "%d at %s, line %d.",
- length, __FILE__, __LINE__);
-
- An `#include' directive changes the expansions of `__FILE__' and
- `__LINE__' to correspond to the included file. At the end of that
- file, when processing resumes on the input file that contained the
- `#include' directive, the expansions of `__FILE__' and `__LINE__'
- revert to the values they had before the `#include' (but `__LINE__' is
- then incremented by one as processing moves to the line after the
- `#include').
-
- A `#line' directive changes `__LINE__', and may change `__FILE__' as
- well. *Note Line Control::.
-
- C99 introduces `__func__', and GCC has provided `__FUNCTION__' for a
- long time. Both of these are strings containing the name of the
- current function (there are slight semantic differences; see the GCC
- manual). Neither of them is a macro; the preprocessor does not know the
- name of the current function. They tend to be useful in conjunction
- with `__FILE__' and `__LINE__', though.
-
- `__DATE__'
- This macro expands to a string constant that describes the date on
- which the preprocessor is being run. The string constant contains
- eleven characters and looks like `"Feb 12 1996"'. If the day of
- the month is less than 10, it is padded with a space on the left.
-
- If GCC cannot determine the current date, it will emit a warning
- message (once per compilation) and `__DATE__' will expand to
- `"??? ?? ????"'.
-
- `__TIME__'
- This macro expands to a string constant that describes the time at
- which the preprocessor is being run. The string constant contains
- eight characters and looks like `"23:59:01"'.
-
- If GCC cannot determine the current time, it will emit a warning
- message (once per compilation) and `__TIME__' will expand to
- `"??:??:??"'.
-
- `__STDC__'
- In normal operation, this macro expands to the constant 1, to
- signify that this compiler conforms to ISO Standard C. If GNU CPP
- is used with a compiler other than GCC, this is not necessarily
- true; however, the preprocessor always conforms to the standard
- unless the `-traditional-cpp' option is used.
-
- This macro is not defined if the `-traditional-cpp' option is used.
-
- On some hosts, the system compiler uses a different convention,
- where `__STDC__' is normally 0, but is 1 if the user specifies
- strict conformance to the C Standard. CPP follows the host
- convention when processing system header files, but when
- processing user files `__STDC__' is always 1. This has been
- reported to cause problems; for instance, some versions of Solaris
- provide X Windows headers that expect `__STDC__' to be either
- undefined or 1. *Note Invocation::.
-
- `__STDC_VERSION__'
- This macro expands to the C Standard's version number, a long
- integer constant of the form `YYYYMML' where YYYY and MM are the
- year and month of the Standard version. This signifies which
- version of the C Standard the compiler conforms to. Like
- `__STDC__', this is not necessarily accurate for the entire
- implementation, unless GNU CPP is being used with GCC.
-
- The value `199409L' signifies the 1989 C standard as amended in
- 1994, which is the current default; the value `199901L' signifies
- the 1999 revision of the C standard. Support for the 1999
- revision is not yet complete.
-
- This macro is not defined if the `-traditional-cpp' option is
- used, nor when compiling C++ or Objective-C.
-
- `__STDC_HOSTED__'
- This macro is defined, with value 1, if the compiler's target is a
- "hosted environment". A hosted environment has the complete
- facilities of the standard C library available.
-
- `__cplusplus'
- This macro is defined when the C++ compiler is in use. You can use
- `__cplusplus' to test whether a header is compiled by a C compiler
- or a C++ compiler. This macro is similar to `__STDC_VERSION__', in
- that it expands to a version number. A fully conforming
- implementation of the 1998 C++ standard will define this macro to
- `199711L'. The GNU C++ compiler is not yet fully conforming, so
- it uses `1' instead. We hope to complete our implementation in
- the near future.
-
- `__OBJC__'
- This macro is defined, with value 1, when the Objective-C compiler
- is in use. You can use `__OBJC__' to test whether a header is
- compiled by a C compiler or a Objective-C compiler.
-
- `__ASSEMBLER__'
- This macro is defined with value 1 when preprocessing assembly
- language.
-
-
- File: cpp, Node: Common Predefined Macros, Next: System-specific Predefined Macros, Prev: Standard Predefined Macros, Up: Predefined Macros
-
- 3.7.2 Common Predefined Macros
- ------------------------------
-
- The common predefined macros are GNU C extensions. They are available
- with the same meanings regardless of the machine or operating system on
- which you are using GNU C. Their names all start with double
- underscores.
-
- `__GNUC__'
- `__GNUC_MINOR__'
- `__GNUC_PATCHLEVEL__'
- These macros are defined by all GNU compilers that use the C
- preprocessor: C, C++, and Objective-C. Their values are the major
- version, minor version, and patch level of the compiler, as integer
- constants. For example, GCC 3.2.1 will define `__GNUC__' to 3,
- `__GNUC_MINOR__' to 2, and `__GNUC_PATCHLEVEL__' to 1. They are
- defined only when the entire compiler is in use; if you invoke the
- preprocessor directly, they are not defined.
-
- `__GNUC_PATCHLEVEL__' is new to GCC 3.0; it is also present in the
- widely-used development snapshots leading up to 3.0 (which identify
- themselves as GCC 2.96 or 2.97, depending on which snapshot you
- have).
-
- If all you need to know is whether or not your program is being
- compiled by GCC, you can simply test `__GNUC__'. If you need to
- write code which depends on a specific version, you must be more
- careful. Each time the minor version is increased, the patch
- level is reset to zero; each time the major version is increased
- (which happens rarely), the minor version and patch level are
- reset. If you wish to use the predefined macros directly in the
- conditional, you will need to write it like this:
-
- /* Test for GCC > 3.2.0 */
- #if __GNUC__ > 3 || \
- (__GNUC__ == 3 && (__GNUC_MINOR__ > 2 || \
- (__GNUC_MINOR__ == 2 && \
- __GNUC_PATCHLEVEL__ > 0))
-
- Another approach is to use the predefined macros to calculate a
- single number, then compare that against a threshold:
-
- #define GCC_VERSION (__GNUC__ * 10000 \
- + __GNUC_MINOR__ * 100 \
- + __GNUC_PATCHLEVEL__)
- ...
- /* Test for GCC > 3.2.0 */
- #if GCC_VERSION > 30200
-
- Many people find this form easier to understand.
-
- `__GNUG__'
- The GNU C++ compiler defines this. Testing it is equivalent to
- testing `(__GNUC__ && __cplusplus)'.
-
- `__STRICT_ANSI__'
- GCC defines this macro if and only if the `-ansi' switch, or a
- `-std' switch specifying strict conformance to some version of ISO
- C, was specified when GCC was invoked. It is defined to `1'.
- This macro exists primarily to direct GNU libc's header files to
- restrict their definitions to the minimal set found in the 1989 C
- standard.
-
- `__BASE_FILE__'
- This macro expands to the name of the main input file, in the form
- of a C string constant. This is the source file that was specified
- on the command line of the preprocessor or C compiler.
-
- `__INCLUDE_LEVEL__'
- This macro expands to a decimal integer constant that represents
- the depth of nesting in include files. The value of this macro is
- incremented on every `#include' directive and decremented at the
- end of every included file. It starts out at 0, it's value within
- the base file specified on the command line.
-
- `__ELF__'
- This macro is defined if the target uses the ELF object format.
-
- `__VERSION__'
- This macro expands to a string constant which describes the
- version of the compiler in use. You should not rely on its
- contents having any particular form, but it can be counted on to
- contain at least the release number.
-
- `__OPTIMIZE__'
- `__OPTIMIZE_SIZE__'
- `__NO_INLINE__'
- These macros describe the compilation mode. `__OPTIMIZE__' is
- defined in all optimizing compilations. `__OPTIMIZE_SIZE__' is
- defined if the compiler is optimizing for size, not speed.
- `__NO_INLINE__' is defined if no functions will be inlined into
- their callers (when not optimizing, or when inlining has been
- specifically disabled by `-fno-inline').
-
- These macros cause certain GNU header files to provide optimized
- definitions, using macros or inline functions, of system library
- functions. You should not use these macros in any way unless you
- make sure that programs will execute with the same effect whether
- or not they are defined. If they are defined, their value is 1.
-
- `__CHAR_UNSIGNED__'
- GCC defines this macro if and only if the data type `char' is
- unsigned on the target machine. It exists to cause the standard
- header file `limits.h' to work correctly. You should not use this
- macro yourself; instead, refer to the standard macros defined in
- `limits.h'.
-
- `__WCHAR_UNSIGNED__'
- Like `__CHAR_UNSIGNED__', this macro is defined if and only if the
- data type `wchar_t' is unsigned and the front-end is in C++ mode.
-
- `__REGISTER_PREFIX__'
- This macro expands to a single token (not a string constant) which
- is the prefix applied to CPU register names in assembly language
- for this target. You can use it to write assembly that is usable
- in multiple environments. For example, in the `m68k-aout'
- environment it expands to nothing, but in the `m68k-coff'
- environment it expands to a single `%'.
-
- `__USER_LABEL_PREFIX__'
- This macro expands to a single token which is the prefix applied to
- user labels (symbols visible to C code) in assembly. For example,
- in the `m68k-aout' environment it expands to an `_', but in the
- `m68k-coff' environment it expands to nothing.
-
- This macro will have the correct definition even if
- `-f(no-)underscores' is in use, but it will not be correct if
- target-specific options that adjust this prefix are used (e.g. the
- OSF/rose `-mno-underscores' option).
-
- `__SIZE_TYPE__'
- `__PTRDIFF_TYPE__'
- `__WCHAR_TYPE__'
- `__WINT_TYPE__'
- These macros are defined to the correct underlying types for the
- `size_t', `ptrdiff_t', `wchar_t', and `wint_t' typedefs,
- respectively. They exist to make the standard header files
- `stddef.h' and `wchar.h' work correctly. You should not use these
- macros directly; instead, include the appropriate headers and use
- the typedefs.
-
- `__CHAR_BIT__'
- Defined to the number of bits used in the representation of the
- `char' data type. It exists to make the standard header given
- numerical limits work correctly. You should not use this macro
- directly; instead, include the appropriate headers.
-
- `__SCHAR_MAX__'
- `__WCHAR_MAX__'
- `__SHRT_MAX__'
- `__INT_MAX__'
- `__LONG_MAX__'
- `__LONG_LONG_MAX__'
- Defined to the maximum value of the `signed char', `wchar_t',
- `signed short', `signed int', `signed long', and `signed long
- long' types respectively. They exist to make the standard header
- given numerical limits work correctly. You should not use these
- macros directly; instead, include the appropriate headers.
-
- `__USING_SJLJ_EXCEPTIONS__'
- This macro is defined, with value 1, if the compiler uses the old
- mechanism based on `setjmp' and `longjmp' for exception handling.
-
- `__NEXT_RUNTIME__'
- This macro is defined, with value 1, if (and only if) the NeXT
- runtime (as in `-fnext-runtime') is in use for Objective-C. If
- the GNU runtime is used, this macro is not defined, so that you
- can use this macro to determine which runtime (NeXT or GNU) is
- being used.
-
- `__LP64__'
- `_LP64'
- These macros are defined, with value 1, if (and only if) the
- compilation is for a target where `long int' and pointer both use
- 64-bits and `int' uses 32-bit.
-
- File: cpp, Node: System-specific Predefined Macros, Next: C++ Named Operators, Prev: Common Predefined Macros, Up: Predefined Macros
-
- 3.7.3 System-specific Predefined Macros
- ---------------------------------------
-
- The C preprocessor normally predefines several macros that indicate what
- type of system and machine is in use. They are obviously different on
- each target supported by GCC. This manual, being for all systems and
- machines, cannot tell you what their names are, but you can use `cpp
- -dM' to see them all. *Note Invocation::. All system-specific
- predefined macros expand to the constant 1, so you can test them with
- either `#ifdef' or `#if'.
-
- The C standard requires that all system-specific macros be part of
- the "reserved namespace". All names which begin with two underscores,
- or an underscore and a capital letter, are reserved for the compiler and
- library to use as they wish. However, historically system-specific
- macros have had names with no special prefix; for instance, it is common
- to find `unix' defined on Unix systems. For all such macros, GCC
- provides a parallel macro with two underscores added at the beginning
- and the end. If `unix' is defined, `__unix__' will be defined too.
- There will never be more than two underscores; the parallel of `_mips'
- is `__mips__'.
-
- When the `-ansi' option, or any `-std' option that requests strict
- conformance, is given to the compiler, all the system-specific
- predefined macros outside the reserved namespace are suppressed. The
- parallel macros, inside the reserved namespace, remain defined.
-
- We are slowly phasing out all predefined macros which are outside the
- reserved namespace. You should never use them in new programs, and we
- encourage you to correct older code to use the parallel macros whenever
- you find it. We don't recommend you use the system-specific macros that
- are in the reserved namespace, either. It is better in the long run to
- check specifically for features you need, using a tool such as
- `autoconf'.
-
- File: cpp, Node: C++ Named Operators, Prev: System-specific Predefined Macros, Up: Predefined Macros
-
- 3.7.4 C++ Named Operators
- -------------------------
-
- In C++, there are eleven keywords which are simply alternate spellings
- of operators normally written with punctuation. These keywords are
- treated as such even in the preprocessor. They function as operators in
- `#if', and they cannot be defined as macros or poisoned. In C, you can
- request that those keywords take their C++ meaning by including
- `iso646.h'. That header defines each one as a normal object-like macro
- expanding to the appropriate punctuator.
-
- These are the named operators and their corresponding punctuators:
-
- Named Operator Punctuator
- `and' `&&'
- `and_eq' `&='
- `bitand' `&'
- `bitor' `|'
- `compl' `~'
- `not' `!'
- `not_eq' `!='
- `or' `||'
- `or_eq' `|='
- `xor' `^'
- `xor_eq' `^='
-
- File: cpp, Node: Undefining and Redefining Macros, Next: Directives Within Macro Arguments, Prev: Predefined Macros, Up: Macros
-
- 3.8 Undefining and Redefining Macros
- ====================================
-
- If a macro ceases to be useful, it may be "undefined" with the `#undef'
- directive. `#undef' takes a single argument, the name of the macro to
- undefine. You use the bare macro name, even if the macro is
- function-like. It is an error if anything appears on the line after
- the macro name. `#undef' has no effect if the name is not a macro.
-
- #define FOO 4
- x = FOO; ==> x = 4;
- #undef FOO
- x = FOO; ==> x = FOO;
-
- Once a macro has been undefined, that identifier may be "redefined"
- as a macro by a subsequent `#define' directive. The new definition
- need not have any resemblance to the old definition.
