Thank you for these references. It is how you say, and, for c++ would involve handling 16 bit "int", char larger than 8 bits and in the case of pre-20 compilers

Thank you for these references. It is how you say, and, for c++ would involve handling 16 bit "int", char larger than 8 bits and in the case of pre-20 compilers you cannot even assume two's compliment. I am sure such correct code can be written, but expecting everyone to play along with standard and ignore that 100% of existing compilers have much saner behaviour, might be very difficult.