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Date:	Wed, 21 Oct 2015 04:45:52 +0200 (CEST)
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To:	"Vladimir Zhbanov (vzhbanov AT gmail DOT com) [via geda-user AT delorie DOT com]" <geda-user AT delorie DOT com>
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Subject:	Re: [geda-user] C99
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On Tue, 20 Oct 2015, Vladimir Zhbanov (vzhbanov AT gmail DOT com) [via geda-user AT delorie DOT com] wrote:

> Probably I have an opportunity to ask a question about the C99 standard :)
> Are any issues mentioned at [1] still relevant? Could any issues appear if
> we start to support it?

There is another aspect: compatibility with old and/or exotic systems. I 
prefer to start my project with C89 and switch to C99 only when there's 
really a strong reason to do so. This pays off if I want my stuff to run 
on other systems than modern GNU/Linux/BSD. This doesn't affect old 
systems only; I remember I ran into win32 (+visual studio) limitations 
about C99 features like 5 years ago (can't recall the details tho, just 
that it didn't 100% support C99).

In case of pcb and geda, we have so many huge external lib dependencies 
that it's very unlikely the projects run on such old/exotic systems. I 
mean even if geda or PCB would be clean C89 and compile with gcc -ansi 
-pedantic, one would still need to compile glib, gtk, guile and other 
stuff.

I haven't checked if these dependencies compiel with C89, but I think 
before a C99 transition it should be. If it turns out dependencies require 
C99 already, there's no reason not to bump geda too. Else the "inertia" 
(and compatibility) may overwhelm the extra features of C99.

Regards,

Igor2

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