From -1236583016854770597 X-Google-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII-7-bit X-Google-Thread: f78e5,e415fe23f06d57ab,start X-Google-Attributes: gidf78e5,public X-Google-ArrivalTime: 2001-04-21 19:17:08 PST Path: newsfeed.google.com!newsfeed.stanford.edu!news-spur1.maxwell.syr.edu!news.maxwell.syr.edu!newsfeed.icl.net!dispose.news.demon.net!news.demon.co.uk!demon!mail2news.demon.co.uk!not-for-mail From: "Yaroslav Mironov" Newsgroups: comp.std.c++ Subject: Suggest rewording Date: Sun, 22 Apr 2001 02:16:53 GMT Approved: Fergus Henderson , moderator of comp.std.c++ Message-ID: <003901c0ca95$562b73c0$9e00000a@yaroslav.nevacom.spb.ru> X-Trace: mail2news.demon.co.uk 987905817 mail2news:24727 mail2news mail2news.demon.co.uk X-Complaints-To: abuse@demon.net X-Mail2News-Path: news.demon.net!mulga.cs.mu.oz.au X-Authentication-Warning: mulga.cs.mu.OZ.AU: fjh set sender to devnull@stump.algebra.com using -f X-Robomod: STUMP, ichudov@algebra.com (Igor Chudov) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="windows-1251" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V4.72.3110.3 Lines: 37 Xref: newsfeed.google.com comp.std.c++:4194 Hi, 3.6.1/2 ...An implementation shall not predefine the main function. This function shall not be overloaded. It shall have a return type of type int, but otherwise its type is implementation-defined... I know that from the point of view of native english speakers the last sentence unambiguously means "the return type is int, everything else about the type of main is implementation-defined" (I hope I'm not mistaken here :)). But to foreigners it is sometimes very hard to distinguish this "otherwise" from the "otherwise" like in "the return type is int, otherwise I'll eat my beard" and they spend too much time in flame wars trying to prove that the standard says "the return type is int, but it can also be implementation-defined". Since it is an international standard I suggest rewording this sentence. It seems to me that something like "An implementation shall not predefine the main function. This function shall not be overloaded. It shall have a return type of type int, but the number and type of (its) parameters are implementation-defined". would mean the same, but in a much clearer way. Comments? Yaroslav --- [ comp.std.c++ is moderated. To submit articles, try just posting with ] [ your news-reader. If that fails, use mailto:std-c++@ncar.ucar.edu ] [ --- Please see the FAQ before posting. --- ] [ FAQ: http://www.research.att.com/~austern/csc/faq.html ]