Re: [PATCH v1 21/25] man/man3type/wchar_t.3type: HISTORY: Update first SUS appearance of wchar_t(3type)

[Alejandro Colomar <alx@kernel.org>]

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Hi Seth,

On Sat, Jan 10, 2026 at 09:08:49AM +0000, Seth McDonald wrote:
> Hi Alex,
> 
> On Friday, 9 January 2026 at 20:37, Alejandro Colomar <alx@kernel.org> wrote:
> > Hi Seth,
> [...]
> > I've recently learned that wchar_t and related APIs were introduced to
> > ISO C in C95.  If you are interested in them, you could check the C95
> > draft (there's a link in standards(7) --I added it a few weeks ago--).
> > Otherwise, I'll have a look at it myself.  Let me know.
> 
> I can include this in later patches, as long as citing the draft is
> sufficient justification.  I personally tend to have a more 'final
> standard only' mindset, but if you're okay with the draft, then I'm
> all good to use it.

For ISO C, unless you have the money to pay for the standard documents
(usually, this is only done by companies that need certification), the
drafts are the only available thing.  The actual standards are behing a
paywall, and most people never see one.  I have never seen an ISO C
standard (and I'm member of the C Committee).

The C Committee publishes drafts of what will become the standard, and
usually, it's enough to consult the draft that's closest to the
standard.  See also:
<https://stackoverflow.com/questions/81656/where-do-i-find-the-current-c-or-c-standard-documents>

For C95, the draft n412 is, as far as I understand, identical to the
standard (except for the ISO cover sheet, etc.).  Draft n412 was an
early draft for C99 published around the publication of C95, and even in
the SUMMARY of the draft, it states that "This document represents C90
with Technical Corrigendum 1 and Amendment 1 applied".  See
<https://www.open-std.org/jtc1/sc22/wg14/www/docs/n412.pdf>.

For C23, for example, the draft n3220 is identical to C23 except for one
typo in C23 that was fixed in n3220.  (n3220 is the first draft of C2y).

In other versions of ISO C, drafts may differ more from the actual
standard.

> 
> For the 3type section I've already covered, it'd probably be easier if
> you could patch up the few types that first appeared in C95.  I'd rather
> not keep going back to refine previous patches, as I've found (from
> general experience) this mindset tends to cause me to *constantly* find
> new ways to polish what I've already done, preventing me from making
> much progress.

Yes, I'm taking your patches as they already improve the pages.  I was
mentioning this in case you want to write patches in the future that
also document C95.  FWIW, I've applied the patches already.


Cheers,
Alex

> 
> ----
> Seth McDonald.
> sethmcmail at pm dot me (mailing lists)
> 2336 E8D2 FEB1 5300 692C  62A9 5839 6AD8 9243 D369

-- 
<https://www.alejandro-colomar.es>

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