Path: csiph.com!eternal-september.org!feeder.eternal-september.org!news.eternal-september.org!.POSTED!not-for-mail From: Keith Thompson Newsgroups: comp.lang.c Subject: Re: gcc needs a curly bracket matching/counting function Date: Tue, 20 Dec 2016 09:33:56 -0800 Organization: None to speak of Lines: 29 Message-ID: References: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Injection-Info: mx02.eternal-september.org; posting-host="b8044c752840ceb89291b47395d36dfc"; logging-data="23558"; mail-complaints-to="abuse@eternal-september.org"; posting-account="U2FsdGVkX1/KFRg6bEbJ6Ox6wDM9U8g2" User-Agent: Gnus/5.13 (Gnus v5.13) Emacs/23.1 (gnu/linux) Cancel-Lock: sha1:sdp2QDC8+vgrnoPcmr/Kt40jSmI= sha1:c84PxeUvZhgfDjgslrf9uPG/1ho= Xref: csiph.com comp.lang.c:99917 Richard Heathfield writes: > On 20/12/16 17:07, Keith Thompson wrote: >> Malcolm McLean writes: >> [...] >>> Rule of three. >>> >>> Parentheses may have only three levels of nesting. >> >> Balderdash. > > Citation required. > > But hang on, I think I have one here: > > 5.2.4.1 Translation limits: "63 nesting levels of parenthesized > expressions within a full expression". [...] > Hypothesis confirmed. Malcolm is indeed talking balderdash. To be fair, it's pretty clear that Malcolm wasn't claiming that the language forbids more than 3 levels of nesting. His claim is about some rule outside the language standard, presumably some kind of stylistic rule. (Sorry if I'm spoiling the joke.) -- Keith Thompson (The_Other_Keith) kst-u@mib.org Working, but not speaking, for JetHead Development, Inc. "We must do something. This is something. Therefore, we must do this." -- Antony Jay and Jonathan Lynn, "Yes Minister"