«

Hello!

In the following code-snippet, is it possible to initialize each
element of arr, with STRUCT_INIT?

struct mystruct {
int a;
char b;
};

#define STRUCT_INIT {5, 'a'}

#define LEN 3
struct mystruct arr[LEN] = \
{STRUCT_INIT};
/* does not work: only 1st element initialized as desired */

/*
I don not want to write
{STRUCT_INIT, STRUCT_INIT, STRUCT_INIT};
since LEN can change!
!!!!!!!!!
*/

..
..
Can this be done?

Thanks
-Albert

..
..
..
..

/****** test-program ******/
#define <stdio.h>
int main(void)
{
int i;

for (i = 0; i < LEN; i++)
printf("|%d|, |%c|\n", arr[i].a, arr[i].b);
return 0;
}

On Aug 27, 1:02 pm, anon.a...@gmail.com wrote:
> Hello!
>
> In the following code-snippet, is it possible to initialize each
> element of arr, with STRUCT_INIT?
>
> struct mystruct {
> int a;
> char b;
>
> };
>
> #define STRUCT_INIT {5, 'a'}
>
> #define LEN 3
> struct mystruct arr[LEN] = \
> {STRUCT_INIT};
> /* does not work: only 1st element initialized as desired */
>
> /*
> I don not want to write
> {STRUCT_INIT, STRUCT_INIT, STRUCT_INIT};
> since LEN can change!
> !!!!!!!!!
> */

Perhaps it can be done with the preprocessor.
I gave it a try, but I'm no preprocessor expert - the code below
results in compiler (preprocessor) errors.

But: Could something along these lines, be done:
#define STRUCT_INIT {5, 'a'}

#define PUT_A(n) \
#if ((n) == 1) \
STRUCT_INIT \
#elif ((n) > 0) \
STRUCT_INIT , PUT_B((n)-1) \
#endif

#define PUT_B(n) \
#if ((n) == 1) \
STRUCT_INIT \
#elif ((n) > 0) \
STRUCT_INIT , PUT_A((n)-1) \
#endif


#define LEN 3
struct mystruct arr[LEN] = \
{PUT_B(LEN)};


Thanks -Albert

writes:

> On Aug 27, 1:02 pm, anon.a...@gmail.com wrote:
>> In the following code-snippet, is it possible to initialize each
>> element of arr, with STRUCT_INIT?
>>
>> struct mystruct {
>> int a;
>> char b;
>>
>> };
>>
>> #define STRUCT_INIT {5, 'a'}
>>
>> #define LEN 3
>> struct mystruct arr[LEN] = \
>> {STRUCT_INIT};
<snip>
>
> Perhaps it can be done with the preprocessor.
<snip>
> #define STRUCT_INIT {5, 'a'}
>
> #define PUT_A(n) \
> #if ((n) == 1) \
> STRUCT_INIT \
> #elif ((n) > 0) \
> STRUCT_INIT , PUT_B((n)-1) \
> #endif
>
<snip>

You are putting a lot of effort to avoid the simplest for loop. Why?
Just initialise your data in a loop.

--
Ben.

On Aug 27, 1:47 pm, Ben Bacarisse <ben.use...@bsb.me.uk> wrote:
<snip>
> You are putting a lot of effort to avoid the simplest for loop. Why?
Good question - it made me think!
Here's a scenario: If you have code running at boot time and want to
boot as fast as possible!

> Just initialise your data in a loop.
True. -Albert

<> wrote in message
news: oups.com...
> On Aug 27, 1:47 pm, Ben Bacarisse <ben.use...@bsb.me.uk> wrote:
> <snip>
>> You are putting a lot of effort to avoid the simplest for loop. Why?
> Good question - it made me think!
> Here's a scenario: If you have code running at boot time and want to
> boot as fast as possible!
How big is this array anyway? I'd say that if it's less than 1 MB it should
take less than a second. I think that performance should only be considered
when the code is run very frequently and is time-consuming. Not when you're
running it just once and at the initialization phase where users expect the
program to spend some time (a second or two) to initialize.

Abdo Haji-Ali
Programmer
In|Framez

wrote On 08/27/07 09:30,:
> On Aug 27, 1:47 pm, Ben Bacarisse <ben.use...@bsb.me.uk> wrote:
> <snip>
>
>>You are putting a lot of effort to avoid the simplest for loop. Why?
>
> Good question - it made me think!
> Here's a scenario: If you have code running at boot time and want to
> boot as fast as possible!

