ISO DIS 9899

[Doug Gwyn]

In article <2551 at ifi.uio.no> gisle at ifi.uio.no (Gisle Hannemyr) writes:
>      "It seems that the efforts to create an unified international
>   standard for C is diverging in two main factions.  One faction
>   will let ISO develop the final C standard, based on the draft
>   ANSI standard, the second faction want to publish the ANSI
>   draft standard, and continue work on a new ANSI C standard
>   to replace the present.  The new ANSI C standard is expected
>   to be purged of several strange features that several
>   commentators has opinied are present in the draft ANSI
>   standard
>      The British has commented that they believe that ISO will
>   create a more complete specification of C than the present
>   ANSI draft"
>Is this totally bogus?

Pretty much so.

There is no intention among X3J11 members (developers of the ANSI C
standard) to begin work on a replacement standard for many years to
come.  (The standard does need to be reviewed every 10 years.)  Some
X3J11 members are working toward a set of extensions targeted at
numerical programming applications.  My feeling is that the only
proper way to do that is through extensions of, not conflicts with,
the ANSI C standard.  (For example, #include <nmath.h> could make
errno-free replacement math functions available for those who think
they prefer them.)

ISO WG14 and X3J11 have agreed to work toward a joint "information
bulletin" that would augment the C standard with additional coverage
of the issue of "undefined behavior", which the British representatives
feel is needed.  This would NOT affect the official ANSI C standard,
although so long as it is compatible with it it would serve as
guidelines for implementors and programmers.  I don't know whether or
not ISO would formally graft such an appendix onto the IS or not.  In
any event it would not, as I understand it, affect the intention of
the ANSI C standard, merely clarify it.

Of course, when it comes to politics, all sorts of silly things might
happen.  However, I have heard nothing about "purging features from the
ANSI C standard".  The only one that might have been in question was
trigraphs, and ISO WG14 voted the Danes down on that issue, which should
have (according to gentlemen's rules of this business) closed the issue.