Thread: a site with gcc warning and errors ellaboration exist?

Recently discussed here:
http://cboard.cprogramming.com/showthread.php?t=94184

The conclusion is "no there isn't".

I personally think that almost all of GCC's warnings and errors are pretty easy to understand (although there are some exceptions). Feel free to post errors/warnings and ask questions. It is obviously helpfull if you can provide the relevant source-code too, as that will certainly help the explaining of what's wrong in your code.

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Mats

I think there is another problem (besides cryptic error messages).

When there is an error, the compiler can easily get confused. It doesn't know what you are trying to do... It just knows it can't interpret the code. (This can happen with any compiler)

For example, once when I was moving some code around by "cutting & pasting", I mis-placed a bracket. There was only one little-tiny syntax error, but the compiler reported a couple-hundred errors and none of them said "mis-placed bracket". (It took me a few hours to find that little-tiny problem!)

Usually, the first error message identifies the line with the first error (or the real error is usually one line up or down), but beyond that, the compiler is often just confused.

Linker messages can be a bit more difficult, because you've lost the line-number information.

When the compiler gives you a warning, it's probably nailed the real problem... It hasn't given-up completely.... It (probably) knows what you are trying to do, and it's warning you that it might be risky.

Doug,

I completely agree - if you get hundreds or thousands of errors, it's most likely caused by an error at the beginning of the list [and, yes, if you are missing a bracket at teh end of a function, that can lead to all sorts of "strange" error messages].

Unfortunately, a "further explanation" will not really help there - unless you add to the "nested function declarations isn't valid in standard C" with "This usually means that you forgot a bracket" - and of course, that's not necessarily the error that you get from missing a bracket, as it can lead to lots of other errors. Unfortunately, this is one of those that you have to figure out with another method. Using the "automatically indent the code" will quickly tell you about a missing end bracket. But there are ohter missing bits that can cause equal confusion and distress - missing semicolon, particularly on type declarations can lead to strange error messages too.

Absolute general rule: Try fixing the first error first.

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Mats