Re: patch 2.5.4 ISO C90 compliance patch

[Paul Edwards]

> > Since the user has already specified the filename for
> > the reject file, that should be used directly rather than
> > going via a temporary file.
> 
> The problem with that approach is that the reject file may
> contain incomplete output if 'patch' exits due to an error.
> The 'rename' approach was taken to avoid this.

I don't see a problem with incomplete data in the reject file.
That's the sort of thing that you expect when a program
ends with a bad return code.

> > My patch is to make the code C90 compliant.  People who
> > want a C90 compliant patch can search for it in bug-gnu-utils,
> > regardless of whether it is actually accepted into the baseline.
> 
> That will work only for patch 2.5.4; 

Yes, I'm happy with that version, in the same way I'm happy
with an old version of bison because the newer versions of
bison have added a whole lot of non-C90 rubbish to them
rendering them useless.  For a text processing program!
Or maybe it was flex, I can't remember.  I revert to older
versions to get away from people inspired to destroy
previously portable C code.

> it won't work for future
> versions of 'patch'.  In contrast, the method I suggested will
> work for all 'patch' versions, and will also work for lots and
> lots of other programs.

Whereas my patch works on all C90 compilers, no kludges
required.

BFN.  Paul.