-
- However, if an identifier which is currently a macro is redefined,
- then the new definition must be "effectively the same" as the old one.
- Two macro definitions are effectively the same if:
- * Both are the same type of macro (object- or function-like).
-
- * All the tokens of the replacement list are the same.
-
- * If there are any parameters, they are the same.
-
- * Whitespace appears in the same places in both. It need not be
- exactly the same amount of whitespace, though. Remember that
- comments count as whitespace.
-
- These definitions are effectively the same:
- #define FOUR (2 + 2)
- #define FOUR (2 + 2)
- #define FOUR (2 /* two */ + 2)
- but these are not:
- #define FOUR (2 + 2)
- #define FOUR ( 2+2 )
- #define FOUR (2 * 2)
- #define FOUR(score,and,seven,years,ago) (2 + 2)
-
- If a macro is redefined with a definition that is not effectively the
- same as the old one, the preprocessor issues a warning and changes the
- macro to use the new definition. If the new definition is effectively
- the same, the redefinition is silently ignored. This allows, for
- instance, two different headers to define a common macro. The
- preprocessor will only complain if the definitions do not match.
-
- File: cpp, Node: Directives Within Macro Arguments, Next: Macro Pitfalls, Prev: Undefining and Redefining Macros, Up: Macros
-
- 3.9 Directives Within Macro Arguments
- =====================================
-
- Occasionally it is convenient to use preprocessor directives within the
- arguments of a macro. The C and C++ standards declare that behavior in
- these cases is undefined.
-
- Versions of CPP prior to 3.2 would reject such constructs with an
- error message. This was the only syntactic difference between normal
- functions and function-like macros, so it seemed attractive to remove
- this limitation, and people would often be surprised that they could
- not use macros in this way. Moreover, sometimes people would use
- conditional compilation in the argument list to a normal library
- function like `printf', only to find that after a library upgrade
- `printf' had changed to be a function-like macro, and their code would
- no longer compile. So from version 3.2 we changed CPP to successfully
- process arbitrary directives within macro arguments in exactly the same
- way as it would have processed the directive were the function-like
- macro invocation not present.
-
- If, within a macro invocation, that macro is redefined, then the new
- definition takes effect in time for argument pre-expansion, but the
- original definition is still used for argument replacement. Here is a
- pathological example:
-
- #define f(x) x x
- f (1
- #undef f
- #define f 2
- f)
-
- which expands to
-
- 1 2 1 2
-
- with the semantics described above.
-
- File: cpp, Node: Macro Pitfalls, Prev: Directives Within Macro Arguments, Up: Macros
-
- 3.10 Macro Pitfalls
- ===================
-
- In this section we describe some special rules that apply to macros and
- macro expansion, and point out certain cases in which the rules have
- counter-intuitive consequences that you must watch out for.
-
- * Menu:
-
- * Misnesting::
- * Operator Precedence Problems::
- * Swallowing the Semicolon::
- * Duplication of Side Effects::
- * Self-Referential Macros::
- * Argument Prescan::
- * Newlines in Arguments::
-
- File: cpp, Node: Misnesting, Next: Operator Precedence Problems, Up: Macro Pitfalls
-
- 3.10.1 Misnesting
- -----------------
-
- When a macro is called with arguments, the arguments are substituted
- into the macro body and the result is checked, together with the rest of
- the input file, for more macro calls. It is possible to piece together
- a macro call coming partially from the macro body and partially from the
- arguments. For example,
-
- #define twice(x) (2*(x))
- #define call_with_1(x) x(1)
- call_with_1 (twice)
- ==> twice(1)
- ==> (2*(1))
-
- Macro definitions do not have to have balanced parentheses. By
- writing an unbalanced open parenthesis in a macro body, it is possible
- to create a macro call that begins inside the macro body but ends
- outside of it. For example,
-
- #define strange(file) fprintf (file, "%s %d",
- ...
- strange(stderr) p, 35)
- ==> fprintf (stderr, "%s %d", p, 35)
-
- The ability to piece together a macro call can be useful, but the
- use of unbalanced open parentheses in a macro body is just confusing,
- and should be avoided.
-
- File: cpp, Node: Operator Precedence Problems, Next: Swallowing the Semicolon, Prev: Misnesting, Up: Macro Pitfalls
-
- 3.10.2 Operator Precedence Problems
- -----------------------------------
-
- You may have noticed that in most of the macro definition examples shown
- above, each occurrence of a macro argument name had parentheses around
- it. In addition, another pair of parentheses usually surround the
- entire macro definition. Here is why it is best to write macros that
- way.
-
- Suppose you define a macro as follows,
-
- #define ceil_div(x, y) (x + y - 1) / y
-
- whose purpose is to divide, rounding up. (One use for this operation is
- to compute how many `int' objects are needed to hold a certain number
- of `char' objects.) Then suppose it is used as follows:
-
- a = ceil_div (b & c, sizeof (int));
- ==> a = (b & c + sizeof (int) - 1) / sizeof (int);
-
- This does not do what is intended. The operator-precedence rules of C
- make it equivalent to this:
-
- a = (b & (c + sizeof (int) - 1)) / sizeof (int);
-
- What we want is this:
-
- a = ((b & c) + sizeof (int) - 1)) / sizeof (int);
-
- Defining the macro as
-
- #define ceil_div(x, y) ((x) + (y) - 1) / (y)
-
- provides the desired result.
-
- Unintended grouping can result in another way. Consider `sizeof
- ceil_div(1, 2)'. That has the appearance of a C expression that would
- compute the size of the type of `ceil_div (1, 2)', but in fact it means
- something very different. Here is what it expands to:
-
- sizeof ((1) + (2) - 1) / (2)
-
- This would take the size of an integer and divide it by two. The
- precedence rules have put the division outside the `sizeof' when it was
- intended to be inside.
-
- Parentheses around the entire macro definition prevent such problems.
- Here, then, is the recommended way to define `ceil_div':
-
- #define ceil_div(x, y) (((x) + (y) - 1) / (y))
-
- File: cpp, Node: Swallowing the Semicolon, Next: Duplication of Side Effects, Prev: Operator Precedence Problems, Up: Macro Pitfalls
-
- 3.10.3 Swallowing the Semicolon
- -------------------------------
-
- Often it is desirable to define a macro that expands into a compound
- statement. Consider, for example, the following macro, that advances a
- pointer (the argument `p' says where to find it) across whitespace
- characters:
-
- #define SKIP_SPACES(p, limit) \
- { char *lim = (limit); \
- while (p < lim) { \
- if (*p++ != ' ') { \
- p--; break; }}}
-
- Here backslash-newline is used to split the macro definition, which must
- be a single logical line, so that it resembles the way such code would
- be laid out if not part of a macro definition.
-
- A call to this macro might be `SKIP_SPACES (p, lim)'. Strictly
- speaking, the call expands to a compound statement, which is a complete
- statement with no need for a semicolon to end it. However, since it
- looks like a function call, it minimizes confusion if you can use it
- like a function call, writing a semicolon afterward, as in `SKIP_SPACES
- (p, lim);'
-
- This can cause trouble before `else' statements, because the
- semicolon is actually a null statement. Suppose you write
-
- if (*p != 0)
- SKIP_SPACES (p, lim);
- else ...
-
- The presence of two statements--the compound statement and a null
- statement--in between the `if' condition and the `else' makes invalid C
- code.
-
- The definition of the macro `SKIP_SPACES' can be altered to solve
- this problem, using a `do ... while' statement. Here is how:
-
- #define SKIP_SPACES(p, limit) \
- do { char *lim = (limit); \
- while (p < lim) { \
- if (*p++ != ' ') { \
- p--; break; }}} \
- while (0)
-
- Now `SKIP_SPACES (p, lim);' expands into
-
- do {...} while (0);
-
- which is one statement. The loop executes exactly once; most compilers
- generate no extra code for it.
-
- File: cpp, Node: Duplication of Side Effects, Next: Self-Referential Macros, Prev: Swallowing the Semicolon, Up: Macro Pitfalls
-
- 3.10.4 Duplication of Side Effects
- ----------------------------------
-
- Many C programs define a macro `min', for "minimum", like this:
-
- #define min(X, Y) ((X) < (Y) ? (X) : (Y))
-
- When you use this macro with an argument containing a side effect,
- as shown here,
-
- next = min (x + y, foo (z));
-
- it expands as follows:
-
- next = ((x + y) < (foo (z)) ? (x + y) : (foo (z)));
-
- where `x + y' has been substituted for `X' and `foo (z)' for `Y'.
-
- The function `foo' is used only once in the statement as it appears
- in the program, but the expression `foo (z)' has been substituted twice
- into the macro expansion. As a result, `foo' might be called two times
- when the statement is executed. If it has side effects or if it takes
- a long time to compute, the results might not be what you intended. We
- say that `min' is an "unsafe" macro.
-
- The best solution to this problem is to define `min' in a way that
- computes the value of `foo (z)' only once. The C language offers no
- standard way to do this, but it can be done with GNU extensions as
- follows:
-
- #define min(X, Y) \
- ({ typeof (X) x_ = (X); \
- typeof (Y) y_ = (Y); \
- (x_ < y_) ? x_ : y_; })
-
- The `({ ... })' notation produces a compound statement that acts as
- an expression. Its value is the value of its last statement. This
- permits us to define local variables and assign each argument to one.
- The local variables have underscores after their names to reduce the
- risk of conflict with an identifier of wider scope (it is impossible to
- avoid this entirely). Now each argument is evaluated exactly once.
-
- If you do not wish to use GNU C extensions, the only solution is to
- be careful when _using_ the macro `min'. For example, you can
- calculate the value of `foo (z)', save it in a variable, and use that
- variable in `min':
-
- #define min(X, Y) ((X) < (Y) ? (X) : (Y))
- ...
- {
- int tem = foo (z);
- next = min (x + y, tem);
- }
-
- (where we assume that `foo' returns type `int').
-
- File: cpp, Node: Self-Referential Macros, Next: Argument Prescan, Prev: Duplication of Side Effects, Up: Macro Pitfalls
-
- 3.10.5 Self-Referential Macros
- ------------------------------
-
- A "self-referential" macro is one whose name appears in its definition.
- Recall that all macro definitions are rescanned for more macros to
- replace. If the self-reference were considered a use of the macro, it
- would produce an infinitely large expansion. To prevent this, the
- self-reference is not considered a macro call. It is passed into the
- preprocessor output unchanged. Let's consider an example:
-
- #define foo (4 + foo)
-
- where `foo' is also a variable in your program.
-
- Following the ordinary rules, each reference to `foo' will expand
- into `(4 + foo)'; then this will be rescanned and will expand into `(4
- + (4 + foo))'; and so on until the computer runs out of memory.
-
- The self-reference rule cuts this process short after one step, at
- `(4 + foo)'. Therefore, this macro definition has the possibly useful
- effect of causing the program to add 4 to the value of `foo' wherever
- `foo' is referred to.
-
- In most cases, it is a bad idea to take advantage of this feature. A
- person reading the program who sees that `foo' is a variable will not
- expect that it is a macro as well. The reader will come across the
- identifier `foo' in the program and think its value should be that of
- the variable `foo', whereas in fact the value is four greater.
-
- One common, useful use of self-reference is to create a macro which
- expands to itself. If you write
-
- #define EPERM EPERM
-
- then the macro `EPERM' expands to `EPERM'. Effectively, it is left
- alone by the preprocessor whenever it's used in running text. You can
- tell that it's a macro with `#ifdef'. You might do this if you want to
- define numeric constants with an `enum', but have `#ifdef' be true for
- each constant.
-
- If a macro `x' expands to use a macro `y', and the expansion of `y'
- refers to the macro `x', that is an "indirect self-reference" of `x'.
- `x' is not expanded in this case either. Thus, if we have
-
- #define x (4 + y)
- #define y (2 * x)
-
- then `x' and `y' expand as follows:
-
- x ==> (4 + y)
- ==> (4 + (2 * x))
-
- y ==> (2 * x)
- ==> (2 * (4 + y))
-
- Each macro is expanded when it appears in the definition of the other
- macro, but not when it indirectly appears in its own definition.
-
- File: cpp, Node: Argument Prescan, Next: Newlines in Arguments, Prev: Self-Referential Macros, Up: Macro Pitfalls
-
- 3.10.6 Argument Prescan
- -----------------------
-
- Macro arguments are completely macro-expanded before they are
- substituted into a macro body, unless they are stringified or pasted
- with other tokens. After substitution, the entire macro body, including
- the substituted arguments, is scanned again for macros to be expanded.
- The result is that the arguments are scanned _twice_ to expand macro
- calls in them.
-
- Most of the time, this has no effect. If the argument contained any
- macro calls, they are expanded during the first scan. The result
- therefore contains no macro calls, so the second scan does not change
- it. If the argument were substituted as given, with no prescan, the
- single remaining scan would find the same macro calls and produce the
- same results.
-
- You might expect the double scan to change the results when a
- self-referential macro is used in an argument of another macro (*note
- Self-Referential Macros::): the self-referential macro would be
- expanded once in the first scan, and a second time in the second scan.
- However, this is not what happens. The self-references that do not
- expand in the first scan are marked so that they will not expand in the
- second scan either.
-
- You might wonder, "Why mention the prescan, if it makes no
- difference? And why not skip it and make the preprocessor faster?"
- The answer is that the prescan does make a difference in three special
- cases:
-
- * Nested calls to a macro.
-
- We say that "nested" calls to a macro occur when a macro's argument
- contains a call to that very macro. For example, if `f' is a macro
- that expects one argument, `f (f (1))' is a nested pair of calls to
- `f'. The desired expansion is made by expanding `f (1)' and
- substituting that into the definition of `f'. The prescan causes
- the expected result to happen. Without the prescan, `f (1)' itself
- would be substituted as an argument, and the inner use of `f' would
- appear during the main scan as an indirect self-reference and
- would not be expanded.
-
- * Macros that call other macros that stringify or concatenate.
-
- If an argument is stringified or concatenated, the prescan does not
- occur. If you _want_ to expand a macro, then stringify or
- concatenate its expansion, you can do that by causing one macro to
- call another macro that does the stringification or concatenation.
- For instance, if you have
-
- #define AFTERX(x) X_ ## x
- #define XAFTERX(x) AFTERX(x)
- #define TABLESIZE 1024
- #define BUFSIZE TABLESIZE
-
- then `AFTERX(BUFSIZE)' expands to `X_BUFSIZE', and
- `XAFTERX(BUFSIZE)' expands to `X_1024'. (Not to `X_TABLESIZE'.
