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Subject: Re: [PATCH v2 1/2] system_data_types.7: Add 'void *'
To:     Jonathan Wakely <jwakely.gcc@gmail.com>,
        "Michael Kerrisk (man-pages)" <mtk.manpages@gmail.com>
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        linux-man <linux-man@vger.kernel.org>,
        GNU C Library <libc-alpha@sourceware.org>,
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From:   Alejandro Colomar <colomar.6.4.3@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <63826e82-7a19-0ecc-f73c-56aa560a842f@gmail.com>
Date:   Fri, 2 Oct 2020 15:20:26 +0200
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On 2020-10-02 15:06, Jonathan Wakely wrote:
 > On Fri, 2 Oct 2020 at 12:31, Michael Kerrisk (man-pages)
 > <mtk.manpages@gmail.com> wrote:
 >>
 >> On Fri, 2 Oct 2020 at 12:49, Jonathan Wakely <jwakely.gcc@gmail.com> 
wrote:
 >>>
 >>> On Fri, 2 Oct 2020 at 09:28, Alejandro Colomar via Gcc 
<gcc@gcc.gnu.org> wrote:
 >>>> However, it might be good that someone starts a page called
 >>>> 'type_qualifiers(7)' or something like that.
 >>>
 >>> Who is this for? Who is trying to learn C from man pages? Should
 >>> somebody stop them?
 >>
 >> Yes, I think so. To add context, Alex has been doing a lot of work to
 >> build up the new system_data_types(7) page [1], which I think is
 >> especially useful for the POSIX system data types that are used with
 >> various APIs.
 >
 > It's definitely useful for types like struct siginfo_t and struct
 > timeval, which aren't in C.

Hi Jonathan,

But then the line is a bit diffuse.
Would you document 'ssize_t' and not 'size_t'?
Would you not document intN_t types?
Would you document stdint types, including 'intptr_t', and not 'void *'?

I guess the basic types (int, long, ...) can be left out for now,
and apart from 'int' those rarely are the most appropriate types
for most uses.
But other than that, I would document all of the types.
And even... when all of the other types are documented,
it will be only a little extra effort to document those,
so in the future I might consider that.
But yes, priority should probably go to Linux/POSIX-only types.

Thanks,

Alex

 >
 > Trying to document C seems like a huge task, ill-suited for man-pages,
 > and not worth the effort.
 >
 > Maybe some people prefer man pages, but for everybody else
 > https://en.cppreference.com/w/c already exists and seems like a better
 > use of time.
 >