Efficient coding considered harmful?

[Richard A. O'Keefe]

In article <764 at wsccs.UUCP> terry at wsccs.UUCP (Every system needs one) writes:
>if statements should look like:
>
>	if( expression operator expression)
>rather than
>	if (expressionoperatorexpression)
>
>which can break old compilers with either the space after the if or

WHAT?  I've used C under UNIX since version 6+, and various VM/CMS,
8086, and VMS C compilers, and I've _never_ run into one with THAT
bug!  The rule that I use is that "things which are similar should
look similar, things which are different should look different";
if statements are not function calls, so they shouldn't look like
them.  Say "squodge 'if' up to the '(' and confuse the h--- out of
readers because I _like_ it that way", but don't say that compilers
were ever allowed to _demand_ it.