- Prescan always does a complete expansion.)
-
- * Macros used in arguments, whose expansions contain unshielded
- commas.
-
- This can cause a macro expanded on the second scan to be called
- with the wrong number of arguments. Here is an example:
-
- #define foo a,b
- #define bar(x) lose(x)
- #define lose(x) (1 + (x))
-
- We would like `bar(foo)' to turn into `(1 + (foo))', which would
- then turn into `(1 + (a,b))'. Instead, `bar(foo)' expands into
- `lose(a,b)', and you get an error because `lose' requires a single
- argument. In this case, the problem is easily solved by the same
- parentheses that ought to be used to prevent misnesting of
- arithmetic operations:
-
- #define foo (a,b)
- or
- #define bar(x) lose((x))
-
- The extra pair of parentheses prevents the comma in `foo''s
- definition from being interpreted as an argument separator.
-
-
- File: cpp, Node: Newlines in Arguments, Prev: Argument Prescan, Up: Macro Pitfalls
-
- 3.10.7 Newlines in Arguments
- ----------------------------
-
- The invocation of a function-like macro can extend over many logical
- lines. However, in the present implementation, the entire expansion
- comes out on one line. Thus line numbers emitted by the compiler or
- debugger refer to the line the invocation started on, which might be
- different to the line containing the argument causing the problem.
-
- Here is an example illustrating this:
-
- #define ignore_second_arg(a,b,c) a; c
-
- ignore_second_arg (foo (),
- ignored (),
- syntax error);
-
- The syntax error triggered by the tokens `syntax error' results in an
- error message citing line three--the line of ignore_second_arg-- even
- though the problematic code comes from line five.
-
- We consider this a bug, and intend to fix it in the near future.
-
- File: cpp, Node: Conditionals, Next: Diagnostics, Prev: Macros, Up: Top
-
- 4 Conditionals
- **************
-
- A "conditional" is a directive that instructs the preprocessor to
- select whether or not to include a chunk of code in the final token
- stream passed to the compiler. Preprocessor conditionals can test
- arithmetic expressions, or whether a name is defined as a macro, or both
- simultaneously using the special `defined' operator.
-
- A conditional in the C preprocessor resembles in some ways an `if'
- statement in C, but it is important to understand the difference between
- them. The condition in an `if' statement is tested during the
- execution of your program. Its purpose is to allow your program to
- behave differently from run to run, depending on the data it is
- operating on. The condition in a preprocessing conditional directive is
- tested when your program is compiled. Its purpose is to allow different
- code to be included in the program depending on the situation at the
- time of compilation.
-
- However, the distinction is becoming less clear. Modern compilers
- often do test `if' statements when a program is compiled, if their
- conditions are known not to vary at run time, and eliminate code which
- can never be executed. If you can count on your compiler to do this,
- you may find that your program is more readable if you use `if'
- statements with constant conditions (perhaps determined by macros). Of
- course, you can only use this to exclude code, not type definitions or
- other preprocessing directives, and you can only do it if the code
- remains syntactically valid when it is not to be used.
-
- GCC version 3 eliminates this kind of never-executed code even when
- not optimizing. Older versions did it only when optimizing.
-
- * Menu:
-
- * Conditional Uses::
- * Conditional Syntax::
- * Deleted Code::
-
- File: cpp, Node: Conditional Uses, Next: Conditional Syntax, Up: Conditionals
-
- 4.1 Conditional Uses
- ====================
-
- There are three general reasons to use a conditional.
-
- * A program may need to use different code depending on the machine
- or operating system it is to run on. In some cases the code for
- one operating system may be erroneous on another operating system;
- for example, it might refer to data types or constants that do not
- exist on the other system. When this happens, it is not enough to
- avoid executing the invalid code. Its mere presence will cause
- the compiler to reject the program. With a preprocessing
- conditional, the offending code can be effectively excised from
- the program when it is not valid.
-
- * You may want to be able to compile the same source file into two
- different programs. One version might make frequent time-consuming
- consistency checks on its intermediate data, or print the values of
- those data for debugging, and the other not.
-
- * A conditional whose condition is always false is one way to
- exclude code from the program but keep it as a sort of comment for
- future reference.
-
- Simple programs that do not need system-specific logic or complex
- debugging hooks generally will not need to use preprocessing
- conditionals.
-
- File: cpp, Node: Conditional Syntax, Next: Deleted Code, Prev: Conditional Uses, Up: Conditionals
-
- 4.2 Conditional Syntax
- ======================
-
- A conditional in the C preprocessor begins with a "conditional
- directive": `#if', `#ifdef' or `#ifndef'.
-
- * Menu:
-
- * Ifdef::
- * If::
- * Defined::
- * Else::
- * Elif::
-
- File: cpp, Node: Ifdef, Next: If, Up: Conditional Syntax
-
- 4.2.1 Ifdef
- -----------
-
- The simplest sort of conditional is
-
- #ifdef MACRO
-
- CONTROLLED TEXT
-
- #endif /* MACRO */
-
- This block is called a "conditional group". CONTROLLED TEXT will be
- included in the output of the preprocessor if and only if MACRO is
- defined. We say that the conditional "succeeds" if MACRO is defined,
- "fails" if it is not.
-
- The CONTROLLED TEXT inside of a conditional can include
- preprocessing directives. They are executed only if the conditional
- succeeds. You can nest conditional groups inside other conditional
- groups, but they must be completely nested. In other words, `#endif'
- always matches the nearest `#ifdef' (or `#ifndef', or `#if'). Also,
- you cannot start a conditional group in one file and end it in another.
-
- Even if a conditional fails, the CONTROLLED TEXT inside it is still
- run through initial transformations and tokenization. Therefore, it
- must all be lexically valid C. Normally the only way this matters is
- that all comments and string literals inside a failing conditional group
- must still be properly ended.
-
- The comment following the `#endif' is not required, but it is a good
- practice if there is a lot of CONTROLLED TEXT, because it helps people
- match the `#endif' to the corresponding `#ifdef'. Older programs
- sometimes put MACRO directly after the `#endif' without enclosing it in
- a comment. This is invalid code according to the C standard. CPP
- accepts it with a warning. It never affects which `#ifndef' the
- `#endif' matches.
-
- Sometimes you wish to use some code if a macro is _not_ defined.
- You can do this by writing `#ifndef' instead of `#ifdef'. One common
- use of `#ifndef' is to include code only the first time a header file
- is included. *Note Once-Only Headers::.
-
- Macro definitions can vary between compilations for several reasons.
- Here are some samples.
-
- * Some macros are predefined on each kind of machine (*note
- System-specific Predefined Macros::). This allows you to provide
- code specially tuned for a particular machine.
-
- * System header files define more macros, associated with the
- features they implement. You can test these macros with
- conditionals to avoid using a system feature on a machine where it
- is not implemented.
-
- * Macros can be defined or undefined with the `-D' and `-U' command
- line options when you compile the program. You can arrange to
- compile the same source file into two different programs by
- choosing a macro name to specify which program you want, writing
- conditionals to test whether or how this macro is defined, and
- then controlling the state of the macro with command line options,
- perhaps set in the Makefile. *Note Invocation::.
-
- * Your program might have a special header file (often called
- `config.h') that is adjusted when the program is compiled. It can
- define or not define macros depending on the features of the
- system and the desired capabilities of the program. The
- adjustment can be automated by a tool such as `autoconf', or done
- by hand.
-
- File: cpp, Node: If, Next: Defined, Prev: Ifdef, Up: Conditional Syntax
-
- 4.2.2 If
- --------
-
- The `#if' directive allows you to test the value of an arithmetic
- expression, rather than the mere existence of one macro. Its syntax is
-
- #if EXPRESSION
-
- CONTROLLED TEXT
-
- #endif /* EXPRESSION */
-
- EXPRESSION is a C expression of integer type, subject to stringent
- restrictions. It may contain
-
- * Integer constants.
-
- * Character constants, which are interpreted as they would be in
- normal code.
-
- * Arithmetic operators for addition, subtraction, multiplication,
- division, bitwise operations, shifts, comparisons, and logical
- operations (`&&' and `||'). The latter two obey the usual
- short-circuiting rules of standard C.
-
- * Macros. All macros in the expression are expanded before actual
- computation of the expression's value begins.
-
- * Uses of the `defined' operator, which lets you check whether macros
- are defined in the middle of an `#if'.
-
- * Identifiers that are not macros, which are all considered to be the
- number zero. This allows you to write `#if MACRO' instead of
- `#ifdef MACRO', if you know that MACRO, when defined, will always
- have a nonzero value. Function-like macros used without their
- function call parentheses are also treated as zero.
-
- In some contexts this shortcut is undesirable. The `-Wundef'
- option causes GCC to warn whenever it encounters an identifier
- which is not a macro in an `#if'.
-
- The preprocessor does not know anything about types in the language.
- Therefore, `sizeof' operators are not recognized in `#if', and neither
- are `enum' constants. They will be taken as identifiers which are not
- macros, and replaced by zero. In the case of `sizeof', this is likely
- to cause the expression to be invalid.
-
- The preprocessor calculates the value of EXPRESSION. It carries out
- all calculations in the widest integer type known to the compiler; on
- most machines supported by GCC this is 64 bits. This is not the same
- rule as the compiler uses to calculate the value of a constant
- expression, and may give different results in some cases. If the value
- comes out to be nonzero, the `#if' succeeds and the CONTROLLED TEXT is
- included; otherwise it is skipped.
-
- File: cpp, Node: Defined, Next: Else, Prev: If, Up: Conditional Syntax
-
- 4.2.3 Defined
- -------------
-
- The special operator `defined' is used in `#if' and `#elif' expressions
- to test whether a certain name is defined as a macro. `defined NAME'
- and `defined (NAME)' are both expressions whose value is 1 if NAME is
- defined as a macro at the current point in the program, and 0
- otherwise. Thus, `#if defined MACRO' is precisely equivalent to
- `#ifdef MACRO'.
-
- `defined' is useful when you wish to test more than one macro for
- existence at once. For example,
-
- #if defined (__vax__) || defined (__ns16000__)
-
- would succeed if either of the names `__vax__' or `__ns16000__' is
- defined as a macro.
-
- Conditionals written like this:
-
- #if defined BUFSIZE && BUFSIZE >= 1024
-
- can generally be simplified to just `#if BUFSIZE >= 1024', since if
- `BUFSIZE' is not defined, it will be interpreted as having the value
- zero.
-
- If the `defined' operator appears as a result of a macro expansion,
- the C standard says the behavior is undefined. GNU cpp treats it as a
- genuine `defined' operator and evaluates it normally. It will warn
- wherever your code uses this feature if you use the command-line option
- `-pedantic', since other compilers may handle it differently.
-
- File: cpp, Node: Else, Next: Elif, Prev: Defined, Up: Conditional Syntax
-
- 4.2.4 Else
- ----------
-
- The `#else' directive can be added to a conditional to provide
- alternative text to be used if the condition fails. This is what it
- looks like:
-
- #if EXPRESSION
- TEXT-IF-TRUE
- #else /* Not EXPRESSION */
- TEXT-IF-FALSE
- #endif /* Not EXPRESSION */
-
- If EXPRESSION is nonzero, the TEXT-IF-TRUE is included and the
- TEXT-IF-FALSE is skipped. If EXPRESSION is zero, the opposite happens.
-
- You can use `#else' with `#ifdef' and `#ifndef', too.
-
- File: cpp, Node: Elif, Prev: Else, Up: Conditional Syntax
-
- 4.2.5 Elif
- ----------
-
- One common case of nested conditionals is used to check for more than
- two possible alternatives. For example, you might have
-
- #if X == 1
- ...
- #else /* X != 1 */
- #if X == 2
- ...
- #else /* X != 2 */
- ...
- #endif /* X != 2 */
- #endif /* X != 1 */
-
- Another conditional directive, `#elif', allows this to be
- abbreviated as follows:
-
- #if X == 1
- ...
- #elif X == 2
- ...
- #else /* X != 2 and X != 1*/
- ...
- #endif /* X != 2 and X != 1*/
-
- `#elif' stands for "else if". Like `#else', it goes in the middle
- of a conditional group and subdivides it; it does not require a
- matching `#endif' of its own. Like `#if', the `#elif' directive
- includes an expression to be tested. The text following the `#elif' is
- processed only if the original `#if'-condition failed and the `#elif'
- condition succeeds.
-
- More than one `#elif' can go in the same conditional group. Then
- the text after each `#elif' is processed only if the `#elif' condition
- succeeds after the original `#if' and all previous `#elif' directives
- within it have failed.
-
- `#else' is allowed after any number of `#elif' directives, but
- `#elif' may not follow `#else'.
-
- File: cpp, Node: Deleted Code, Prev: Conditional Syntax, Up: Conditionals
-
- 4.3 Deleted Code
- ================
-
- If you replace or delete a part of the program but want to keep the old
- code around for future reference, you often cannot simply comment it
- out. Block comments do not nest, so the first comment inside the old
- code will end the commenting-out. The probable result is a flood of
- syntax errors.
-
- One way to avoid this problem is to use an always-false conditional
- instead. For instance, put `#if 0' before the deleted code and
- `#endif' after it. This works even if the code being turned off
- contains conditionals, but they must be entire conditionals (balanced
- `#if' and `#endif').
-
- Some people use `#ifdef notdef' instead. This is risky, because
- `notdef' might be accidentally defined as a macro, and then the
- conditional would succeed. `#if 0' can be counted on to fail.
-
- Do not use `#if 0' for comments which are not C code. Use a real
- comment, instead. The interior of `#if 0' must consist of complete
- tokens; in particular, single-quote characters must balance. Comments
- often contain unbalanced single-quote characters (known in English as
- apostrophes). These confuse `#if 0'. They don't confuse `/*'.
-
- File: cpp, Node: Diagnostics, Next: Line Control, Prev: Conditionals, Up: Top
-
- 5 Diagnostics
- *************
-
- The directive `#error' causes the preprocessor to report a fatal error.
- The tokens forming the rest of the line following `#error' are used as
- the error message.
-
- You would use `#error' inside of a conditional that detects a
- combination of parameters which you know the program does not properly
- support. For example, if you know that the program will not run
- properly on a VAX, you might write
-
- #ifdef __vax__
- #error "Won't work on VAXen. See comments at get_last_object."
- #endif
-
- If you have several configuration parameters that must be set up by
- the installation in a consistent way, you can use conditionals to detect
- an inconsistency and report it with `#error'. For example,
-
- #if !defined(UNALIGNED_INT_ASM_OP) && defined(DWARF2_DEBUGGING_INFO)
- #error "DWARF2_DEBUGGING_INFO requires UNALIGNED_INT_ASM_OP."
