Clang C Compiler 'class' keyword reserved? - c

Hi I am compiling ffmpeg using xcode, which I believe uses clang for compilation. In ffmpeg there is a struct with a member variable named 'class' I believe this is perfectly fine in C but clang is trying to parse it as a keyword. Any idea how to fix? Basically the following in a cpp file will cause the error:
extern C {
typedef struct {
int class;
} SomeStruct;
}
It tries to interpret class as a keyword.
FYI the file that is throwing the error in ffmpeg is libavcodec/mpegvideo.h and I need to include this to have access to the MpegEncContext struct to pull out motion map info.
EDIT
The above code sample was just to demonstrate the error. But perhaps its fixable in another way. In my actual code I have it like this:
#ifdef __cplusplus
extern "C" {
#endif
#include "libavcodec/mpegvideo.h"
#include "libavformat/avformat.h"
#if __cplusplus
} //Extern C
#endif
How would I get that to include the two files as C files and not C++?
Thanks

It's completely fine in C. When you build that as C++, you encounter an error because class is a C++ keyword.
As far as fixing it, you would normally choose an identifier other than class. However, ffmpeg developers may not be so agreeable with that change. Therefore, you may need to either:
restrict the visibility of that header to C translations
or edit your own copy in order to use it in C++ translations
Fortunately, you are also using a C compiler which has good support of C99 features in this case. C Compilers which do not support C99 well are particularly troublesome with ffmpeg sources (because you would then compile the whole program as C++ for the C99 features, and the conflict count would be much higher).
(there are other dirty tricks you could do to try to work around the problem, but i will not mention them)

Basically the following in a cpp file will cause the error
.cpp files are processed as C++ files, not C, and class is a reserved word in C++.

If you don't have a choice to rename anything in those header files, you could just replace the class token by something else
#ifdef __cplusplus
extern "C" {
# define class videoClass
#endif
#include "libavcodec/mpegvideo.h"
#include "libavformat/avformat.h"
#if __cplusplus
# undef class
} //Extern C
#endif
This is quite a dirty hack, but for such badly interfaced code you don't have much choice. The real solution would be to have all the struct members in these files use names that us some sort of prefix or so, as it is done in the network layer code. There all members have some prefixes as ss_ or sa_ and such problems are very unlikely to occur.

Related

I'm trying to install the NVIDIA version of a toolkit, and I'm getting error messages like "... this declaration may not have extern "C" linkage"

I'm trying to install the NVIDIA version of an externally supplied toolkit (for the purposes of this message it doesn't matter what the toolkit is, this is a problem about how to use nvcc), and I'm getting error messages like "usr/include/c++/6/utility(329): error: this declaration may not have extern "C" linkage".
I'm not a C or C++ programmer, but I am happy enough poking around in things like Makefiles. I'm pretty sure that I've got all the paths set to point to the right places, and /usr/include/c++/6 contains all the files that are generating the error messages. But I have no idea what these error messages mean and what I should do to get round them.
I believe these errors are from C/C++ name mangling differences and the fact that NVCC compiles as a C++ compiler. I was able to compile HTK 3.5 by simply removing the extern "C" declarations from HCUDA.cu:
#ifdef __cplusplus
extern "C" {
#endif
/* ... */
#ifdef __cplusplus
}
#endif
I suspect that, because they're already declared extern "C" in HCUDA.h, they don't need to be declared such in HCUDA.cu, but I'm not sure.

How can I insert C code into C++/CLI code?

I have some files written in C that I want to insert into my .NET C++/CLI code.
This C code is huge and has not been written by me, so it would be a hard task to me 'translating' all the code.
How can I insert this code and call the functions I need without any compatibility problems?
I used to think that, if C++/CLI is definitely C++ and C is compatible with C++, there is no problem to insert C code into C++/CLI code. But I've read about something called extern "C", which made me change my mind.
How can I insert the code into my project, preferably in another file?
Thank you in advance.
C++ can run C code without modifications. The only difference is the way the names of functions and variables are encoded. The process is called name mangling.
Just enclose your C code (headers and source) in a extern "C" block:
extern "C" {
... (C code)
}
All C code must be written in such a block. This tells C++ compiler how to treat function and variable names. Read more about extern "C" here.
What Mario is writing is correct. I am just modifying his example below. Just add all the header file declaration like below and compile you code to use all the function declared in c into your C++ application. Also include c libraries into your make file as well.
#ifdef __cplusplus
extern "C" {
#endif
//declare your header file here
#include "your c header file"
void foo(int i);//your c function
#ifdef __cplusplus
}
#endif

#include guards does not work and #pragma once is obsolete

There are two head files _stub_defs.h
///stub code
#pragma once
#include "random.h"
#include <stdarg.h>
and stasrg.h
#ifndef __GNUC_VA_LIST
#define __GNUC_VA_LIST
typedef __builtin_va_list __gnuc_va_list;
#endif
When I use my cross-compiler(sparc-rtems-gcc) to compile, the two head files both are included.Then the terminal tells me:
warning: #pragma once is obsolete
stdarg.h: conflicting types for `__gnuc_va_list'
stdarg.h: previous declaration of `__gnuc_va_list'
Obviously, #include guards does not work.Is this the problem of head files' codes or the problem of my cross-compiler?
The include guards work. You have another problem.
The best way to debug this is to run only the C preprocessor. For gcc (including cross compiler gcc), you can use the -E option. Just add this to your compile stage. Instead of getting an object file, you will get a C file after the preprocessor stage.
Take that file, and search for the duplicate definition there. The file will also have markers that tell the compiler which file this definition originally came from, as well as markers when includes are nested. If you follow those, you will see both where the two definitions come from and which file included each of them.

