Byron Jeff wrote:

> I always hated the fact that the braces were not required even when the
> body of a control statement consisted of a single statement. The
> inconsistency of making it optional is a bad idea.

It actually is one area where C is very consistent. Statements in C do
not have braces but any statement in C is made into a compound
statement with braces.

if (condition)
   statement_if
else
  statement_else

statement_if can be a single statement which ends in ";" or a
compound statement containing one or more statements
{ statement1;  statement2; . . . .  }

Braces have some other characteristics that can be
usefull

{ char a,b,c; statement1; statement2;... }

the declaration of the local variables chars a,b,c  remains
until the "}" and the space can be reused for other local variables.
Nesting braces provides local control over variable scope a
feature that is almost uniquely C.

Braces in C keep thoughts in one place unlike most languages
that use ";" as a statement continuation.

I wish that pascal had braces and statement locals and C had
pascal's local functions.

All the best of the season,

w..
--
Walter Banks
Byte Craft Limited
http://www.bytecraft.com





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