- #endif
-
- The directive `#warning' is like `#error', but causes the
- preprocessor to issue a warning and continue preprocessing. The tokens
- following `#warning' are used as the warning message.
-
- You might use `#warning' in obsolete header files, with a message
- directing the user to the header file which should be used instead.
-
- Neither `#error' nor `#warning' macro-expands its argument.
- Internal whitespace sequences are each replaced with a single space.
- The line must consist of complete tokens. It is wisest to make the
- argument of these directives be a single string constant; this avoids
- problems with apostrophes and the like.
-
- File: cpp, Node: Line Control, Next: Pragmas, Prev: Diagnostics, Up: Top
-
- 6 Line Control
- **************
-
- The C preprocessor informs the C compiler of the location in your source
- code where each token came from. Presently, this is just the file name
- and line number. All the tokens resulting from macro expansion are
- reported as having appeared on the line of the source file where the
- outermost macro was used. We intend to be more accurate in the future.
-
- If you write a program which generates source code, such as the
- `bison' parser generator, you may want to adjust the preprocessor's
- notion of the current file name and line number by hand. Parts of the
- output from `bison' are generated from scratch, other parts come from a
- standard parser file. The rest are copied verbatim from `bison''s
- input. You would like compiler error messages and symbolic debuggers
- to be able to refer to `bison''s input file.
-
- `bison' or any such program can arrange this by writing `#line'
- directives into the output file. `#line' is a directive that specifies
- the original line number and source file name for subsequent input in
- the current preprocessor input file. `#line' has three variants:
-
- `#line LINENUM'
- LINENUM is a non-negative decimal integer constant. It specifies
- the line number which should be reported for the following line of
- input. Subsequent lines are counted from LINENUM.
-
- `#line LINENUM FILENAME'
- LINENUM is the same as for the first form, and has the same
- effect. In addition, FILENAME is a string constant. The
- following line and all subsequent lines are reported to come from
- the file it specifies, until something else happens to change that.
- FILENAME is interpreted according to the normal rules for a string
- constant: backslash escapes are interpreted. This is different
- from `#include'.
-
- Previous versions of CPP did not interpret escapes in `#line'; we
- have changed it because the standard requires they be interpreted,
- and most other compilers do.
-
- `#line ANYTHING ELSE'
- ANYTHING ELSE is checked for macro calls, which are expanded. The
- result should match one of the above two forms.
-
- `#line' directives alter the results of the `__FILE__' and
- `__LINE__' predefined macros from that point on. *Note Standard
- Predefined Macros::. They do not have any effect on `#include''s idea
- of the directory containing the current file. This is a change from
- GCC 2.95. Previously, a file reading
-
- #line 1 "../src/gram.y"
- #include "gram.h"
-
- would search for `gram.h' in `../src', then the `-I' chain; the
- directory containing the physical source file would not be searched.
- In GCC 3.0 and later, the `#include' is not affected by the presence of
- a `#line' referring to a different directory.
-
- We made this change because the old behavior caused problems when
- generated source files were transported between machines. For instance,
- it is common practice to ship generated parsers with a source release,
- so that people building the distribution do not need to have yacc or
- Bison installed. These files frequently have `#line' directives
- referring to the directory tree of the system where the distribution was
- created. If GCC tries to search for headers in those directories, the
- build is likely to fail.
-
- The new behavior can cause failures too, if the generated file is not
- in the same directory as its source and it attempts to include a header
- which would be visible searching from the directory containing the
- source file. However, this problem is easily solved with an additional
- `-I' switch on the command line. The failures caused by the old
- semantics could sometimes be corrected only by editing the generated
- files, which is difficult and error-prone.
-
- File: cpp, Node: Pragmas, Next: Other Directives, Prev: Line Control, Up: Top
-
- 7 Pragmas
- *********
-
- The `#pragma' directive is the method specified by the C standard for
- providing additional information to the compiler, beyond what is
- conveyed in the language itself. Three forms of this directive
- (commonly known as "pragmas") are specified by the 1999 C standard. A
- C compiler is free to attach any meaning it likes to other pragmas.
-
- GCC has historically preferred to use extensions to the syntax of the
- language, such as `__attribute__', for this purpose. However, GCC does
- define a few pragmas of its own. These mostly have effects on the
- entire translation unit or source file.
-
- In GCC version 3, all GNU-defined, supported pragmas have been given
- a `GCC' prefix. This is in line with the `STDC' prefix on all pragmas
- defined by C99. For backward compatibility, pragmas which were
- recognized by previous versions are still recognized without the `GCC'
- prefix, but that usage is deprecated. Some older pragmas are
- deprecated in their entirety. They are not recognized with the `GCC'
- prefix. *Note Obsolete Features::.
-
- C99 introduces the `_Pragma' operator. This feature addresses a
- major problem with `#pragma': being a directive, it cannot be produced
- as the result of macro expansion. `_Pragma' is an operator, much like
- `sizeof' or `defined', and can be embedded in a macro.
-
- Its syntax is `_Pragma (STRING-LITERAL)', where STRING-LITERAL can
- be either a normal or wide-character string literal. It is
- destringized, by replacing all `\\' with a single `\' and all `\"' with
- a `"'. The result is then processed as if it had appeared as the right
- hand side of a `#pragma' directive. For example,
-
- _Pragma ("GCC dependency \"parse.y\"")
-
- has the same effect as `#pragma GCC dependency "parse.y"'. The same
- effect could be achieved using macros, for example
-
- #define DO_PRAGMA(x) _Pragma (#x)
- DO_PRAGMA (GCC dependency "parse.y")
-
- The standard is unclear on where a `_Pragma' operator can appear.
- The preprocessor does not accept it within a preprocessing conditional
- directive like `#if'. To be safe, you are probably best keeping it out
- of directives other than `#define', and putting it on a line of its own.
-
- This manual documents the pragmas which are meaningful to the
- preprocessor itself. Other pragmas are meaningful to the C or C++
- compilers. They are documented in the GCC manual.
-
- `#pragma GCC dependency'
- `#pragma GCC dependency' allows you to check the relative dates of
- the current file and another file. If the other file is more
- recent than the current file, a warning is issued. This is useful
- if the current file is derived from the other file, and should be
- regenerated. The other file is searched for using the normal
- include search path. Optional trailing text can be used to give
- more information in the warning message.
-
- #pragma GCC dependency "parse.y"
- #pragma GCC dependency "/usr/include/time.h" rerun fixincludes
-
- `#pragma GCC poison'
- Sometimes, there is an identifier that you want to remove
- completely from your program, and make sure that it never creeps
- back in. To enforce this, you can "poison" the identifier with
- this pragma. `#pragma GCC poison' is followed by a list of
- identifiers to poison. If any of those identifiers appears
- anywhere in the source after the directive, it is a hard error.
- For example,
-
- #pragma GCC poison printf sprintf fprintf
- sprintf(some_string, "hello");
-
- will produce an error.
-
- If a poisoned identifier appears as part of the expansion of a
- macro which was defined before the identifier was poisoned, it
- will _not_ cause an error. This lets you poison an identifier
- without worrying about system headers defining macros that use it.
-
- For example,
-
- #define strrchr rindex
- #pragma GCC poison rindex
- strrchr(some_string, 'h');
-
- will not produce an error.
-
- `#pragma GCC system_header'
- This pragma takes no arguments. It causes the rest of the code in
- the current file to be treated as if it came from a system header.
- *Note System Headers::.
-
-
- File: cpp, Node: Other Directives, Next: Preprocessor Output, Prev: Pragmas, Up: Top
-
- 8 Other Directives
- ******************
-
- The `#ident' directive takes one argument, a string constant. On some
- systems, that string constant is copied into a special segment of the
- object file. On other systems, the directive is ignored.
-
- This directive is not part of the C standard, but it is not an
- official GNU extension either. We believe it came from System V.
-
- The `#sccs' directive is recognized, because it appears in the
- header files of some systems. It is a very old, obscure, extension
- which we did not invent, and we have been unable to find any
- documentation of what it should do, so GCC simply ignores it.
-
- The "null directive" consists of a `#' followed by a newline, with
- only whitespace (including comments) in between. A null directive is
- understood as a preprocessing directive but has no effect on the
- preprocessor output. The primary significance of the existence of the
- null directive is that an input line consisting of just a `#' will
- produce no output, rather than a line of output containing just a `#'.
- Supposedly some old C programs contain such lines.
-
- File: cpp, Node: Preprocessor Output, Next: Traditional Mode, Prev: Other Directives, Up: Top
-
- 9 Preprocessor Output
- *********************
-
- When the C preprocessor is used with the C, C++, or Objective-C
- compilers, it is integrated into the compiler and communicates a stream
- of binary tokens directly to the compiler's parser. However, it can
- also be used in the more conventional standalone mode, where it produces
- textual output.
-
- The output from the C preprocessor looks much like the input, except
- that all preprocessing directive lines have been replaced with blank
- lines and all comments with spaces. Long runs of blank lines are
- discarded.
-
- The ISO standard specifies that it is implementation defined whether
- a preprocessor preserves whitespace between tokens, or replaces it with
- e.g. a single space. In GNU CPP, whitespace between tokens is collapsed
- to become a single space, with the exception that the first token on a
- non-directive line is preceded with sufficient spaces that it appears in
- the same column in the preprocessed output that it appeared in the
- original source file. This is so the output is easy to read. *Note
- Differences from previous versions::. CPP does not insert any
- whitespace where there was none in the original source, except where
- necessary to prevent an accidental token paste.
-
- Source file name and line number information is conveyed by lines of
- the form
-
- # LINENUM FILENAME FLAGS
-
- These are called "linemarkers". They are inserted as needed into the
- output (but never within a string or character constant). They mean
- that the following line originated in file FILENAME at line LINENUM.
- FILENAME will never contain any non-printing characters; they are
- replaced with octal escape sequences.
-
- After the file name comes zero or more flags, which are `1', `2',
- `3', or `4'. If there are multiple flags, spaces separate them. Here
- is what the flags mean:
-
- `1'
- This indicates the start of a new file.
-
- `2'
- This indicates returning to a file (after having included another
- file).
-
- `3'
- This indicates that the following text comes from a system header
- file, so certain warnings should be suppressed.
-
- `4'
- This indicates that the following text should be treated as being
- wrapped in an implicit `extern "C"' block.
-
- As an extension, the preprocessor accepts linemarkers in
- non-assembler input files. They are treated like the corresponding
- `#line' directive, (*note Line Control::), except that trailing flags
- are permitted, and are interpreted with the meanings described above.
- If multiple flags are given, they must be in ascending order.
-
- Some directives may be duplicated in the output of the preprocessor.
- These are `#ident' (always), `#pragma' (only if the preprocessor does
- not handle the pragma itself), and `#define' and `#undef' (with certain
- debugging options). If this happens, the `#' of the directive will
- always be in the first column, and there will be no space between the
- `#' and the directive name. If macro expansion happens to generate
- tokens which might be mistaken for a duplicated directive, a space will
- be inserted between the `#' and the directive name.
-
- File: cpp, Node: Traditional Mode, Next: Implementation Details, Prev: Preprocessor Output, Up: Top
-
- 10 Traditional Mode
- *******************
-
- Traditional (pre-standard) C preprocessing is rather different from the
- preprocessing specified by the standard. When GCC is given the
- `-traditional-cpp' option, it attempts to emulate a traditional
- preprocessor.
-
- GCC versions 3.2 and later only support traditional mode semantics in
- the preprocessor, and not in the compiler front ends. This chapter
- outlines the traditional preprocessor semantics we implemented.
-
- The implementation does not correspond precisely to the behavior of
- earlier versions of GCC, nor to any true traditional preprocessor.
- After all, inconsistencies among traditional implementations were a
- major motivation for C standardization. However, we intend that it
- should be compatible with true traditional preprocessors in all ways
- that actually matter.
-
- * Menu:
-
- * Traditional lexical analysis::
- * Traditional macros::
- * Traditional miscellany::
- * Traditional warnings::
-
- File: cpp, Node: Traditional lexical analysis, Next: Traditional macros, Up: Traditional Mode
-
- 10.1 Traditional lexical analysis
- =================================
-
- The traditional preprocessor does not decompose its input into tokens
- the same way a standards-conforming preprocessor does. The input is
- simply treated as a stream of text with minimal internal form.
-
- This implementation does not treat trigraphs (*note trigraphs::)
- specially since they were an invention of the standards committee. It
- handles arbitrarily-positioned escaped newlines properly and splices
- the lines as you would expect; many traditional preprocessors did not
- do this.
-
- The form of horizontal whitespace in the input file is preserved in
- the output. In particular, hard tabs remain hard tabs. This can be
- useful if, for example, you are preprocessing a Makefile.
-
- Traditional CPP only recognizes C-style block comments, and treats
- the `/*' sequence as introducing a comment only if it lies outside
- quoted text. Quoted text is introduced by the usual single and double
- quotes, and also by an initial `<' in a `#include' directive.
-
- Traditionally, comments are completely removed and are not replaced
- with a space. Since a traditional compiler does its own tokenization
- of the output of the preprocessor, this means that comments can
- effectively be used as token paste operators. However, comments behave
- like separators for text handled by the preprocessor itself, since it
- doesn't re-lex its input. For example, in
-
- #if foo/**/bar
-
- `foo' and `bar' are distinct identifiers and expanded separately if
- they happen to be macros. In other words, this directive is equivalent
- to
-
- #if foo bar
-
- rather than
-
- #if foobar
-
- Generally speaking, in traditional mode an opening quote need not
- have a matching closing quote. In particular, a macro may be defined
- with replacement text that contains an unmatched quote. Of course, if
- you attempt to compile preprocessed output containing an unmatched quote
- you will get a syntax error.
-
- However, all preprocessing directives other than `#define' require
- matching quotes. For example:
-
- #define m This macro's fine and has an unmatched quote
- "/* This is not a comment. */
- /* This is a comment. The following #include directive
- is ill-formed. */
- #include <stdio.h
-
- Just as for the ISO preprocessor, what would be a closing quote can
- be escaped with a backslash to prevent the quoted text from closing.
-
- File: cpp, Node: Traditional macros, Next: Traditional miscellany, Prev: Traditional lexical analysis, Up: Traditional Mode
-
- 10.2 Traditional macros
- =======================
-
- The major difference between traditional and ISO macros is that the
- former expand to text rather than to a token sequence. CPP removes all
- leading and trailing horizontal whitespace from a macro's replacement
- text before storing it, but preserves the form of internal whitespace.
