C alternative tokens
C alternative tokens refer to a set of alternative spellings of common operators in the C programming language. They are implemented as a group of macro constants in the C standard library in the iso646.h
header. The tokens were created by Bjarne Stroustrup for the pre-standard C++ language[1] and were added to the C standard in a 1995 amendment to the C90 standard via library to avoid the breakage of existing code.
C standard library |
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General topics |
Miscellaneous headers |
The alternative tokens allow programmers to use C language bitwise and logical operators which could otherwise be hard to type on some international and non-QWERTY keyboards. The name of the header file they are implemented in refers to the ISO/IEC 646 standard, a 7-bit character set with a number of regional variations, some of which have accented characters in place of the punctuation marks used by C operators.
The macros
The iso646.h
header defines the following 11 macros as stated below:[2]
Macro | Defined as |
---|---|
and | && |
and_eq | &= |
bitand | & |
bitor | | |
compl | ~ |
not | ! |
not_eq | != |
or | || |
or_eq | |= |
xor | ^ |
xor_eq | ^= |
C++
The above-mentioned identifiers are operator keywords in the ISO C++ programming language and do not require the inclusion of a header file.[3] For consistency, the C++98 standard provides the header <ciso646>
. However the latter file has no effect, being empty.[4] Some compilers, such as Microsoft Visual C++ have, at least in the past, required the header to be included in order to use these identifiers.
See also
References
- "CppCon 2017: Panel "Grill the Committee"".
- "Rationale for International Standard - Programming Languages - C" (PDF). 5.10. April 2003. Archived (PDF) from the original on 2016-06-06. Retrieved 2010-10-17.
- Stroustrup, Bjarne (1994-03-29). Design and Evolution of C++ (1st ed.). Addison-Wesley Publishing Company. ISBN 0-201-54330-3.
- Lischner, Ray (2003). C++ in a Nutshell. O'Reilly Media. p. 212. ISBN 0-596-00298-X.
External links
- : alternative spellings – Base Definitions Reference, The Single UNIX Specification, Issue 7 from The Open Group