Which do you think is faster: Running a loop that
copies constant data into a million array slots, or
reading a million copies of that data from the boot
device?

--

On Mon, 27 Aug 2007 11:02:00 +0000, anon.asdf wrote:

> Hello!
>
> In the following code-snippet, is it possible to initialize each
> element of arr, with STRUCT_INIT?
>
> struct mystruct {
> int a;
> char b;
> };
>
> #define STRUCT_INIT {5, 'a'}
>
> #define LEN 3
> struct mystruct arr[LEN] = \
> {STRUCT_INIT};
> /* does not work: only 1st element initialized as desired */
>
> /*
> I don not want to write
> {STRUCT_INIT, STRUCT_INIT, STRUCT_INIT};
> since LEN can change!
> !!!!!!!!!
> */
>
<snip>
If you can put this in a separate C file, you could write
a wee program to write that C file, given LEN, and invoke it
as part of your build process.

Off topic: if you use gcc and don't care about portability to other
compilers, you could write
struct mystruct arr[] = { [0 ... LEN-1 ] = STRUCT_INIT};
That's not C but a gcc extension.

On Aug 27, 6:47 am, Ben Bacarisse <ben.use...@bsb.me.uk> wrote:
> anon.a...@gmail.com writes:
> > On Aug 27, 1:02 pm, anon.a...@gmail.com wrote:
> >> In the following code-snippet, is it possible to initialize each
> >> element of arr, with STRUCT_INIT?
>
> >> struct mystruct {
> >> int a;
> >> char b;
>
> >> };
>
> >> #define STRUCT_INIT {5, 'a'}
>
> >> #define LEN 3
> >> struct mystruct arr[LEN] = \
> >> {STRUCT_INIT};
> <snip>
>
> > Perhaps it can be done with the preprocessor.
> <snip>
> > #define STRUCT_INIT {5, 'a'}
>
> > #define PUT_A(n) \
> > #if ((n) == 1) \
> > STRUCT_INIT \
> > #elif ((n) > 0) \
> > STRUCT_INIT , PUT_B((n)-1) \
> > #endif
>
> <snip>
>
> You are putting a lot of effort to avoid the simplest for loop. Why?
> Just initialise your data in a loop.
>

All the world is not a hosted system. And many of us deal with
software that is not loaded from disk, memory that cannot be written
at runtime, and RAM that is scarce and expensive. Of course, in those
situations, you rarely (never?) want all the elements of the array to
contain identical data.

This is one of C's few real shortcomings for writing embedded
software.

The standard way to (or at least, the way I usually) overcome this is
to #define LEN in a header file, and write a simple PC application
that can be invoked by the makefile to generate the initialization
data and save it to a file, so the code becomes

#include "len.h"

struct mystruct arr[LEN] = {
#include "initarr.dat"
};

Regards,

-=Dave

Eric Sosman wrote, On 27/08/07 16:04:
> wrote On 08/27/07 09:30,:
>> On Aug 27, 1:47 pm, Ben Bacarisse <ben.use...@bsb.me.uk> wrote:
>> <snip>
>>
>>> You are putting a lot of effort to avoid the simplest for loop. Why?
>> Good question - it made me think!
>> Here's a scenario: If you have code running at boot time and want to
>> boot as fast as possible!
>
> Which do you think is faster: Running a loop that
> copies constant data into a million array slots, or
> reading a million copies of that data from the boot
> device?

It depends. And there are situations I am aware of which almost
certainly do *not* apply to the OP where the bootup time *is* critical.
--
Flash Gordon

Dave Hansen <> writes:

> On Aug 27, 6:47 am, Ben Bacarisse <ben.use...@bsb.me.uk> wrote:
>> anon.a...@gmail.com writes:
>> > On Aug 27, 1:02 pm, anon.a...@gmail.com wrote:
>> >> In the following code-snippet, is it possible to initialize each
>> >> element of arr, with STRUCT_INIT?
<lost of macro stuff>
>>
>> You are putting a lot of effort to avoid the simplest for loop. Why?
>> Just initialise your data in a loop.
>>
>
> All the world is not a hosted system.

Yes, it was a genuine question. I thought it prudent to check, first,
that there *was* reason to go to all the effort of statically
initialising the array.

--
Ben.