| Message ID | 20160510075014.A743C41C38CF4@oldenburg.str.redhat.com |
|---|---|
| State | New |
| Headers | show |
On Tue, 10 May 2016 09:50:14 +0200 fweimer@redhat.com (Florian Weimer) wrote: > The earlierst reference I could find is in a German book on Borland's > Turbo C programming environment (Ekkehard Kaier, Edwin Rudolfs, > »Turbo C Grundkurs«, first published in 1988). It is not generally > available on current Microsoft platforms, and there are online > references that claim that it was not part of earlier Microsoft C > environments. This suggests that the previous speculative attribution > to MS-DOS (sic) was incorrect. > > 2016-05-10 Florian Weimer <fweimer@redhat.com> > > [BZ #3629] > * manual/string.texi (Copying Strings and Arrays): Document > provenience of the stpcpy function. > > diff --git a/manual/string.texi b/manual/string.texi > index 016fd0b..f22d2ac 100644 > --- a/manual/string.texi > +++ b/manual/string.texi > @@ -612,9 +612,8 @@ and @samp{bar} to produce @samp{foobar}, which it then prints. > @include stpcpy.c.texi > @end smallexample > > -This function is not part of the ISO or POSIX standards, and is not > -customary on Unix systems, but we did not invent it either. Perhaps it > -comes from MS-DOG. > +This function is a Turbo C extension. It is not part of the ISO or > +POSIX standards. According to the manpage for stpcpy, it has been added to POSIX.1-2008. It shows up in section 13 (Headers) under 'string.h': http://pubs.opengroup.org/onlinepubs/9699919799/nframe.html Perhaps a small change your last sentence? Other than that, lgtm. > > Its behavior is undefined if the strings overlap. The function is > declared in @file{string.h}. >
I can confirm it's documented in my Turbo C manual from 1987. There's no specific information on where they got it from, other than saying str*() functions _as a group_ are "available on Unix systems." (and that K&R define strcat() ;) > This suggests that the previous speculative attribution to MS-DOS > (sic) was incorrect. Of course, Turbo C is an MS-DOS compiler :-) (for a while it was the dominant MS-DOS compiler)
On Tue, May 10, 2016 at 3:50 AM, Florian Weimer <fweimer@redhat.com> wrote: > +This function is a Turbo C extension. It is not part of the ISO or > +POSIX standards. Even the current man pages tell you that this isn't right. Of course it was an extension but not introduced in Turbo C. It was introduced earlier. Amiga Lattice C had it: http://www.bombjack.org/commodore/amiga/applications/Lattice_C_Compiler_V3_Programmers_Reference_Guide_%28Sep_12_1986%29.pdf Page F-178.
diff --git a/manual/string.texi b/manual/string.texi index 016fd0b..f22d2ac 100644 --- a/manual/string.texi +++ b/manual/string.texi @@ -612,9 +612,8 @@ and @samp{bar} to produce @samp{foobar}, which it then prints. @include stpcpy.c.texi @end smallexample -This function is not part of the ISO or POSIX standards, and is not -customary on Unix systems, but we did not invent it either. Perhaps it -comes from MS-DOG. +This function is a Turbo C extension. It is not part of the ISO or +POSIX standards. Its behavior is undefined if the strings overlap. The function is declared in @file{string.h}.