Re: Integral types and own type definitions (was Re: Suggested method for returning a string from a C program?)

On 2025-03-25, Richard Heathfield <rjh@cpax.org.uk> wrote:

On 25/03/2025 11:55, Tim Rentsch wrote:

Janis Papanagnou <janis_papanagnou+ng@hotmail.com> writes:
 

On 25.03.2025 05:56, Tim Rentsch wrote:
>

Janis Papanagnou <janis_papanagnou+ng@hotmail.com> writes:
>
[...]
>

When I started with "C" or C++ there were not only 8-bit
multiples defined for the integral types;  [...]

>
In C the correct phrase is integer types, not integral types.

>
My apologies if I'm using language independent terms.

 
The problem is that what was written used the word "integral"
incorrectly.

>
But "integer type" is also a problem. 'Integer' is a noun, not an
adjective. To modify the noun 'type' you need an adjective that
means 'of, pertaining to, or being an integer'. The only
available candidate is 'integral'.

How can you post that from of the proximity of the birth place
of the English language?

The English language features noun phrases (NPs), and in that
category are found compound nouns.  Compound nouns have a head. The head
is always the rightmost element of the sequence. The other nouns modify
the head as if they were adjectives.

Example:

"law school entrance examination results"

There is a rule that only the head may be plural (as I have it);
the constituent adjectivized nouns may not be pluralized.

This noun referes primarily to "results" of some kind.

What kind? "examination results"

What sort of test results? "entrance examination results"

And so on.

"X Bar theory" hypothesizes that NPs and similar structures
are all built as binary cells.

             NP
           /   \
         _     results
         N
     _ /  \
     N     examination
   /  \
  ...   entrance

The theory hypothesizes that binary construction is expressed
in all language.

I'll cheerfully accept "integer type" because, though clumsy,

So integer type is an NP. "integers type" would be ungrammatical
because a non-head noun is pluralized; "integer types" is fine.

Not only do we have nouns that can be adjectives, but
adjectives can be nouns: "literals", "deliverables", "perishables",
"convertibles", "unmentionables", "greens", ...

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