A more general mechanism is #define strrel(a,R,b) (strcmp(a, b) R 0) which allows you to write strrel(a,==,b). I *like* it! In fact, I think this is sufficiently general enuf to be called simply `string'. Some consider this to be abuse of the preprocessor. Well, they're just a bunch of wimps! (Root Boy) Jim Cottrell <rbj at cmr> "One man gathers what another man spills"