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From: Keith Thompson <kst-u@mib.org>
Newsgroups: comp.lang.c
Subject: Re: gcc needs a curly bracket matching/counting function
Date: Tue, 20 Dec 2016 13:51:39 -0800
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Gareth Owen <gwowen@gmail.com> writes:
> Keith Thompson <kst-u@mib.org> writes:
>> If the code doesn't use macros, digraphs, or trigraphs to hide braces,
>> existing tools can be used to find any missing braces.  If it does, I
>> probably don't care about fixing it.
>
> The only code that I've seen that
> a) doesn't (ab)use the features you mention above
> b) confuses bracket matchers (emacs, specifically)
>
> #ifdef CAUTIOUS_DOOHICKEY_FROBNICATION
>    if(doohickey != NULL && FROBNICATION_DEPTH < 3) {
> #else
>    if(doohickey != NULL) {
> #endif
>       /// Refrobnicate the doohickey
>       frobnicate(doohickey);
>    }
>
> That's not a style I would use, or recommend, but I have worked on
> codebases with constructs like that in it, and sometimes so many that
> refactoring becomes quite an intrusive change.

If I felt the need to write code like that, I'd probably put the { on
its own line:

#ifdef CAUTIOUS_DOOHICKEY_FROBNICATION
   if(doohickey != NULL && FROBNICATION_DEPTH < 3)
#else
   if(doohickey != NULL)
#endif
   {
      /// Refrobnicate the doohickey
      frobnicate(doohickey);
   }

I might even consider writing something like this:

   if (doohickey != NULL
#ifdef CAUTIOUS_DOOHICKEY_FROBNICATION
                         && FROBNICATION_DEPTH < 3
#endif
                                                  ) {
      /// Refrobnicate the doohickey
      frobnicate(doohickey);
   }

though I'd be sympathetic to charges that it's too freaking ugly.

-- 
Keith Thompson (The_Other_Keith) kst-u@mib.org  <http://www.ghoti.net/~kst>
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"