3 ms·

* for pointers was a stupid choice and there's no reason to keep it solely because people are used to it. Why not keep prefix dereference too? The syntax is att

* for pointers was a stupid choice and there's no reason to keep it solely because people are used to it. Why not keep prefix dereference too? The syntax is attrocious but hey, C does it, so everyone else must.

echoangle 2y ago
What’s the problem with *? Do you just want a different symbol or an entirely different syntax?
- flohofwoe 2y ago
  Not the OP, but the '*' is already the common symbol for multiplication. Not much of a problem for people who are used to C syntax of course, but may be confusing to anybody else, especially in expressions which have both pointer dereference and multiplication, for instance this is entirely valid C: int a = 3 ** int_ptr; The '^' is the pointer symbol in Pascal, so it's not a new thing either, it just fell a bit out of fashion.
  - Y_Y 2y ago
    That's horrifying, I think I would have preferred int a = powl(3,int_ptr); edit: The parent's code does a dereference and then a multiplcation. This is because of (imho) bizarre parsing rules for a dereference asterisk. I'm saying that's so horrifying that I would be less horrified if it really was an exponent (as it might seem by mixing languages).
    - echoangle 2y ago
      I’m not sure I understand your comment, wasn’t the point that int a = 3 ** int_ptr; Calculates 3 times (*int_ptr)?
      - AlexeyBrin 2y ago
        It was a confusion between ** used as the rise to power operator in languages like Fortran or Python which just validated the grandparent point of confusing syntax for people not used with C that come from other programming languages. In Python and Fortran for example: 3 ** 2 = 9
    - flohofwoe 2y ago
      See, it is confusing, because the code doesn't compute a power. It's a multiplication with the value pointed to by int_ptr, e.g. rewritten to make more sense: int a = 3 * (*int_ptr); ...or in Odin it would look like this (I think, haven't used Odin all that much yet): a := 3 * int_ptr^
    - jpc0 2y ago
      That's not what the code does. 3 ** int_ptr multiplies the vakue pointed at by int_ptr by 3. It is exactly the same code as 3 * (*int_ptr) which is the point the parent was making. powl(3, int_ptr) would be (int)int_ptr * (int)int_ptr * (int)int_ptr which is also unlikely what you wanted. You probably wanted to say powl(3, *int_ptr) EDIT: actually even my last paragraph is wrong because the first arg is base... I'm not going to write it out but you get the point...
  - Izkata 2y ago
    Related: I like the "down to" operator: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/1642028/what-is-the-operator-in-c-c https://stackoverflow.com/questions/1642028/what-is-the-oper... (No, it's not a real operator, it's another case of weird but allowed spacing causing confusion)
abecedarius 2y ago
Ritchie's paper on the history of C discusses that prefix dereference thing: another Bell Labs researcher pointed out that C's notorious issues with declaration syntax, etc., would work much better if pointer deref were postfix instead. Ritchie said it was already too late by then to fix it in C, but didn't contradict the point. Odin had no such block to improvement. Props to them.

echoangle 2y ago

What’s the problem with *? Do you just want a different symbol or an entirely different syntax?

flohofwoe 2y ago
Not the OP, but the '*' is already the common symbol for multiplication. Not much of a problem for people who are used to C syntax of course, but may be confusing to anybody else, especially in expressions which have both pointer dereference and multiplication, for instance this is entirely valid C: int a = 3 ** int_ptr; The '^' is the pointer symbol in Pascal, so it's not a new thing either, it just fell a bit out of fashion.
- Y_Y 2y ago
  That's horrifying, I think I would have preferred int a = powl(3,int_ptr); edit: The parent's code does a dereference and then a multiplcation. This is because of (imho) bizarre parsing rules for a dereference asterisk. I'm saying that's so horrifying that I would be less horrified if it really was an exponent (as it might seem by mixing languages).
  - echoangle 2y ago
    I’m not sure I understand your comment, wasn’t the point that int a = 3 ** int_ptr; Calculates 3 times (*int_ptr)?
    - AlexeyBrin 2y ago
      It was a confusion between ** used as the rise to power operator in languages like Fortran or Python which just validated the grandparent point of confusing syntax for people not used with C that come from other programming languages. In Python and Fortran for example: 3 ** 2 = 9
  - flohofwoe 2y ago
    See, it is confusing, because the code doesn't compute a power. It's a multiplication with the value pointed to by int_ptr, e.g. rewritten to make more sense: int a = 3 * (*int_ptr); ...or in Odin it would look like this (I think, haven't used Odin all that much yet): a := 3 * int_ptr^
  - jpc0 2y ago
    That's not what the code does. 3 ** int_ptr multiplies the vakue pointed at by int_ptr by 3. It is exactly the same code as 3 * (*int_ptr) which is the point the parent was making. powl(3, int_ptr) would be (int)int_ptr * (int)int_ptr * (int)int_ptr which is also unlikely what you wanted. You probably wanted to say powl(3, *int_ptr) EDIT: actually even my last paragraph is wrong because the first arg is base... I'm not going to write it out but you get the point...
- Izkata 2y ago
  Related: I like the "down to" operator: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/1642028/what-is-the-operator-in-c-c https://stackoverflow.com/questions/1642028/what-is-the-oper... (No, it's not a real operator, it's another case of weird but allowed spacing causing confusion)

abecedarius 2y ago

Ritchie's paper on the history of C discusses that prefix dereference thing: another Bell Labs researcher pointed out that C's notorious issues with declaration syntax, etc., would work much better if pointer deref were postfix instead. Ritchie said it was already too late by then to fix it in C, but didn't contradict the point. Odin had no such block to improvement. Props to them.