C Programming Language

1323 readers

2 users here now

Welcome to the C community!

C is quirky, flawed, and an enormous success.
... When I read commentary about suggestions for where C should go, I often think back and give thanks that it wasn't developed under the advice of a worldwide crowd.
... The only way to learn a new programming language is by writing programs in it.

irc: #c

🌐 https://en.cppreference.com/w/c

founded 3 years ago

MODERATORS

snowe@programming.dev

thomas@lemmy.douwes.co.uk

modev@programming.dev

Why do some C devs prefer using mainly C89 over C23? (slrpnk.net)

submitted 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago) by BlackRoseAmongThorns@slrpnk.net to c/c_lang@programming.dev

10 comments fedilink hide all child comments

I have watched some developers giving advice about using C for general software development, i noticed that a not insignificant amount of them are strictly using C89, vaguely gesturing that more recent versions of C are less dependable, or more broken.

I would appreciate if anyone here can explain the specifics, as me not being a C developer (yet) and looking over the source code of some libraries which do heavily use modern C features, for example to have a defer-like macro (using attributes, or the 2 for statement trick), or generic data structures (using manual name mangling).

I understand these examples are strictly not how C is usually used, and are common in other more modern languages, which may turn some developers away from using these, my main question is "why exactly?".

I don't mind being given further reading about this, so if you have an article in mind, it too would be greatly appreciated.

note: in the title i referred to C23, but it could be anything post C89/C99 depending on the subject matter.

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments

[–] BB_C@programming.dev 6 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Later versions than C99 have no real added value proposition for the real use-cases where C is actually desired as an implementation language.

Later versions than C99 continue to introduce C++isms among other shit, from committee members some of whom probably never coded anything serious in C. This actually sometimes trickles down to compiler implementations even when you're sticking with an older version. So they manage to anger you even when you're keeping a distance.

Despite street myths and stereotypes, most people who choose C for some projects are not grey-hairs stuck in the past and incapable of learning new tools. Many of them in fact do use newer languages like Rust where they see fit. So there is no pressure to pick the one or two features from newer C versions that are maybe possibly can be useful.

Still, for some big projects that are kind of half-stuck with millions of lines of C, while at the same time having immense pressure to deliver maximum reliability AND security, these newer versions could proof useful at times. But the only project that comes to mind that fits this mold is the Linux kernel really. And there, non-standard language extensions are getting used anyway, so it's kind of an exceptional situation, that is also not very portable, but that's not a concern by the very nature of where a kernel sets in the stack.

[–] BlackRoseAmongThorns@slrpnk.net 3 points 1 day ago

That's very fair for the linux kernel, I'm aware that they use more modern features of C, though i have no idea to what extent.

It was part of the inspiration for asking this question to begin with.