-
- One consequence is that it is legitimate for the replacement text to
- contain an unmatched quote (*note Traditional lexical analysis::). An
- unclosed string or character constant continues into the text following
- the macro call. Similarly, the text at the end of a macro's expansion
- can run together with the text after the macro invocation to produce a
- single token.
-
- Normally comments are removed from the replacement text after the
- macro is expanded, but if the `-CC' option is passed on the command
- line comments are preserved. (In fact, the current implementation
- removes comments even before saving the macro replacement text, but it
- careful to do it in such a way that the observed effect is identical
- even in the function-like macro case.)
-
- The ISO stringification operator `#' and token paste operator `##'
- have no special meaning. As explained later, an effect similar to
- these operators can be obtained in a different way. Macro names that
- are embedded in quotes, either from the main file or after macro
- replacement, do not expand.
-
- CPP replaces an unquoted object-like macro name with its replacement
- text, and then rescans it for further macros to replace. Unlike
- standard macro expansion, traditional macro expansion has no provision
- to prevent recursion. If an object-like macro appears unquoted in its
- replacement text, it will be replaced again during the rescan pass, and
- so on _ad infinitum_. GCC detects when it is expanding recursive
- macros, emits an error message, and continues after the offending macro
- invocation.
-
- #define PLUS +
- #define INC(x) PLUS+x
- INC(foo);
- ==> ++foo;
-
- Function-like macros are similar in form but quite different in
- behavior to their ISO counterparts. Their arguments are contained
- within parentheses, are comma-separated, and can cross physical lines.
- Commas within nested parentheses are not treated as argument
- separators. Similarly, a quote in an argument cannot be left unclosed;
- a following comma or parenthesis that comes before the closing quote is
- treated like any other character. There is no facility for handling
- variadic macros.
-
- This implementation removes all comments from macro arguments, unless
- the `-C' option is given. The form of all other horizontal whitespace
- in arguments is preserved, including leading and trailing whitespace.
- In particular
-
- f( )
-
- is treated as an invocation of the macro `f' with a single argument
- consisting of a single space. If you want to invoke a function-like
- macro that takes no arguments, you must not leave any whitespace
- between the parentheses.
-
- If a macro argument crosses a new line, the new line is replaced with
- a space when forming the argument. If the previous line contained an
- unterminated quote, the following line inherits the quoted state.
-
- Traditional preprocessors replace parameters in the replacement text
- with their arguments regardless of whether the parameters are within
- quotes or not. This provides a way to stringize arguments. For example
-
- #define str(x) "x"
- str(/* A comment */some text )
- ==> "some text "
-
- Note that the comment is removed, but that the trailing space is
- preserved. Here is an example of using a comment to effect token
- pasting.
-
- #define suffix(x) foo_/**/x
- suffix(bar)
- ==> foo_bar
-
- File: cpp, Node: Traditional miscellany, Next: Traditional warnings, Prev: Traditional macros, Up: Traditional Mode
-
- 10.3 Traditional miscellany
- ===========================
-
- Here are some things to be aware of when using the traditional
- preprocessor.
-
- * Preprocessing directives are recognized only when their leading
- `#' appears in the first column. There can be no whitespace
- between the beginning of the line and the `#', but whitespace can
- follow the `#'.
-
- * A true traditional C preprocessor does not recognize `#error' or
- `#pragma', and may not recognize `#elif'. CPP supports all the
- directives in traditional mode that it supports in ISO mode,
- including extensions, with the exception that the effects of
- `#pragma GCC poison' are undefined.
-
- * __STDC__ is not defined.
-
- * If you use digraphs the behavior is undefined.
-
- * If a line that looks like a directive appears within macro
- arguments, the behavior is undefined.
-
-
- File: cpp, Node: Traditional warnings, Prev: Traditional miscellany, Up: Traditional Mode
-
- 10.4 Traditional warnings
- =========================
-
- You can request warnings about features that did not exist, or worked
- differently, in traditional C with the `-Wtraditional' option. GCC
- does not warn about features of ISO C which you must use when you are
- using a conforming compiler, such as the `#' and `##' operators.
-
- Presently `-Wtraditional' warns about:
-
- * Macro parameters that appear within string literals in the macro
- body. In traditional C macro replacement takes place within
- string literals, but does not in ISO C.
-
- * In traditional C, some preprocessor directives did not exist.
- Traditional preprocessors would only consider a line to be a
- directive if the `#' appeared in column 1 on the line. Therefore
- `-Wtraditional' warns about directives that traditional C
- understands but would ignore because the `#' does not appear as the
- first character on the line. It also suggests you hide directives
- like `#pragma' not understood by traditional C by indenting them.
- Some traditional implementations would not recognize `#elif', so it
- suggests avoiding it altogether.
-
- * A function-like macro that appears without an argument list. In
- some traditional preprocessors this was an error. In ISO C it
- merely means that the macro is not expanded.
-
- * The unary plus operator. This did not exist in traditional C.
-
- * The `U' and `LL' integer constant suffixes, which were not
- available in traditional C. (Traditional C does support the `L'
- suffix for simple long integer constants.) You are not warned
- about uses of these suffixes in macros defined in system headers.
- For instance, `UINT_MAX' may well be defined as `4294967295U', but
- you will not be warned if you use `UINT_MAX'.
-
- You can usually avoid the warning, and the related warning about
- constants which are so large that they are unsigned, by writing the
- integer constant in question in hexadecimal, with no U suffix.
- Take care, though, because this gives the wrong result in exotic
- cases.
-
- File: cpp, Node: Implementation Details, Next: Invocation, Prev: Traditional Mode, Up: Top
-
- 11 Implementation Details
- *************************
-
- Here we document details of how the preprocessor's implementation
- affects its user-visible behavior. You should try to avoid undue
- reliance on behavior described here, as it is possible that it will
- change subtly in future implementations.
-
- Also documented here are obsolete features and changes from previous
- versions of CPP.
-
- * Menu:
-
- * Implementation-defined behavior::
- * Implementation limits::
- * Obsolete Features::
- * Differences from previous versions::
-
- File: cpp, Node: Implementation-defined behavior, Next: Implementation limits, Up: Implementation Details
-
- 11.1 Implementation-defined behavior
- ====================================
-
- This is how CPP behaves in all the cases which the C standard describes
- as "implementation-defined". This term means that the implementation
- is free to do what it likes, but must document its choice and stick to
- it.
-
- * The mapping of physical source file multi-byte characters to the
- execution character set.
-
- Currently, CPP requires its input to be ASCII or UTF-8. The
- execution character set may be controlled by the user, with the
- `-ftarget-charset' and `-ftarget-wide-charset' options.
-
- * Identifier characters.
-
- The C and C++ standards allow identifiers to be composed of `_'
- and the alphanumeric characters. C++ and C99 also allow universal
- character names (not implemented in GCC), and C99 further permits
- implementation-defined characters.
-
- GCC allows the `$' character in identifiers as an extension for
- most targets. This is true regardless of the `std=' switch, since
- this extension cannot conflict with standards-conforming programs.
- When preprocessing assembler, however, dollars are not identifier
- characters by default.
-
- Currently the targets that by default do not permit `$' are AVR,
- IP2K, MMIX, MIPS Irix 3, ARM aout, and PowerPC targets for the AIX
- and BeOS operating systems.
-
- You can override the default with `-fdollars-in-identifiers' or
- `fno-dollars-in-identifiers'. *Note fdollars-in-identifiers::.
-
- * Non-empty sequences of whitespace characters.
-
- In textual output, each whitespace sequence is collapsed to a
- single space. For aesthetic reasons, the first token on each
- non-directive line of output is preceded with sufficient spaces
- that it appears in the same column as it did in the original
- source file.
-
- * The numeric value of character constants in preprocessor
- expressions.
-
- The preprocessor and compiler interpret character constants in the
- same way; i.e. escape sequences such as `\a' are given the values
- they would have on the target machine.
-
- The compiler values a multi-character character constant a
- character at a time, shifting the previous value left by the
- number of bits per target character, and then or-ing in the
- bit-pattern of the new character truncated to the width of a
- target character. The final bit-pattern is given type `int', and
- is therefore signed, regardless of whether single characters are
- signed or not (a slight change from versions 3.1 and earlier of
- GCC). If there are more characters in the constant than would fit
- in the target `int' the compiler issues a warning, and the excess
- leading characters are ignored.
-
- For example, 'ab' for a target with an 8-bit `char' would be
- interpreted as
- (int) ((unsigned char) 'a' * 256 + (unsigned char) 'b'), and
- '\234a' as
- (int) ((unsigned char) '\234' * 256 + (unsigned char) 'a').
-
- * Source file inclusion.
-
- For a discussion on how the preprocessor locates header files,
- *Note Include Operation::.
-
- * Interpretation of the filename resulting from a macro-expanded
- `#include' directive.
-
- *Note Computed Includes::.
-
- * Treatment of a `#pragma' directive that after macro-expansion
- results in a standard pragma.
-
- No macro expansion occurs on any `#pragma' directive line, so the
- question does not arise.
-
- Note that GCC does not yet implement any of the standard pragmas.
-
-
- File: cpp, Node: Implementation limits, Next: Obsolete Features, Prev: Implementation-defined behavior, Up: Implementation Details
-
- 11.2 Implementation limits
- ==========================
-
- CPP has a small number of internal limits. This section lists the
- limits which the C standard requires to be no lower than some minimum,
- and all the others we are aware of. We intend there to be as few limits
- as possible. If you encounter an undocumented or inconvenient limit,
- please report that to us as a bug. (See the section on reporting bugs
- in the GCC manual.)
-
- Where we say something is limited "only by available memory", that
- means that internal data structures impose no intrinsic limit, and space
- is allocated with `malloc' or equivalent. The actual limit will
- therefore depend on many things, such as the size of other things
- allocated by the compiler at the same time, the amount of memory
- consumed by other processes on the same computer, etc.
-
- * Nesting levels of `#include' files.
-
- We impose an arbitrary limit of 200 levels, to avoid runaway
- recursion. The standard requires at least 15 levels.
-
- * Nesting levels of conditional inclusion.
-
- The C standard mandates this be at least 63. CPP is limited only
- by available memory.
-
- * Levels of parenthesized expressions within a full expression.
-
- The C standard requires this to be at least 63. In preprocessor
- conditional expressions, it is limited only by available memory.
-
- * Significant initial characters in an identifier or macro name.
-
- The preprocessor treats all characters as significant. The C
- standard requires only that the first 63 be significant.
-
- * Number of macros simultaneously defined in a single translation
- unit.
-
- The standard requires at least 4095 be possible. CPP is limited
- only by available memory.
-
- * Number of parameters in a macro definition and arguments in a
- macro call.
-
- We allow `USHRT_MAX', which is no smaller than 65,535. The minimum
- required by the standard is 127.
-
- * Number of characters on a logical source line.
-
- The C standard requires a minimum of 4096 be permitted. CPP places
- no limits on this, but you may get incorrect column numbers
- reported in diagnostics for lines longer than 65,535 characters.
-
- * Maximum size of a source file.
-
- The standard does not specify any lower limit on the maximum size
- of a source file. GNU cpp maps files into memory, so it is
- limited by the available address space. This is generally at
- least two gigabytes. Depending on the operating system, the size
- of physical memory may or may not be a limitation.
-
-
- File: cpp, Node: Obsolete Features, Next: Differences from previous versions, Prev: Implementation limits, Up: Implementation Details
-
- 11.3 Obsolete Features
- ======================
-
- CPP has a number of features which are present mainly for compatibility
- with older programs. We discourage their use in new code. In some
- cases, we plan to remove the feature in a future version of GCC.
-
- * Menu:
-
- * Assertions::
- * Obsolete once-only headers::
-
- File: cpp, Node: Assertions, Next: Obsolete once-only headers, Up: Obsolete Features
-
- 11.3.1 Assertions
- -----------------
-
- "Assertions" are a deprecated alternative to macros in writing
- conditionals to test what sort of computer or system the compiled
- program will run on. Assertions are usually predefined, but you can
- define them with preprocessing directives or command-line options.
-
- Assertions were intended to provide a more systematic way to describe
- the compiler's target system. However, in practice they are just as
- unpredictable as the system-specific predefined macros. In addition,
- they are not part of any standard, and only a few compilers support
- them. Therefore, the use of assertions is *less* portable than the use
- of system-specific predefined macros. We recommend you do not use them
- at all.
-
- An assertion looks like this:
-
- #PREDICATE (ANSWER)
-
- PREDICATE must be a single identifier. ANSWER can be any sequence of
- tokens; all characters are significant except for leading and trailing
- whitespace, and differences in internal whitespace sequences are
- ignored. (This is similar to the rules governing macro redefinition.)
- Thus, `(x + y)' is different from `(x+y)' but equivalent to
- `( x + y )'. Parentheses do not nest inside an answer.
-
- To test an assertion, you write it in an `#if'. For example, this
- conditional succeeds if either `vax' or `ns16000' has been asserted as
- an answer for `machine'.
-
- #if #machine (vax) || #machine (ns16000)
-
- You can test whether _any_ answer is asserted for a predicate by
- omitting the answer in the conditional:
-
- #if #machine
-
- Assertions are made with the `#assert' directive. Its sole argument
- is the assertion to make, without the leading `#' that identifies
- assertions in conditionals.
-
- #assert PREDICATE (ANSWER)
-
- You may make several assertions with the same predicate and different
- answers. Subsequent assertions do not override previous ones for the
- same predicate. All the answers for any given predicate are
- simultaneously true.
-
- Assertions can be canceled with the `#unassert' directive. It has
- the same syntax as `#assert'. In that form it cancels only the answer
- which was specified on the `#unassert' line; other answers for that
- predicate remain true. You can cancel an entire predicate by leaving
- out the answer:
-
- #unassert PREDICATE
-
- In either form, if no such assertion has been made, `#unassert' has no
- effect.
-
- You can also make or cancel assertions using command line options.
- *Note Invocation::.
-
- File: cpp, Node: Obsolete once-only headers, Prev: Assertions, Up: Obsolete Features
-
- 11.3.2 Obsolete once-only headers
- ---------------------------------
-
- CPP supports two more ways of indicating that a header file should be
- read only once. Neither one is as portable as a wrapper `#ifndef', and
- we recommend you do not use them in new programs.
-
- In the Objective-C language, there is a variant of `#include' called
- `#import' which includes a file, but does so at most once. If you use
- `#import' instead of `#include', then you don't need the conditionals
- inside the header file to prevent multiple inclusion of the contents.
- GCC permits the use of `#import' in C and C++ as well as Objective-C.
