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>>> 3. add a pre-processing step that uses gnu cpp or awk to strip the
>>>    // comments
>>
>> That's exactly what I had had in mind. How could this best be 
>> accomplished
>> (using awk, for example)? And how would one add it to the Makefile?
>
> Sed seems simpler:
>
>
> .c.o:
> 	@(echo ${CC} ${CFLAGS} -c $< && \
> 	PID=$$$$ && \
> 	sed -e 's,//.*$$,,' < $< > tmp$${PID}.c && \
> 	${CC} ${CFLAGS} -c tmp$${PID}.c && \
> 	mv tmp$${PID}.o $@ && \
> 	rm -f tmp$${PID}.c)
>
> I would have used /dev/stdin, but some cc's check that the file ends 
> in .c

ADDENDUM: Just finished reading the other emails on this, which came in 
while I was writing this. Not sure if this is as useful if it doesn't 
do quoting (which I had forgotten also)... I could spiff up the awk 
example to do that (although using " and ' as characters in awk is a 
bitch).

Just to play devil's advocate: if the .c files mix the two commenting 
styles in certain (admittedly unorthodox) ways, you could end up in 
trouble. For instance:

/* begin comment
// end comment */

would seriously break something down the road, as would:

/* comment // */

I wrote something in awk that looks like it evaluates the commenting 
properly to figure out what stays and what goes. Of course, no 
guarantees that it doesn't have bugs, but I did some checking with a 
pretty good test file and it did everything ok.

To use this, do: awk -f rem_comments.awk $FILE > temp${FILE}${PID}.c

I'm not as up on make, so I won't try to figure out exactly how that 
should look. The script is attached below.

-- Erik

----rem_comments.awk----
$0~/\/\*|\*\/|\/\// {
   i=1;
   while(i < length) {
     mysub = substr($0,i,length-i+1);
     if(cmnt==0) {
       a = index(mysub,"/*");
       m = index(mysub,"//");
       if( m && m<a ) {
         a=0;
       }
       if(a) {
         cmnt=1;
         i = a + 2;
       } else if(m) {
         $0=substr($0,1,m-1);
         break;
       } else {
         break;
       }
     } else {
       z = index(mysub,"*/");
       if( z ) {
         cmnt=0;
         i = i + ( z - 1 ) + 2;
       } else {
         break;
       }
     }
   }
}
{
   print;
}
------end rem_comments.awk-----

I tested this with this file:

-----test.c------
/* dumb test file for awk script
  *
  */
#include <stdlib.h>
int main() {
   // all goes
   int b = 2;
   int a = 2;
   /* will this // mess up? */
   /* how about // this? */ printf("a\n");
   int c;// half stays half goes
   printf("x\n");
   // all goes
   // /* this whole line is gone
   printf("not a comment\n");
   // */ so is this.
   /*
   // fake out */
   printf("x\n");
   return 0;
}
-----end test.c------

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