[HN Gopher] Infrequently Asked Questions in Comp.lang.c (1999)
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Infrequently Asked Questions in Comp.lang.c (1999)
Author : hummusandsushi
Score : 64 points
Date : 2023-08-20 13:22 UTC (9 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.seebs.net)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.seebs.net)
| archfrog wrote:
| I don't want to be toxic but why make a function to cast a char
| to an int? I was astounded when I briefly skimmed through the
| list. I hope this is not curriculum in education.
| [deleted]
| xhainingx wrote:
| It's not. The whole thing is a joke.
| Kamq wrote:
| I don't see the one you're talking to on a brief skim, but
| there are several functions that deal with processing a file
| character by character. They generally use ints because they
| need a way to signal end of file and you can't do that with any
| value of a byte.
| chihuahua wrote:
| I got the impression that the entire document is meant as a
| joke.
| MobiusHorizons wrote:
| Unambiguously so if you click to any of the footnotes.
| [deleted]
| zh3 wrote:
| Some great in-jokes there (hands up who gets the EBCDIC one).
|
| More seriously, a lot of the discussions about "undefined
| behaviour" seem to be aimed at the kind of code that no
| experienced engineer would write anyway. Until there's a language
| that's proved formally correct, every language is going to have
| "undefined" behaviour (though some languages - especially more
| modern ones - cover more cases/make it harder for less
| experienced users to blow their foot [or worse, someone elses]
| off).
| tragomaskhalos wrote:
| A good reminder that there were a lot of smartarses on usenet.
| NoZebra120vClip wrote:
| Yes, like that snopes guy who cut his troll teeth on Usenet!
| ukuina wrote:
| Obligatory reference to http://vanilla-js.com
| eska wrote:
| Programmer humor is so shit, man..
| not_your_vase wrote:
| > Comes to a website that's very well known to be mostly
| frequented by programmers > Complains about the content
| that tries to appeal to programmers
|
| sigh
| eska wrote:
| I am the target audience.
| wizzwizz4 wrote:
| Well, no. The target audience is people who find this
| funny.
| raverbashing wrote:
| Great joke list. Though sometimes reality beats fiction
|
| > 1.6: I finally figured out the syntax for declaring pointers to
| functions, but now how do I initialize one?
|
| > With the assignment operator
|
| Well what did you expect right?!
| spacedcowboy wrote:
| Given how opaque the syntax is, expecting to have to use a
| screwdriver isn't that weird...
| awestroke wrote:
| After reading through this, I'm not sure if it's a list of jokes
| or real information? For example:
|
| > long ints can be entered using hexadecimal notation; for
| instance,
|
| > long int foo = 07;
|
| How is this a good example of hexadecimal input?
| torstenvl wrote:
| Most of them are inside jokes that aren't very funny.
|
| Most of them are indeed frequently asked, but by people who are
| a bit obstinate or otherwise don't fit the mold that old timers
| thought newbies should fit.
|
| As a result, the responses are often intentionally dismissive
| and unhelpful.
|
| EDIT: It occurs to me that comp.lang.c was the 80s-90s version
| of Stack Overflow. So at least they're comparatively _funnier_
| than the SO responses they 'd elicit today.
| bluetomcat wrote:
| On SO, any of these answers would be downvoted to death by
| people not recognising them as jokes at all. Language lawyer
| types would cite the part of the standard that classifies
| this as UB in the blink of an eye. It's a different world
| we're living in.
| torstenvl wrote:
| On SO these questions would get downvoted to death and the
| newbie would be admonished for breaking the site
| guidelines.
|
| 1.1: How do you decide which integer type to use?
| Closed as opinion based.
|
| 1.3: If I write the code int i, j; can I assume that (&i +
| 1) == &j? Please provide a minimal,
| complete and verifiable example.
|
| Etc.
| bluedino wrote:
| It was better than StackOverflow in a lot of ways.
|
| Sure, it wasn't useful as a searchable database of questions,
| but the FAQ was very useful if you could spend time to wade
| through it, and any zero-effort posters were either flamed to
| oblivion or simply ignored.
|
| I remember asking a couple stupid questions and directed to
| the documentation. To this day, at work I will suggest "let's
| see what the manual says", while troubleshooting and get a
| funny look and eve pushback after I find the answer.
| MrLeap wrote:
| What kind of pushback?
| layer8 wrote:
| "The documentation can't possibly be up-to-date",
| probably.
| st_goliath wrote:
| > After reading through this, I'm not sure if it's a list of
| jokes or real information?
|
| The whole point is pulling peoples legs, the joke being on the
| person who doesn't know the language well enough and takes it
| serious.
|
| The answers in the list are the equivalent of telling an
| apprentice to go get a can of blinker fluid (or Siemens
| Lufthacken, etc...), which they dutifully do and end up getting
| laughed at.
|
| E.g. just before the one you quoted was this gem:
|
| > 1.8: What's the auto keyword good for?
|
| >
|
| > Declaring vehicles.
|
| Regarding your question:
|
| > How is this a good example of hexadecimal input?
|
| It _isn 't_. In C, a leading zero in an integer literal means
| _octal_. It compiles and works out, because `7`, `07` and
| `0x07` happen to have the same value.
| ethbr1 wrote:
| > _a leading zero in an integer literal means octal. It
| compiles and works out, because `7`, `07` and `0x07` happen
| to have the same value_
|
| That is a hilariously beautiful and simple example to
| communicate that.
| IgorPartola wrote:
| Smart apprentices take the day off when told to get blinker
| fluid. But your point stands.
| oaiey wrote:
| They also go me for a while (and I have C in my education but
| with C/C++ you never know for sure) but when Microsoft invented
| C I knew something was wrong.
| zh3 wrote:
| Try compiling:-
|
| main() { int foo = 08; }
| TheSoftwareGuy wrote:
| Most of the answers seem to contain bullshit. The one you
| quoted is wrong because the leading 0 is for _octal_ notation,
| not hex
| teo_zero wrote:
| Just as a broken clock shows the correct time twice a day, you
| can use this syntax to input hexadecimal numbers less than 0A.
| zoky wrote:
| Less than 8 actually. 0 at the start of a number indicates
| it's octal, so 08 and 09 are not syntactically valid numbers.
| denotational wrote:
| It's meant to be humorous, there are footnotes explaining some
| of the jokes.
| Smaug123 wrote:
| You have asked question 19.27, by the way.
| herdcall wrote:
| These don't look like "stupid questions" at all, but the
| disdainful smart aleck responders do look stupid. What a sad,
| toxic group of people.
| [deleted]
| kichimi wrote:
| Why is it toxic?
| compiler-guy wrote:
| It's a joke list of silly things. Not serious at all.
| [deleted]
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