Re: argument names in function declarations

[der Mouse <mouse%Rodents-Montreal.ORG@localhost>]

> Does using leading underscores in the names help with the cpp issue?

In system headers?  It may help a little.

Identifiers beginning with a double underscore, or an underscore
followed by an uppercase letter, are "always reserved for any use"
according to the C spec.  This means that the implementation (and
system includes count as part of the implementation) can use them any
way it finds convenient, including this one.

Other identifiers beginning with an underscore are "always reserved for
use as identifiers with file scope in both the ordinary and tag name
spaces".  This use does not have file scope, so as I read it such
identifiers are not reserved for these purposes and thus we can't
safely use them here.

However, taking advantage of this has the potential to render the code
uncompilable by other compilers which do not have our lack of magic
semantics for the identifiers in question.  And I see additional
reasons to avoid them: system headers are not, in general, the right
place to document call arguments, and, even if you _do_ want to
document the arguments there, just a name is at best a memory-jogger,
not real documentation.  If you want to document them in the header, I
say, use comments; that's what they exist for.

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