Re: relearning C: why does an in-place change to a char* segfault?

On 28.09.2024 05:34, Keith Thompson wrote:

Tim Rentsch <tr.17687@z991.linuxsc.com> writes:

Keith Thompson <Keith.S.Thompson+u@gmail.com> writes:

The more C is changed to resemble C++ the worse it becomes.  It
isn't surprising that you like it.

 
For context, since the parent article is from a month and a half
ago, I was discussing a proposal to change a future C standard to
refer to "constants" as "literals".  I mentioned that I think it's
a good idea.

I've heard of and seen various forms to name such entities...
- in a Pascal and an Eiffel book I find all these named "constants"
- in an Algol 68 book I read about "standard designations"
- in a book about languages and programming in general I find
    "literals" ("abc"), "numerals" (42), "word-symbols" (false),
    "graphemes" (©), etc., differentiated
- I've also have heard about "standard representations [for the
    values of a respective type]"; also a type-independent term

I also think (for various reasons) that "constants" is not a good
term. (Personally I like terms like the Algol 68 term, that seems
to "operate" on another [more conceptual] abstraction level.)

But you'll certainly have to expect a lot of anger if the terminology
of some standards documents get changed from one version to another.

Janis