- However, it is not in standard C or C++ and should therefore not be
- used by portable programs.
-
- `#import' is not a well designed feature. It requires the users of
- a header file to know that it should only be included once. It is much
- better for the header file's implementor to write the file so that users
- don't need to know this. Using a wrapper `#ifndef' accomplishes this
- goal.
-
- In the present implementation, a single use of `#import' will
- prevent the file from ever being read again, by either `#import' or
- `#include'. You should not rely on this; do not use both `#import' and
- `#include' to refer to the same header file.
-
- Another way to prevent a header file from being included more than
- once is with the `#pragma once' directive. If `#pragma once' is seen
- when scanning a header file, that file will never be read again, no
- matter what.
-
- `#pragma once' does not have the problems that `#import' does, but
- it is not recognized by all preprocessors, so you cannot rely on it in
- a portable program.
-
- File: cpp, Node: Differences from previous versions, Prev: Obsolete Features, Up: Implementation Details
-
- 11.4 Differences from previous versions
- =======================================
-
- This section details behavior which has changed from previous versions
- of CPP. We do not plan to change it again in the near future, but we
- do not promise not to, either.
-
- The "previous versions" discussed here are 2.95 and before. The
- behavior of GCC 3.0 is mostly the same as the behavior of the widely
- used 2.96 and 2.97 development snapshots. Where there are differences,
- they generally represent bugs in the snapshots.
-
- * Order of evaluation of `#' and `##' operators
-
- The standard does not specify the order of evaluation of a chain of
- `##' operators, nor whether `#' is evaluated before, after, or at
- the same time as `##'. You should therefore not write any code
- which depends on any specific ordering. It is possible to
- guarantee an ordering, if you need one, by suitable use of nested
- macros.
-
- An example of where this might matter is pasting the arguments `1',
- `e' and `-2'. This would be fine for left-to-right pasting, but
- right-to-left pasting would produce an invalid token `e-2'.
-
- GCC 3.0 evaluates `#' and `##' at the same time and strictly left
- to right. Older versions evaluated all `#' operators first, then
- all `##' operators, in an unreliable order.
-
- * The form of whitespace between tokens in preprocessor output
-
- *Note Preprocessor Output::, for the current textual format. This
- is also the format used by stringification. Normally, the
- preprocessor communicates tokens directly to the compiler's
- parser, and whitespace does not come up at all.
-
- Older versions of GCC preserved all whitespace provided by the
- user and inserted lots more whitespace of their own, because they
- could not accurately predict when extra spaces were needed to
- prevent accidental token pasting.
-
- * Optional argument when invoking rest argument macros
-
- As an extension, GCC permits you to omit the variable arguments
- entirely when you use a variable argument macro. This is
- forbidden by the 1999 C standard, and will provoke a pedantic
- warning with GCC 3.0. Previous versions accepted it silently.
-
- * `##' swallowing preceding text in rest argument macros
-
- Formerly, in a macro expansion, if `##' appeared before a variable
- arguments parameter, and the set of tokens specified for that
- argument in the macro invocation was empty, previous versions of
- CPP would back up and remove the preceding sequence of
- non-whitespace characters (*not* the preceding token). This
- extension is in direct conflict with the 1999 C standard and has
- been drastically pared back.
-
- In the current version of the preprocessor, if `##' appears between
- a comma and a variable arguments parameter, and the variable
- argument is omitted entirely, the comma will be removed from the
- expansion. If the variable argument is empty, or the token before
- `##' is not a comma, then `##' behaves as a normal token paste.
-
- * `#line' and `#include'
-
- The `#line' directive used to change GCC's notion of the
- "directory containing the current file," used by `#include' with a
- double-quoted header file name. In 3.0 and later, it does not.
- *Note Line Control::, for further explanation.
-
- * Syntax of `#line'
-
- In GCC 2.95 and previous, the string constant argument to `#line'
- was treated the same way as the argument to `#include': backslash
- escapes were not honored, and the string ended at the second `"'.
- This is not compliant with the C standard. In GCC 3.0, an attempt
- was made to correct the behavior, so that the string was treated
- as a real string constant, but it turned out to be buggy. In 3.1,
- the bugs have been fixed. (We are not fixing the bugs in 3.0
- because they affect relatively few people and the fix is quite
- invasive.)
-
-
- File: cpp, Node: Invocation, Next: Environment Variables, Prev: Implementation Details, Up: Top
-
- 12 Invocation
- *************
-
- Most often when you use the C preprocessor you will not have to invoke
- it explicitly: the C compiler will do so automatically. However, the
- preprocessor is sometimes useful on its own. All the options listed
- here are also acceptable to the C compiler and have the same meaning,
- except that the C compiler has different rules for specifying the output
- file.
-
- *Note:* Whether you use the preprocessor by way of `gcc' or `cpp',
- the "compiler driver" is run first. This program's purpose is to
- translate your command into invocations of the programs that do the
- actual work. Their command line interfaces are similar but not
- identical to the documented interface, and may change without notice.
-
- The C preprocessor expects two file names as arguments, INFILE and
- OUTFILE. The preprocessor reads INFILE together with any other files
- it specifies with `#include'. All the output generated by the combined
- input files is written in OUTFILE.
-
- Either INFILE or OUTFILE may be `-', which as INFILE means to read
- from standard input and as OUTFILE means to write to standard output.
- Also, if either file is omitted, it means the same as if `-' had been
- specified for that file.
-
- Unless otherwise noted, or the option ends in `=', all options which
- take an argument may have that argument appear either immediately after
- the option, or with a space between option and argument: `-Ifoo' and
- `-I foo' have the same effect.
-
- Many options have multi-letter names; therefore multiple
- single-letter options may _not_ be grouped: `-dM' is very different from
- `-d -M'.
-
- `-D NAME'
- Predefine NAME as a macro, with definition `1'.
-
- `-D NAME=DEFINITION'
- Predefine NAME as a macro, with definition DEFINITION. The
- contents of DEFINITION are tokenized and processed as if they
- appeared during translation phase three in a `#define' directive.
- In particular, the definition will be truncated by embedded
- newline characters.
-
- If you are invoking the preprocessor from a shell or shell-like
- program you may need to use the shell's quoting syntax to protect
- characters such as spaces that have a meaning in the shell syntax.
-
- If you wish to define a function-like macro on the command line,
- write its argument list with surrounding parentheses before the
- equals sign (if any). Parentheses are meaningful to most shells,
- so you will need to quote the option. With `sh' and `csh',
- `-D'NAME(ARGS...)=DEFINITION'' works.
-
- `-D' and `-U' options are processed in the order they are given on
- the command line. All `-imacros FILE' and `-include FILE' options
- are processed after all `-D' and `-U' options.
-
- `-U NAME'
- Cancel any previous definition of NAME, either built in or
- provided with a `-D' option.
-
- `-undef'
- Do not predefine any system-specific or GCC-specific macros. The
- standard predefined macros remain defined. *Note Standard
- Predefined Macros::.
-
- `-I DIR'
- Add the directory DIR to the list of directories to be searched
- for header files. *Note Search Path::. Directories named by `-I'
- are searched before the standard system include directories. If
- the directory DIR is a standard system include directory, the
- option is ignored to ensure that the default search order for
- system directories and the special treatment of system headers are
- not defeated (*note System Headers::) .
-
- `-o FILE'
- Write output to FILE. This is the same as specifying FILE as the
- second non-option argument to `cpp'. `gcc' has a different
- interpretation of a second non-option argument, so you must use
- `-o' to specify the output file.
-
- `-Wall'
- Turns on all optional warnings which are desirable for normal code.
- At present this is `-Wcomment', `-Wtrigraphs', `-Wmultichar' and a
- warning about integer promotion causing a change of sign in `#if'
- expressions. Note that many of the preprocessor's warnings are on
- by default and have no options to control them.
-
- `-Wcomment'
- `-Wcomments'
- Warn whenever a comment-start sequence `/*' appears in a `/*'
- comment, or whenever a backslash-newline appears in a `//' comment.
- (Both forms have the same effect.)
-
- `-Wtrigraphs'
- Most trigraphs in comments cannot affect the meaning of the
- program. However, a trigraph that would form an escaped newline
- (`??/' at the end of a line) can, by changing where the comment
- begins or ends. Therefore, only trigraphs that would form escaped
- newlines produce warnings inside a comment.
-
- This option is implied by `-Wall'. If `-Wall' is not given, this
- option is still enabled unless trigraphs are enabled. To get
- trigraph conversion without warnings, but get the other `-Wall'
- warnings, use `-trigraphs -Wall -Wno-trigraphs'.
-
- `-Wtraditional'
- Warn about certain constructs that behave differently in
- traditional and ISO C. Also warn about ISO C constructs that have
- no traditional C equivalent, and problematic constructs which
- should be avoided. *Note Traditional Mode::.
-
- `-Wimport'
- Warn the first time `#import' is used.
-
- `-Wundef'
- Warn whenever an identifier which is not a macro is encountered in
- an `#if' directive, outside of `defined'. Such identifiers are
- replaced with zero.
-
- `-Wunused-macros'
- Warn about macros defined in the main file that are unused. A
- macro is "used" if it is expanded or tested for existence at least
- once. The preprocessor will also warn if the macro has not been
- used at the time it is redefined or undefined.
-
- Built-in macros, macros defined on the command line, and macros
- defined in include files are not warned about.
-
- *Note:* If a macro is actually used, but only used in skipped
- conditional blocks, then CPP will report it as unused. To avoid
- the warning in such a case, you might improve the scope of the
- macro's definition by, for example, moving it into the first
- skipped block. Alternatively, you could provide a dummy use with
- something like:
-
- #if defined the_macro_causing_the_warning
- #endif
-
- `-Wendif-labels'
- Warn whenever an `#else' or an `#endif' are followed by text.
- This usually happens in code of the form
-
- #if FOO
- ...
- #else FOO
- ...
- #endif FOO
-
- The second and third `FOO' should be in comments, but often are not
- in older programs. This warning is on by default.
-
- `-Werror'
- Make all warnings into hard errors. Source code which triggers
- warnings will be rejected.
-
- `-Wsystem-headers'
- Issue warnings for code in system headers. These are normally
- unhelpful in finding bugs in your own code, therefore suppressed.
- If you are responsible for the system library, you may want to see
- them.
-
- `-w'
- Suppress all warnings, including those which GNU CPP issues by
- default.
-
- `-pedantic'
- Issue all the mandatory diagnostics listed in the C standard.
- Some of them are left out by default, since they trigger
- frequently on harmless code.
-
- `-pedantic-errors'
- Issue all the mandatory diagnostics, and make all mandatory
- diagnostics into errors. This includes mandatory diagnostics that
- GCC issues without `-pedantic' but treats as warnings.
-
- `-M'
- Instead of outputting the result of preprocessing, output a rule
- suitable for `make' describing the dependencies of the main source
- file. The preprocessor outputs one `make' rule containing the
- object file name for that source file, a colon, and the names of
- all the included files, including those coming from `-include' or
- `-imacros' command line options.
-
- Unless specified explicitly (with `-MT' or `-MQ'), the object file
- name consists of the basename of the source file with any suffix
- replaced with object file suffix. If there are many included
- files then the rule is split into several lines using `\'-newline.
- The rule has no commands.
-
- This option does not suppress the preprocessor's debug output,
- such as `-dM'. To avoid mixing such debug output with the
- dependency rules you should explicitly specify the dependency
- output file with `-MF', or use an environment variable like
- `DEPENDENCIES_OUTPUT' (*note Environment Variables::). Debug
- output will still be sent to the regular output stream as normal.
-
- Passing `-M' to the driver implies `-E', and suppresses warnings
- with an implicit `-w'.
-
- `-MM'
- Like `-M' but do not mention header files that are found in system
- header directories, nor header files that are included, directly
- or indirectly, from such a header.
-
- This implies that the choice of angle brackets or double quotes in
- an `#include' directive does not in itself determine whether that
- header will appear in `-MM' dependency output. This is a slight
- change in semantics from GCC versions 3.0 and earlier.
-
- `-MF FILE'
- When used with `-M' or `-MM', specifies a file to write the
- dependencies to. If no `-MF' switch is given the preprocessor
- sends the rules to the same place it would have sent preprocessed
- output.
-
- When used with the driver options `-MD' or `-MMD', `-MF' overrides
- the default dependency output file.
-
- `-MG'
- In conjunction with an option such as `-M' requesting dependency
- generation, `-MG' assumes missing header files are generated files
- and adds them to the dependency list without raising an error.
- The dependency filename is taken directly from the `#include'
- directive without prepending any path. `-MG' also suppresses
- preprocessed output, as a missing header file renders this useless.
-
- This feature is used in automatic updating of makefiles.
-
- `-MP'
- This option instructs CPP to add a phony target for each dependency
- other than the main file, causing each to depend on nothing. These
- dummy rules work around errors `make' gives if you remove header
- files without updating the `Makefile' to match.
-
- This is typical output:
-
- test.o: test.c test.h
-
- test.h:
-
- `-MT TARGET'
- Change the target of the rule emitted by dependency generation. By
- default CPP takes the name of the main input file, including any
- path, deletes any file suffix such as `.c', and appends the
- platform's usual object suffix. The result is the target.
-
- An `-MT' option will set the target to be exactly the string you
- specify. If you want multiple targets, you can specify them as a
- single argument to `-MT', or use multiple `-MT' options.
-
- For example, `-MT '$(objpfx)foo.o'' might give
-
- $(objpfx)foo.o: foo.c
-
- `-MQ TARGET'
- Same as `-MT', but it quotes any characters which are special to
- Make. `-MQ '$(objpfx)foo.o'' gives
-
- $$(objpfx)foo.o: foo.c
-
- The default target is automatically quoted, as if it were given
- with `-MQ'.
-
- `-MD'
- `-MD' is equivalent to `-M -MF FILE', except that `-E' is not
- implied. The driver determines FILE based on whether an `-o'
- option is given. If it is, the driver uses its argument but with
- a suffix of `.d', otherwise it take the basename of the input file
- and applies a `.d' suffix.
-
- If `-MD' is used in conjunction with `-E', any `-o' switch is
- understood to specify the dependency output file (but *note -MF:
- dashMF.), but if used without `-E', each `-o' is understood to
- specify a target object file.
-
- Since `-E' is not implied, `-MD' can be used to generate a
- dependency output file as a side-effect of the compilation process.
-
- `-MMD'
- Like `-MD' except mention only user header files, not system
- -header files.
-
- `-x c'
- `-x c++'
- `-x objective-c'
- `-x assembler-with-cpp'
- Specify the source language: C, C++, Objective-C, or assembly.
