Re: Recursion, Yo

On 11/04/2024 17:04, Kaz Kylheku wrote:

On 2024-04-11, Scott Lurndal <scott@slp53.sl.home> wrote:

David Brown <david.brown@hesbynett.no> writes:

On 11/04/2024 02:18, Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote:

On Wed, 10 Apr 2024 16:46:43 +0200, David Brown wrote:
>

Just for your entertainment, with C++ lambdas this is now legal code:
>
void foo(void) {
[](){}();
}

>
C programmer still has habit of writing “(void)” when C++ allows “()”
instead.

>
I do that sometimes, yes.  I could argue that I think it is better to be
explicit than implicit, but it's just my fingers on automatic.

>
I would use the same argument.   Make it explicit.

 (void) is a dongle intoduced in ANSI C so that () could continue
to mean "unknown number of parameters". It didn't exist in C++
until ANSI C invented it.

I like history as much as the next person - probably more so, and thus I do appreciate you explaining where this comes from.  But I don't base my programming choices or style on history.  From the point of view of current programming, it's irrelevant when "(void)" was introduced to C and C++, it's only relevant what it means /now/ to the compiler, and what it means to someone reading the code.
I write "(void)" in C code, or in C++ code that might be seen by a C compiler (such as in a header file that could be used with C or C++), or if it might be read by someone who is more familiar with C than C++.  If the code is "pure C++", such as this example, I normally don't bother with "(void)".  But I don't object to it either.

 () is a perfectly explicit empty list. (void) does not look empty;
it looks like it's declaring one parameter of type void.

"void" has always been a bit weird as a "type" or as a placeholder for an empty type.

 An actual implicit empty parameter list might look like this:
    function foo
   {
   }
 Once you have empty parentheses, that is explicit.
 

"(void)" stands out more.

Countless programming languages have only (); no such thing as (void) or
similar ugly hack, due to not having a quirky history that would have
caused such a thing to be required.
 

It has never struck me as "ugly", but it is arguably quirky.