Thread: #ifndef _MATH_H

  1. #1
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    #ifndef _MATH_H

    probably this is a stupid question ... at least, it sounds stupid.

    I've taken recently to reading *.h in my /usr/include dir to see what functions they might offer, but am always scared off with the amount of preprocessor type expressions that appear.

    these standard .h files (take math.h) seems to be littered with #ifndef and similar statements and variables with double underscore variables, some that looked a bit like environment variables, but others that don't.

    It's a pity I can't follow it all, cos then reading these files could be useful.

    If anybody can shed a little light or point me to some URLs, I'd appreciate it. (You could also say, "you're not meant to read them, period" or even better: "if you can't read them, then you're not meant to" :-D).

    Cheers.

  2. #2
    Officially An Architect brewbuck's Avatar
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    It's not a wasted exercise... You have to be careful though, because header files might contain things which look useful but are undocumented and subject to change. The library documentation should be what you work from, but for learning purposes, there's nothing wrong with poking through header files.

    System headers are usually strewn with tons of #ifdef because they are intended to work on various system configurations.
    Code:
    //try
    //{
    	if (a) do { f( b); } while(1);
    	else   do { f(!b); } while(1);
    //}

  3. #3
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    ah brewbuck, many thanks for your explanation. see pm ref. an earlier post.

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