- This has nothing to do with standards conformance or extensions;
- it merely selects which base syntax to expect. If you give none
- of these options, cpp will deduce the language from the extension
- of the source file: `.c', `.cc', `.m', or `.S'. Some other common
- extensions for C++ and assembly are also recognized. If cpp does
- not recognize the extension, it will treat the file as C; this is
- the most generic mode.
-
- *Note:* Previous versions of cpp accepted a `-lang' option which
- selected both the language and the standards conformance level.
- This option has been removed, because it conflicts with the `-l'
- option.
-
- `-std=STANDARD'
- `-ansi'
- Specify the standard to which the code should conform. Currently
- CPP knows about C and C++ standards; others may be added in the
- future.
-
- STANDARD may be one of:
- `iso9899:1990'
- `c89'
- The ISO C standard from 1990. `c89' is the customary
- shorthand for this version of the standard.
-
- The `-ansi' option is equivalent to `-std=c89'.
-
- `iso9899:199409'
- The 1990 C standard, as amended in 1994.
-
- `iso9899:1999'
- `c99'
- `iso9899:199x'
- `c9x'
- The revised ISO C standard, published in December 1999.
- Before publication, this was known as C9X.
-
- `gnu89'
- The 1990 C standard plus GNU extensions. This is the default.
-
- `gnu99'
- `gnu9x'
- The 1999 C standard plus GNU extensions.
-
- `c++98'
- The 1998 ISO C++ standard plus amendments.
-
- `gnu++98'
- The same as `-std=c++98' plus GNU extensions. This is the
- default for C++ code.
-
- `-I-'
- Split the include path. Any directories specified with `-I'
- options before `-I-' are searched only for headers requested with
- `#include "FILE"'; they are not searched for `#include <FILE>'.
- If additional directories are specified with `-I' options after
- the `-I-', those directories are searched for all `#include'
- directives.
-
- In addition, `-I-' inhibits the use of the directory of the current
- file directory as the first search directory for `#include "FILE"'.
- *Note Search Path::.
-
- `-nostdinc'
- Do not search the standard system directories for header files.
- Only the directories you have specified with `-I' options (and the
- directory of the current file, if appropriate) are searched.
-
- `-nostdinc++'
- Do not search for header files in the C++-specific standard
- directories, but do still search the other standard directories.
- (This option is used when building the C++ library.)
-
- `-include FILE'
- Process FILE as if `#include "file"' appeared as the first line of
- the primary source file. However, the first directory searched
- for FILE is the preprocessor's working directory _instead of_ the
- directory containing the main source file. If not found there, it
- is searched for in the remainder of the `#include "..."' search
- chain as normal.
-
- If multiple `-include' options are given, the files are included
- in the order they appear on the command line.
-
- `-imacros FILE'
- Exactly like `-include', except that any output produced by
- scanning FILE is thrown away. Macros it defines remain defined.
- This allows you to acquire all the macros from a header without
- also processing its declarations.
-
- All files specified by `-imacros' are processed before all files
- specified by `-include'.
-
- `-idirafter DIR'
- Search DIR for header files, but do it _after_ all directories
- specified with `-I' and the standard system directories have been
- exhausted. DIR is treated as a system include directory.
-
- `-iprefix PREFIX'
- Specify PREFIX as the prefix for subsequent `-iwithprefix'
- options. If the prefix represents a directory, you should include
- the final `/'.
-
- `-iwithprefix DIR'
- `-iwithprefixbefore DIR'
- Append DIR to the prefix specified previously with `-iprefix', and
- add the resulting directory to the include search path.
- `-iwithprefixbefore' puts it in the same place `-I' would;
- `-iwithprefix' puts it where `-idirafter' would.
-
- `-isystem DIR'
- Search DIR for header files, after all directories specified by
- `-I' but before the standard system directories. Mark it as a
- system directory, so that it gets the same special treatment as is
- applied to the standard system directories. *Note System
- Headers::.
-
- `-fdollars-in-identifiers'
- Accept `$' in identifiers. *Note Identifier characters::.
-
- `-fpreprocessed'
- Indicate to the preprocessor that the input file has already been
- preprocessed. This suppresses things like macro expansion,
- trigraph conversion, escaped newline splicing, and processing of
- most directives. The preprocessor still recognizes and removes
- comments, so that you can pass a file preprocessed with `-C' to
- the compiler without problems. In this mode the integrated
- preprocessor is little more than a tokenizer for the front ends.
-
- `-fpreprocessed' is implicit if the input file has one of the
- extensions `.i', `.ii' or `.mi'. These are the extensions that
- GCC uses for preprocessed files created by `-save-temps'.
-
- `-ftabstop=WIDTH'
- Set the distance between tab stops. This helps the preprocessor
- report correct column numbers in warnings or errors, even if tabs
- appear on the line. If the value is less than 1 or greater than
- 100, the option is ignored. The default is 8.
-
- `-fexec-charset=CHARSET'
- Set the execution character set, used for string and character
- constants. The default is UTF-8. CHARSET can be any encoding
- supported by the system's `iconv' library routine.
-
- `-fwide-exec-charset=CHARSET'
- Set the wide execution character set, used for wide string and
- character constants. The default is UTF-32 or UTF-16, whichever
- corresponds to the width of `wchar_t'. As with
- `-ftarget-charset', CHARSET can be any encoding supported by the
- system's `iconv' library routine; however, you will have problems
- with encodings that do not fit exactly in `wchar_t'.
-
- `-finput-charset=CHARSET'
- Set the input character set, used for translation from the
- character set of the input file to the source character set used
- by GCC. If the locale does not specify, or GCC cannot get this
- information from the locale, the default is UTF-8. This can be
- overridden by either the locale or this command line option.
- Currently the command line option takes precedence if there's a
- conflict. CHARSET can be any encoding supported by the system's
- `iconv' library routine.
-
- `-fworking-directory'
- Enable generation of linemarkers in the preprocessor output that
- will let the compiler know the current working directory at the
- time of preprocessing. When this option is enabled, the
- preprocessor will emit, after the initial linemarker, a second
- linemarker with the current working directory followed by two
- slashes. GCC will use this directory, when it's present in the
- preprocessed input, as the directory emitted as the current
- working directory in some debugging information formats. This
- option is implicitly enabled if debugging information is enabled,
- but this can be inhibited with the negated form
- `-fno-working-directory'. If the `-P' flag is present in the
- command line, this option has no effect, since no `#line'
- directives are emitted whatsoever.
-
- `-fno-show-column'
- Do not print column numbers in diagnostics. This may be necessary
- if diagnostics are being scanned by a program that does not
- understand the column numbers, such as `dejagnu'.
-
- `-A PREDICATE=ANSWER'
- Make an assertion with the predicate PREDICATE and answer ANSWER.
- This form is preferred to the older form `-A PREDICATE(ANSWER)',
- which is still supported, because it does not use shell special
- characters. *Note Assertions::.
-
- `-A -PREDICATE=ANSWER'
- Cancel an assertion with the predicate PREDICATE and answer ANSWER.
-
- `-dCHARS'
- CHARS is a sequence of one or more of the following characters,
- and must not be preceded by a space. Other characters are
- interpreted by the compiler proper, or reserved for future
- versions of GCC, and so are silently ignored. If you specify
- characters whose behavior conflicts, the result is undefined.
-
- `M'
- Instead of the normal output, generate a list of `#define'
- directives for all the macros defined during the execution of
- the preprocessor, including predefined macros. This gives
- you a way of finding out what is predefined in your version
- of the preprocessor. Assuming you have no file `foo.h', the
- command
-
- touch foo.h; cpp -dM foo.h
-
- will show all the predefined macros.
-
- `D'
- Like `M' except in two respects: it does _not_ include the
- predefined macros, and it outputs _both_ the `#define'
- directives and the result of preprocessing. Both kinds of
- output go to the standard output file.
-
- `N'
- Like `D', but emit only the macro names, not their expansions.
-
- `I'
- Output `#include' directives in addition to the result of
- preprocessing.
-
- `-P'
- Inhibit generation of linemarkers in the output from the
- preprocessor. This might be useful when running the preprocessor
- on something that is not C code, and will be sent to a program
- which might be confused by the linemarkers. *Note Preprocessor
- Output::.
-
- `-C'
- Do not discard comments. All comments are passed through to the
- output file, except for comments in processed directives, which
- are deleted along with the directive.
-
- You should be prepared for side effects when using `-C'; it causes
- the preprocessor to treat comments as tokens in their own right.
- For example, comments appearing at the start of what would be a
- directive line have the effect of turning that line into an
- ordinary source line, since the first token on the line is no
- longer a `#'.
-
- `-CC'
- Do not discard comments, including during macro expansion. This is
- like `-C', except that comments contained within macros are also
- passed through to the output file where the macro is expanded.
-
- In addition to the side-effects of the `-C' option, the `-CC'
- option causes all C++-style comments inside a macro to be
- converted to C-style comments. This is to prevent later use of
- that macro from inadvertently commenting out the remainder of the
- source line.
-
- The `-CC' option is generally used to support lint comments.
-
- `-traditional-cpp'
- Try to imitate the behavior of old-fashioned C preprocessors, as
- opposed to ISO C preprocessors. *Note Traditional Mode::.
-
- `-trigraphs'
- Process trigraph sequences. *Note Initial processing::.
-
- `-remap'
- Enable special code to work around file systems which only permit
- very short file names, such as MS-DOS.
-
- `--help'
- `--target-help'
- Print text describing all the command line options instead of
- preprocessing anything.
-
- `-v'
- Verbose mode. Print out GNU CPP's version number at the beginning
- of execution, and report the final form of the include path.
-
- `-H'
- Print the name of each header file used, in addition to other
- normal activities. Each name is indented to show how deep in the
- `#include' stack it is. Precompiled header files are also
- printed, even if they are found to be invalid; an invalid
- precompiled header file is printed with `...x' and a valid one
- with `...!' .
-
- `-version'
- `--version'
- Print out GNU CPP's version number. With one dash, proceed to
- preprocess as normal. With two dashes, exit immediately.
-
- File: cpp, Node: Environment Variables, Next: GNU Free Documentation License, Prev: Invocation, Up: Top
-
- 13 Environment Variables
- ************************
-
- This section describes the environment variables that affect how CPP
- operates. You can use them to specify directories or prefixes to use
- when searching for include files, or to control dependency output.
-
- Note that you can also specify places to search using options such as
- `-I', and control dependency output with options like `-M' (*note
- Invocation::). These take precedence over environment variables, which
- in turn take precedence over the configuration of GCC.
-
- `CPATH'
- `C_INCLUDE_PATH'
- `CPLUS_INCLUDE_PATH'
- `OBJC_INCLUDE_PATH'
- Each variable's value is a list of directories separated by a
- special character, much like `PATH', in which to look for header
- files. The special character, `PATH_SEPARATOR', is
- target-dependent and determined at GCC build time. For Microsoft
- Windows-based targets it is a semicolon, and for almost all other
- targets it is a colon.
-
- `CPATH' specifies a list of directories to be searched as if
- specified with `-I', but after any paths given with `-I' options
- on the command line. This environment variable is used regardless
- of which language is being preprocessed.
-
- The remaining environment variables apply only when preprocessing
- the particular language indicated. Each specifies a list of
- directories to be searched as if specified with `-isystem', but
- after any paths given with `-isystem' options on the command line.
-
- In all these variables, an empty element instructs the compiler to
- search its current working directory. Empty elements can appear
- at the beginning or end of a path. For instance, if the value of
- `CPATH' is `:/special/include', that has the same effect as
- `-I. -I/special/include'.
-
- See also *Note Search Path::.
-
- `DEPENDENCIES_OUTPUT'
- If this variable is set, its value specifies how to output
- dependencies for Make based on the non-system header files
- processed by the compiler. System header files are ignored in the
- dependency output.
-
- The value of `DEPENDENCIES_OUTPUT' can be just a file name, in
- which case the Make rules are written to that file, guessing the
- target name from the source file name. Or the value can have the
- form `FILE TARGET', in which case the rules are written to file
- FILE using TARGET as the target name.
-
- In other words, this environment variable is equivalent to
- combining the options `-MM' and `-MF' (*note Invocation::), with
- an optional `-MT' switch too.
-
- `SUNPRO_DEPENDENCIES'
- This variable is the same as `DEPENDENCIES_OUTPUT' (see above),
- except that system header files are not ignored, so it implies
- `-M' rather than `-MM'. However, the dependence on the main input
- file is omitted. *Note Invocation::.
-
- File: cpp, Node: GNU Free Documentation License, Next: Index of Directives, Prev: Environment Variables, Up: Top
-
- GNU Free Documentation License
- ******************************
-
- Version 1.2, November 2002
-
- Copyright (C) 2000,2001,2002 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
- 59 Temple Place, Suite 330, Boston, MA 02111-1307, USA
-
- Everyone is permitted to copy and distribute verbatim copies
- of this license document, but changing it is not allowed.
-
- 0. PREAMBLE
-
- The purpose of this License is to make a manual, textbook, or other
- functional and useful document "free" in the sense of freedom: to
- assure everyone the effective freedom to copy and redistribute it,
- with or without modifying it, either commercially or
- noncommercially. Secondarily, this License preserves for the
- author and publisher a way to get credit for their work, while not
- being considered responsible for modifications made by others.
-
- This License is a kind of "copyleft", which means that derivative
- works of the document must themselves be free in the same sense.
- It complements the GNU General Public License, which is a copyleft
- license designed for free software.
-
- We have designed this License in order to use it for manuals for
- free software, because free software needs free documentation: a
- free program should come with manuals providing the same freedoms
- that the software does. But this License is not limited to
- software manuals; it can be used for any textual work, regardless
- of subject matter or whether it is published as a printed book.
- We recommend this License principally for works whose purpose is
- instruction or reference.
-
- 1. APPLICABILITY AND DEFINITIONS
-
- This License applies to any manual or other work, in any medium,
- that contains a notice placed by the copyright holder saying it
- can be distributed under the terms of this License. Such a notice
- grants a world-wide, royalty-free license, unlimited in duration,
- to use that work under the conditions stated herein. The
- "Document", below, refers to any such manual or work. Any member
- of the public is a licensee, and is addressed as "you". You
- accept the license if you copy, modify or distribute the work in a
- way requiring permission under copyright law.
-
- A "Modified Version" of the Document means any work containing the
- Document or a portion of it, either copied verbatim, or with
- modifications and/or translated into another language.
