Re: const versus __attribute__((const))

H. Peter Anvin
2003-12-09T16:51:47Z

Linus Torvalds wrote:
>
> On Tue, 9 Dec 2003, H. Peter Anvin wrote:
>
>>In some ways, this is rather unfortunate, too. What it really means is
>>that the gcc "m" constraint is overloaded; it would have been better if
>>they would have created a new modifier (say "*") for "must be lvalue."
>
>
> The thing is, most users of "m" (like 99%) actually mean "_THIS_ memory
> location". So just fixing the "m" modifier was an easy way to make sure
> that users get the behaviour they expect.
>

Agreed. It's just a bit ugly that the "m" in "rm" has a different
meaning than just "m".

-hpa