From: Alejandro Colomar <colomar.6.4.3@gmail.com>
To: Jonathan Wakely <jwakely.gcc@gmail.com>
Cc: "Michael Kerrisk (man-pages)" <mtk.manpages@gmail.com>,
Paul Eggert <eggert@cs.ucla.edu>,
linux-man <linux-man@vger.kernel.org>,
GNU C Library <libc-alpha@sourceware.org>,
"linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org" <linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org>,
"gcc@gcc.gnu.org" <gcc@gcc.gnu.org>
Subject: Re: [PATCH v2 1/2] system_data_types.7: Add 'void *'
Date: Fri, 2 Oct 2020 15:51:17 +0200 [thread overview]
Message-ID: <4422e4bc-f54c-02cf-9b47-808d07ce8ba5@gmail.com> (raw)
In-Reply-To: <CAH6eHdTpzNk4+Rg-+kUCRDZPLHe7MBBf2PK5i1WqD4VeEs60oQ@mail.gmail.com>
Hi Jonathan,
On 2020-10-02 15:27, Jonathan Wakely wrote:
> On Fri, 2 Oct 2020 at 14:20, Alejandro Colomar <colomar.6.4.3@gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>
>>
>> On 2020-10-02 15:06, Jonathan Wakely wrote:
>> > On Fri, 2 Oct 2020 at 12:31, Michael Kerrisk (man-pages)
>> > <mtk.manpages@gmail.com> wrote:
>> >>
>> >> On Fri, 2 Oct 2020 at 12:49, Jonathan Wakely <jwakely.gcc@gmail.com>
>> wrote:
>> >>>
>> >>> On Fri, 2 Oct 2020 at 09:28, Alejandro Colomar via Gcc
>> <gcc@gcc.gnu.org> wrote:
>> >>>> However, it might be good that someone starts a page called
>> >>>> 'type_qualifiers(7)' or something like that.
>> >>>
>> >>> Who is this for? Who is trying to learn C from man pages? Should
>> >>> somebody stop them?
>> >>
>> >> Yes, I think so. To add context, Alex has been doing a lot of work to
>> >> build up the new system_data_types(7) page [1], which I think is
>> >> especially useful for the POSIX system data types that are used with
>> >> various APIs.
>> >
>> > It's definitely useful for types like struct siginfo_t and struct
>> > timeval, which aren't in C.
>>
>> Hi Jonathan,
>>
>> But then the line is a bit diffuse.
>> Would you document 'ssize_t' and not 'size_t'?
>
> Yes. My documentation for ssize_t would mention size_t, refer to the C
> standard, and not define it.
>
>> Would you not document intN_t types?
>> Would you document stdint types, including 'intptr_t', and not 'void *'?
>
> I would document neither.
>
> I can see some small value in documenting size_t and the stdint types,
> as they are technically defined by the libc headers. But documenting
> void* seems very silly. It's one of the most fundamental built-in
> parts of the C language, not an interface provided by the system.
>
>> I guess the basic types (int, long, ...) can be left out for now,
>
> I should hope so!
>
>> and apart from 'int' those rarely are the most appropriate types
>> for most uses.
>> But other than that, I would document all of the types.
>> And even... when all of the other types are documented,
>> it will be only a little extra effort to document those,
>> so in the future I might consider that.
>
> [insert Jurassic Park meme "Your scientists were so preoccupied with
> whether or not they could, they didn't stop to think if they should."
> ]
>
> I don't see value in bloating the man-pages with information nobody
> will ever use, and which doesn't (IMHO) belong there anyway. We seem
> to fundamentally disagree about what the man pages are for. I don't
> think they are supposed to teach C programming from scratch.
Agree in part.
I'll try to think about it again.
In the meantime, I trust Michael to tell me when something is way off :)
Thanks, really!
Alex
>
>
>> But yes, priority should probably go to Linux/POSIX-only types.
next prev parent reply other threads:[~2020-10-02 13:51 UTC|newest]
Thread overview: 16+ messages / expand[flat|nested] mbox.gz Atom feed top
[not found] <41affebd-3354-9420-0048-bffd14535e95@gmail.com>
[not found] ` <20201001154946.104626-2-colomar.6.4.3@gmail.com>
[not found] ` <538b683f-01d2-6148-4f1d-1b293eb5cd6b@cs.ucla.edu>
2020-10-02 8:24 ` [PATCH v2 1/2] system_data_types.7: Add 'void *' Alejandro Colomar
2020-10-02 8:48 ` Alejandro Colomar
2020-10-02 11:44 ` Michael Kerrisk (man-pages)
2020-10-02 9:10 ` David Laight
2020-10-02 17:00 ` Paul Eggert
2020-10-02 10:49 ` Jonathan Wakely
2020-10-02 11:31 ` Michael Kerrisk (man-pages)
2020-10-02 13:06 ` Jonathan Wakely
2020-10-02 13:20 ` Alejandro Colomar
2020-10-02 13:27 ` Jonathan Wakely
2020-10-02 13:51 ` Alejandro Colomar [this message]
2020-10-03 8:00 ` Navigational corrections (was: Re: [PATCH v2 1/2] system_data_types.7: Add 'void *') Michael Kerrisk (man-pages)
2020-10-03 9:16 ` Navigational corrections Alejandro Colomar
2020-10-03 11:39 ` Michael Kerrisk (man-pages)
2020-10-05 22:08 ` Alejandro Colomar
2020-10-07 6:53 ` Michael Kerrisk (man-pages)
Reply instructions:
You may reply publicly to this message via plain-text email
using any one of the following methods:
* Save the following mbox file, import it into your mail client,
and reply-to-all from there: mbox
Avoid top-posting and favor interleaved quoting:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Posting_style#Interleaved_style
* Reply using the --to, --cc, and --in-reply-to
switches of git-send-email(1):
git send-email \
--in-reply-to=4422e4bc-f54c-02cf-9b47-808d07ce8ba5@gmail.com \
--to=colomar.6.4.3@gmail.com \
--cc=eggert@cs.ucla.edu \
--cc=gcc@gcc.gnu.org \
--cc=jwakely.gcc@gmail.com \
--cc=libc-alpha@sourceware.org \
--cc=linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org \
--cc=linux-man@vger.kernel.org \
--cc=mtk.manpages@gmail.com \
/path/to/YOUR_REPLY
https://kernel.org/pub/software/scm/git/docs/git-send-email.html
* If your mail client supports setting the In-Reply-To header
via mailto: links, try the mailto: link
Be sure your reply has a Subject: header at the top and a blank line
before the message body.
This is a public inbox, see mirroring instructions
for how to clone and mirror all data and code used for this inbox;
as well as URLs for NNTP newsgroup(s).