May be there's a way to configure macros to detect support of incline functionsso that they replace the macro _expression_ by a function call. This would allow better type analyses on platforms with C99 compatibility and linting, including unsafe or unchecked typecasts and conversions, causing undefined behaviors.
Embedded systems can have a very long life cycle (20+ years) and many of
our customers use legacy build systems.
-Wilfred
> That's Interesting.
>
> Out of curiosity, could you disclose which kind of systems are you
> talking about and whether they are just legacy systems or something
> that is actively developed (from the manufacturer side, I mean)?
>
> -- Lorenzo
>
>
> On 15/11/2022 15:58, Wilfred Nilsen wrote:
>>
>> Yes, it is absolutely necessary to keep Lua C89 compatible. We work
>> with embedded systems and many environments use old C89 compilers.
>>
>> -Wilfred
>>
>>> Hi, Roberto,
>>>
>>> I was thinking, is it really worth the hassle to keep Lua compatible
>>> with C89 nowadays? Shouldn't it be moved to C99, whose features
>>> would help make the code clearer and more maintainable? After all we
>>> are talking about a 30+ years old standard that was the first
>>> attempt at standardization of C.
>>>
>>> The fact that C89 is rather flawed (from a modern language POV) is
>>> evident (IMO) from how many improvements C99 introduced, many of
>>> which are given for granted in modern languages and systems. Just to
>>> name a few off the top of my head: long long int type with
>>> guaranteed minimum 64bit width, fixed width integer types, variable
>>> declarations at the point of usage, line comments, boolean types,
>>> IEEE754 support, type-generic macros, inline functions, complex
>>> numbers (BTW, I would welcome native complex numbers support in
>>> Lua). Even later C standards didn't introduce so many and deep
>>> innovations as those introduced in the leap from C89 to C99, if my
>>> memory serves me correctly.
>>>
>>> I have a feeling that nowadays no one creates compilers that are
>>> just C89 compatible any longer, even for exotic new systems (e.g.
>>> newer low-cost MCU families) that require a quick and dirty compiler
>>> put together in a hurry. C99 seems to the baseline even for the
>>> simplest and dumbest C compiler out there. Is it really worthwhile
>>> to keep developing Lua using a C89 programming style?
>>>
>>> Just my two cents.
>>>
>>> Cheers!
>>>
>>> -- Lorenzo
>>>
>>> On 14/11/2022 17:45, Roberto Ierusalimschy wrote:
>>>>> I noticed that Lua code sometimes uses macros where a static
>>>>> inline function
>>>>> would appear to work equally as well.
>>>>> [...]
>>>>>
>>>>> How interested would the Lua development team be in replacing such
>>>>> macros with
>>>>> functions in the future?
>>>> Inline functions is not present in C89, and Lua is (still) compatible
>>>> with C89.
>>>>
>>>> -- Roberto
>>