Is calling atoi without stdlib undefined behaviour?

Is calling atoi without including stdlib.h undefined behaviour?
I can't find where I have included stdlib.h in my project, even though I have used atoi.
The thing is actually atoi has been working fine - it has been parsing integers correctly every time the software has been used.
It is some embedded device.
So is there case this can be well defined?
btw. In this line:
#ifdef __cplusplus
#if __cplusplus
extern "C"{
#endif
#endif /* __cplusplus */
#include "sdkGlob.h"
#ifdef __cplusplus
#if __cplusplus
}
#endif
#endif /* __cplusplus */
that header includes stdlib.h but I can't understand in which case it is included. And I am not sure if this cplusplus is defined anywhere. This is a c project anyway.
Prior to C99 it was acceptable to use functions that hadn't previously been declared. The compiler might generate a warning but there would be no error until the linker either didn't find the function or found a function of the same name with a signature other than the one that the compiler had guessed. Luckily for you, the compiler always guesses a return type of int.
In C99 it became necessary for function declarations to be visible but not all compilers strictly enforce the rule.
As per Random832's comment, it's also quite possible that sdkGlob simply includes stdlib for itself.
As to your other question: sdkGlob is always included but if run through a C++ compiler rather than a C compiler you also get the extern "C"{ .. } wrapping. That tells the C++ compiler not to mangle the names so that you can link against a version of that module that was built using an ordinary C compiler. It's the normal way to provide plain C libraries in a way that allows them to be used by both C and C++ code.
The short answer
Two possibilities:
It's probable that sdkGlob.h include stdlib.h or define its own version of atoi.
Some compilers, like GCC, resolve missing #include and even hide the errors or warnings. Run gcc -Wall and check if warnings appears.
About ifndef
The #ifdef __cplusplus sections are used by C++ compilers. Here, you're saying '*if and if only the code is being compiled by a C++ compiler, do ... *'.
The C-only version of your code:
#include "sdkGlob.h"
The C++-only version of your code:
extern "C"{
#include "sdkGlob.h"
}

Managing redundant typedefs from multiple vendors

What are some of the best ways to manage redundant typedefs used for platform independence from multiple middleware (operating systems, protocol stacks) vendors in the C programming language.
e.g.:
target.h
/* inclusion lock etc */
typedef char CHAR;
typedef unsigned char BYTE;
typedef unsigned short int WORD;
/* ... more of the same ... */
OS_types.h
/* inclusion lock etc */
typedef char CHAR;
typedef unsigned char BYTE;
typedef unsigned short int WORD;
/* ... more of the same ... */
At some point the compiler recognizes that it has two redundant typedef symbols and bails out with an error because this is simply not allowed by definition in C.
One possible way to do this without modifying the vendor's header would be to use the preprocessor with some header wrappers, e.g.
mytypes.h
#define BYTE VENDOR1_BYTE
#include <vendor1/types.h>
#undef BYTE
#define BYTE VENDOR2_BYTE
#include <vendor2/types.h>
#undef BYTE
typedef unsigned char BYTE;
This would result in the vendor's code generating different typedefs but hopefully mapped to the same actual type (unsigned char in the example). If the vendors are using different underlying types for the same type names then the method will likely not work.
That's a toughie. If I had to do something, I'd probably hold my nose and modify the third-party header-files -- possibly using macros to obtain conditional compilation of the offending typedefs.
Good luck.
If the vendor is responsive to feedback, you could beg them to move those generic type definitions into a separate file, e.g. types.h. If they're isolated in a separate file, it's much easier to manage. The solution could be as simple as removing their types.h and adding your own project-specific types.h which can do whatever it needs to do in your project.
Even better, beg them to use the standard C typedefs in stdint.h, i.e. uint16_t.
Otherwise, I'd suggest a modification to the vendor header files, done as cleanly as possible so it's easy to re-do when they next release code. Of course this all goes in your VCS so you can track exactly what changes you made!
One approach, although it could be a lot of work, is to build your own "wrapper" layers which provide only the functionality you need from each of the middleware vendors. If you keep each wrapper in its own compilation unit (.c file) that's the only place you'll need to refer to the vendor's header file. That gives you a way to prevent the conflicting types from "leaking" into your application, as you can use your own typedefs and translate them to the vendor-specific types in the wrapper.
As Steve suggested, modifying the header files might be the best solution, depending on how often the vendor ships new versions of their stuff. The overhead could get pretty high.
If you have the option to use C++ compilation for your own code (even if it is essentially C code) you could create namespace wrappers thus:
vendorA_target.h
namespace vendorA
{
extern "C"
{
#include <target.h>
}
}
vendorB_OS_types.h
namespace vendorB
{
extern "C"
{
#include <target.h>
}
}
Then in your own code. include these headers in place of the originals, and use scope-resolution, or if you are certain that types with the same name have identical or compatible definitions, simply us a using directive:
using vendorB::WORD
WORD timeout = 100 ;
vendorA::WORD x = 0xffff ;
Note that the extern "C" wrappers are not necessary if the headers already have them internally in __cplusplus macro conditionals - but it won't hurt.
Using C++ to compile C code imposes no overhead, but it does have stricter type comformaty checking, which while good for your code quality, may cause other headaches; especially if the third-party headers contain code that is invalid as C++. If the headers already have extern "C" declarations in __cplusplus macro conditionals, then they are already intended to be "C++-ready" and you may not have any such problems.
Unfortunately this method will not solve the problem of preprocessor macros with the same name. If you have that problem, you may have to #undef the macros from one header before including the other, or modify the headers.

Resources