-
- A "Secondary Section" is a named appendix or a front-matter section
- of the Document that deals exclusively with the relationship of the
- publishers or authors of the Document to the Document's overall
- subject (or to related matters) and contains nothing that could
- fall directly within that overall subject. (Thus, if the Document
- is in part a textbook of mathematics, a Secondary Section may not
- explain any mathematics.) The relationship could be a matter of
- historical connection with the subject or with related matters, or
- of legal, commercial, philosophical, ethical or political position
- regarding them.
-
- The "Invariant Sections" are certain Secondary Sections whose
- titles are designated, as being those of Invariant Sections, in
- the notice that says that the Document is released under this
- License. If a section does not fit the above definition of
- Secondary then it is not allowed to be designated as Invariant.
- The Document may contain zero Invariant Sections. If the Document
- does not identify any Invariant Sections then there are none.
-
- The "Cover Texts" are certain short passages of text that are
- listed, as Front-Cover Texts or Back-Cover Texts, in the notice
- that says that the Document is released under this License. A
- Front-Cover Text may be at most 5 words, and a Back-Cover Text may
- be at most 25 words.
-
- A "Transparent" copy of the Document means a machine-readable copy,
- represented in a format whose specification is available to the
- general public, that is suitable for revising the document
- straightforwardly with generic text editors or (for images
- composed of pixels) generic paint programs or (for drawings) some
- widely available drawing editor, and that is suitable for input to
- text formatters or for automatic translation to a variety of
- formats suitable for input to text formatters. A copy made in an
- otherwise Transparent file format whose markup, or absence of
- markup, has been arranged to thwart or discourage subsequent
- modification by readers is not Transparent. An image format is
- not Transparent if used for any substantial amount of text. A
- copy that is not "Transparent" is called "Opaque".
-
- Examples of suitable formats for Transparent copies include plain
- ASCII without markup, Texinfo input format, LaTeX input format,
- SGML or XML using a publicly available DTD, and
- standard-conforming simple HTML, PostScript or PDF designed for
- human modification. Examples of transparent image formats include
- PNG, XCF and JPG. Opaque formats include proprietary formats that
- can be read and edited only by proprietary word processors, SGML or
- XML for which the DTD and/or processing tools are not generally
- available, and the machine-generated HTML, PostScript or PDF
- produced by some word processors for output purposes only.
-
- The "Title Page" means, for a printed book, the title page itself,
- plus such following pages as are needed to hold, legibly, the
- material this License requires to appear in the title page. For
- works in formats which do not have any title page as such, "Title
- Page" means the text near the most prominent appearance of the
- work's title, preceding the beginning of the body of the text.
-
- A section "Entitled XYZ" means a named subunit of the Document
- whose title either is precisely XYZ or contains XYZ in parentheses
- following text that translates XYZ in another language. (Here XYZ
- stands for a specific section name mentioned below, such as
- "Acknowledgements", "Dedications", "Endorsements", or "History".)
- To "Preserve the Title" of such a section when you modify the
- Document means that it remains a section "Entitled XYZ" according
- to this definition.
-
- The Document may include Warranty Disclaimers next to the notice
- which states that this License applies to the Document. These
- Warranty Disclaimers are considered to be included by reference in
- this License, but only as regards disclaiming warranties: any other
- implication that these Warranty Disclaimers may have is void and
- has no effect on the meaning of this License.
-
- 2. VERBATIM COPYING
-
- You may copy and distribute the Document in any medium, either
- commercially or noncommercially, provided that this License, the
- copyright notices, and the license notice saying this License
- applies to the Document are reproduced in all copies, and that you
- add no other conditions whatsoever to those of this License. You
- may not use technical measures to obstruct or control the reading
- or further copying of the copies you make or distribute. However,
- you may accept compensation in exchange for copies. If you
- distribute a large enough number of copies you must also follow
- the conditions in section 3.
-
- You may also lend copies, under the same conditions stated above,
- and you may publicly display copies.
-
- 3. COPYING IN QUANTITY
-
- If you publish printed copies (or copies in media that commonly
- have printed covers) of the Document, numbering more than 100, and
- the Document's license notice requires Cover Texts, you must
- enclose the copies in covers that carry, clearly and legibly, all
- these Cover Texts: Front-Cover Texts on the front cover, and
- Back-Cover Texts on the back cover. Both covers must also clearly
- and legibly identify you as the publisher of these copies. The
- front cover must present the full title with all words of the
- title equally prominent and visible. You may add other material
- on the covers in addition. Copying with changes limited to the
- covers, as long as they preserve the title of the Document and
- satisfy these conditions, can be treated as verbatim copying in
- other respects.
-
- If the required texts for either cover are too voluminous to fit
- legibly, you should put the first ones listed (as many as fit
- reasonably) on the actual cover, and continue the rest onto
- adjacent pages.
-
- If you publish or distribute Opaque copies of the Document
- numbering more than 100, you must either include a
- machine-readable Transparent copy along with each Opaque copy, or
- state in or with each Opaque copy a computer-network location from
- which the general network-using public has access to download
- using public-standard network protocols a complete Transparent
- copy of the Document, free of added material. If you use the
- latter option, you must take reasonably prudent steps, when you
- begin distribution of Opaque copies in quantity, to ensure that
- this Transparent copy will remain thus accessible at the stated
- location until at least one year after the last time you
- distribute an Opaque copy (directly or through your agents or
- retailers) of that edition to the public.
-
- It is requested, but not required, that you contact the authors of
- the Document well before redistributing any large number of
- copies, to give them a chance to provide you with an updated
- version of the Document.
-
- 4. MODIFICATIONS
-
- You may copy and distribute a Modified Version of the Document
- under the conditions of sections 2 and 3 above, provided that you
- release the Modified Version under precisely this License, with
- the Modified Version filling the role of the Document, thus
- licensing distribution and modification of the Modified Version to
- whoever possesses a copy of it. In addition, you must do these
- things in the Modified Version:
-
- A. Use in the Title Page (and on the covers, if any) a title
- distinct from that of the Document, and from those of
- previous versions (which should, if there were any, be listed
- in the History section of the Document). You may use the
- same title as a previous version if the original publisher of
- that version gives permission.
-
- B. List on the Title Page, as authors, one or more persons or
- entities responsible for authorship of the modifications in
- the Modified Version, together with at least five of the
- principal authors of the Document (all of its principal
- authors, if it has fewer than five), unless they release you
- from this requirement.
-
- C. State on the Title page the name of the publisher of the
- Modified Version, as the publisher.
-
- D. Preserve all the copyright notices of the Document.
-
- E. Add an appropriate copyright notice for your modifications
- adjacent to the other copyright notices.
-
- F. Include, immediately after the copyright notices, a license
- notice giving the public permission to use the Modified
- Version under the terms of this License, in the form shown in
- the Addendum below.
-
- G. Preserve in that license notice the full lists of Invariant
- Sections and required Cover Texts given in the Document's
- license notice.
-
- H. Include an unaltered copy of this License.
-
- I. Preserve the section Entitled "History", Preserve its Title,
- and add to it an item stating at least the title, year, new
- authors, and publisher of the Modified Version as given on
- the Title Page. If there is no section Entitled "History" in
- the Document, create one stating the title, year, authors,
- and publisher of the Document as given on its Title Page,
- then add an item describing the Modified Version as stated in
- the previous sentence.
-
- J. Preserve the network location, if any, given in the Document
- for public access to a Transparent copy of the Document, and
- likewise the network locations given in the Document for
- previous versions it was based on. These may be placed in
- the "History" section. You may omit a network location for a
- work that was published at least four years before the
- Document itself, or if the original publisher of the version
- it refers to gives permission.
-
- K. For any section Entitled "Acknowledgements" or "Dedications",
- Preserve the Title of the section, and preserve in the
- section all the substance and tone of each of the contributor
- acknowledgements and/or dedications given therein.
-
- L. Preserve all the Invariant Sections of the Document,
- unaltered in their text and in their titles. Section numbers
- or the equivalent are not considered part of the section
- titles.
-
- M. Delete any section Entitled "Endorsements". Such a section
- may not be included in the Modified Version.
-
- N. Do not retitle any existing section to be Entitled
- "Endorsements" or to conflict in title with any Invariant
- Section.
-
- O. Preserve any Warranty Disclaimers.
-
- If the Modified Version includes new front-matter sections or
- appendices that qualify as Secondary Sections and contain no
- material copied from the Document, you may at your option
- designate some or all of these sections as invariant. To do this,
- add their titles to the list of Invariant Sections in the Modified
- Version's license notice. These titles must be distinct from any
- other section titles.
-
- You may add a section Entitled "Endorsements", provided it contains
- nothing but endorsements of your Modified Version by various
- parties--for example, statements of peer review or that the text
- has been approved by an organization as the authoritative
- definition of a standard.
-
- You may add a passage of up to five words as a Front-Cover Text,
- and a passage of up to 25 words as a Back-Cover Text, to the end
- of the list of Cover Texts in the Modified Version. Only one
- passage of Front-Cover Text and one of Back-Cover Text may be
- added by (or through arrangements made by) any one entity. If the
- Document already includes a cover text for the same cover,
- previously added by you or by arrangement made by the same entity
- you are acting on behalf of, you may not add another; but you may
- replace the old one, on explicit permission from the previous
- publisher that added the old one.
-
- The author(s) and publisher(s) of the Document do not by this
- License give permission to use their names for publicity for or to
- assert or imply endorsement of any Modified Version.
-
- 5. COMBINING DOCUMENTS
-
- You may combine the Document with other documents released under
- this License, under the terms defined in section 4 above for
- modified versions, provided that you include in the combination
- all of the Invariant Sections of all of the original documents,
- unmodified, and list them all as Invariant Sections of your
- combined work in its license notice, and that you preserve all
- their Warranty Disclaimers.
-
- The combined work need only contain one copy of this License, and
- multiple identical Invariant Sections may be replaced with a single
- copy. If there are multiple Invariant Sections with the same name
- but different contents, make the title of each such section unique
- by adding at the end of it, in parentheses, the name of the
- original author or publisher of that section if known, or else a
- unique number. Make the same adjustment to the section titles in
- the list of Invariant Sections in the license notice of the
- combined work.
-
- In the combination, you must combine any sections Entitled
- "History" in the various original documents, forming one section
- Entitled "History"; likewise combine any sections Entitled
- "Acknowledgements", and any sections Entitled "Dedications". You
- must delete all sections Entitled "Endorsements."
-
- 6. COLLECTIONS OF DOCUMENTS
-
- You may make a collection consisting of the Document and other
- documents released under this License, and replace the individual
- copies of this License in the various documents with a single copy
- that is included in the collection, provided that you follow the
- rules of this License for verbatim copying of each of the
- documents in all other respects.
-
- You may extract a single document from such a collection, and
- distribute it individually under this License, provided you insert
- a copy of this License into the extracted document, and follow
- this License in all other respects regarding verbatim copying of
- that document.
-
- 7. AGGREGATION WITH INDEPENDENT WORKS
-
- A compilation of the Document or its derivatives with other
- separate and independent documents or works, in or on a volume of
- a storage or distribution medium, is called an "aggregate" if the
- copyright resulting from the compilation is not used to limit the
- legal rights of the compilation's users beyond what the individual
- works permit. When the Document is included an aggregate, this
- License does not apply to the other works in the aggregate which
- are not themselves derivative works of the Document.
-
- If the Cover Text requirement of section 3 is applicable to these
- copies of the Document, then if the Document is less than one half
- of the entire aggregate, the Document's Cover Texts may be placed
- on covers that bracket the Document within the aggregate, or the
- electronic equivalent of covers if the Document is in electronic
- form. Otherwise they must appear on printed covers that bracket
- the whole aggregate.
-
- 8. TRANSLATION
-
- Translation is considered a kind of modification, so you may
- distribute translations of the Document under the terms of section
- 4. Replacing Invariant Sections with translations requires special
- permission from their copyright holders, but you may include
- translations of some or all Invariant Sections in addition to the
- original versions of these Invariant Sections. You may include a
- translation of this License, and all the license notices in the
- Document, and any Warrany Disclaimers, provided that you also
- include the original English version of this License and the
- original versions of those notices and disclaimers. In case of a
- disagreement between the translation and the original version of
- this License or a notice or disclaimer, the original version will
- prevail.
-
- If a section in the Document is Entitled "Acknowledgements",
- "Dedications", or "History", the requirement (section 4) to
- Preserve its Title (section 1) will typically require changing the
- actual title.
-
- 9. TERMINATION
-
- You may not copy, modify, sublicense, or distribute the Document
- except as expressly provided for under this License. Any other
- attempt to copy, modify, sublicense or distribute the Document is
- void, and will automatically terminate your rights under this
- License. However, parties who have received copies, or rights,
- from you under this License will not have their licenses
- terminated so long as such parties remain in full compliance.
-
- 10. FUTURE REVISIONS OF THIS LICENSE
-
- The Free Software Foundation may publish new, revised versions of
- the GNU Free Documentation License from time to time. Such new
- versions will be similar in spirit to the present version, but may
- differ in detail to address new problems or concerns. See
- `http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/'.
-
- Each version of the License is given a distinguishing version
- number. If the Document specifies that a particular numbered
- version of this License "or any later version" applies to it, you
- have the option of following the terms and conditions either of
- that specified version or of any later version that has been
- published (not as a draft) by the Free Software Foundation. If
- the Document does not specify a version number of this License,
- you may choose any version ever published (not as a draft) by the
- Free Software Foundation.
-
- ADDENDUM: How to use this License for your documents
- ====================================================
-
- To use this License in a document you have written, include a copy of
- the License in the document and put the following copyright and license
- notices just after the title page:
-
- Copyright (C) YEAR YOUR NAME.
- Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document
- under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.2
- or any later version published by the Free Software Foundation;
- with no Invariant Sections, no Front-Cover Texts, and no Back-Cover Texts.
- A copy of the license is included in the section entitled ``GNU
- Free Documentation License''.
-
- If you have Invariant Sections, Front-Cover Texts and Back-Cover
- Texts, replace the "with...Texts." line with this:
-
- with the Invariant Sections being LIST THEIR TITLES, with
- the Front-Cover Texts being LIST, and with the Back-Cover Texts
- being LIST.
-
- If you have Invariant Sections without Cover Texts, or some other
- combination of the three, merge those two alternatives to suit the
- situation.
-
- If your document contains nontrivial examples of program code, we
- recommend releasing these examples in parallel under your choice of
- free software license, such as the GNU General Public License, to
- permit their use in free software.
-
- File: cpp, Node: Index of Directives, Next: Option Index, Prev: GNU Free Documentation License, Up: Top
-
- Index of Directives
- *******************
-