|
- <!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/loose.dtd">
- <html>
- <!-- Copyright (C) 1987-2020 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
-
- Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document
- under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.3 or
- any later version published by the Free Software Foundation. A copy of
- the license is included in the
- section entitled "GNU Free Documentation License".
-
- This manual contains no Invariant Sections. The Front-Cover Texts are
- (a) (see below), and the Back-Cover Texts are (b) (see below).
-
- (a) The FSF's Front-Cover Text is:
-
- A GNU Manual
-
- (b) The FSF's Back-Cover Text is:
-
- You have freedom to copy and modify this GNU Manual, like GNU
- software. Copies published by the Free Software Foundation raise
- funds for GNU development. -->
- <!-- Created by GNU Texinfo 6.5, http://www.gnu.org/software/texinfo/ -->
- <head>
- <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8">
- <title>Concatenation (The C Preprocessor)</title>
-
- <meta name="description" content="Concatenation (The C Preprocessor)">
- <meta name="keywords" content="Concatenation (The C Preprocessor)">
- <meta name="resource-type" content="document">
- <meta name="distribution" content="global">
- <meta name="Generator" content="makeinfo">
- <link href="index.html#Top" rel="start" title="Top">
- <link href="Index-of-Directives.html#Index-of-Directives" rel="index" title="Index of Directives">
- <link href="index.html#SEC_Contents" rel="contents" title="Table of Contents">
- <link href="Macros.html#Macros" rel="up" title="Macros">
- <link href="Variadic-Macros.html#Variadic-Macros" rel="next" title="Variadic Macros">
- <link href="Stringizing.html#Stringizing" rel="prev" title="Stringizing">
- <style type="text/css">
- <!--
- a.summary-letter {text-decoration: none}
- blockquote.indentedblock {margin-right: 0em}
- blockquote.smallindentedblock {margin-right: 0em; font-size: smaller}
- blockquote.smallquotation {font-size: smaller}
- div.display {margin-left: 3.2em}
- div.example {margin-left: 3.2em}
- div.lisp {margin-left: 3.2em}
- div.smalldisplay {margin-left: 3.2em}
- div.smallexample {margin-left: 3.2em}
- div.smalllisp {margin-left: 3.2em}
- kbd {font-style: oblique}
- pre.display {font-family: inherit}
- pre.format {font-family: inherit}
- pre.menu-comment {font-family: serif}
- pre.menu-preformatted {font-family: serif}
- pre.smalldisplay {font-family: inherit; font-size: smaller}
- pre.smallexample {font-size: smaller}
- pre.smallformat {font-family: inherit; font-size: smaller}
- pre.smalllisp {font-size: smaller}
- span.nolinebreak {white-space: nowrap}
- span.roman {font-family: initial; font-weight: normal}
- span.sansserif {font-family: sans-serif; font-weight: normal}
- ul.no-bullet {list-style: none}
- -->
- </style>
-
-
- </head>
-
- <body lang="en">
- <a name="Concatenation"></a>
- <div class="header">
- <p>
- Next: <a href="Variadic-Macros.html#Variadic-Macros" accesskey="n" rel="next">Variadic Macros</a>, Previous: <a href="Stringizing.html#Stringizing" accesskey="p" rel="prev">Stringizing</a>, Up: <a href="Macros.html#Macros" accesskey="u" rel="up">Macros</a> [<a href="index.html#SEC_Contents" title="Table of contents" rel="contents">Contents</a>][<a href="Index-of-Directives.html#Index-of-Directives" title="Index" rel="index">Index</a>]</p>
- </div>
- <hr>
- <a name="Concatenation-1"></a>
- <h3 class="section">3.5 Concatenation</h3>
- <a name="index-concatenation"></a>
- <a name="index-token-pasting"></a>
- <a name="index-token-concatenation"></a>
- <a name="index-_0023_0023-operator"></a>
-
- <p>It is often useful to merge two tokens into one while expanding macros.
- This is called <em>token pasting</em> or <em>token concatenation</em>. The
- ‘<samp>##</samp>’ preprocessing operator performs token pasting. When a macro
- is expanded, the two tokens on either side of each ‘<samp>##</samp>’ operator
- are combined into a single token, which then replaces the ‘<samp>##</samp>’ and
- the two original tokens in the macro expansion. Usually both will be
- identifiers, or one will be an identifier and the other a preprocessing
- number. When pasted, they make a longer identifier. This isn’t the
- only valid case. It is also possible to concatenate two numbers (or a
- number and a name, such as <code>1.5</code> and <code>e3</code>) into a number.
- Also, multi-character operators such as <code>+=</code> can be formed by
- token pasting.
- </p>
- <p>However, two tokens that don’t together form a valid token cannot be
- pasted together. For example, you cannot concatenate <code>x</code> with
- <code>+</code> in either order. If you try, the preprocessor issues a warning
- and emits the two tokens. Whether it puts white space between the
- tokens is undefined. It is common to find unnecessary uses of ‘<samp>##</samp>’
- in complex macros. If you get this warning, it is likely that you can
- simply remove the ‘<samp>##</samp>’.
- </p>
- <p>Both the tokens combined by ‘<samp>##</samp>’ could come from the macro body,
- but you could just as well write them as one token in the first place.
- Token pasting is most useful when one or both of the tokens comes from a
- macro argument. If either of the tokens next to an ‘<samp>##</samp>’ is a
- parameter name, it is replaced by its actual argument before ‘<samp>##</samp>’
- executes. As with stringizing, the actual argument is not
- macro-expanded first. If the argument is empty, that ‘<samp>##</samp>’ has no
- effect.
- </p>
- <p>Keep in mind that the C preprocessor converts comments to whitespace
- before macros are even considered. Therefore, you cannot create a
- comment by concatenating ‘<samp>/</samp>’ and ‘<samp>*</samp>’. You can put as much
- whitespace between ‘<samp>##</samp>’ and its operands as you like, including
- comments, and you can put comments in arguments that will be
- concatenated. However, it is an error if ‘<samp>##</samp>’ appears at either
- end of a macro body.
- </p>
- <p>Consider a C program that interprets named commands. There probably
- needs to be a table of commands, perhaps an array of structures declared
- as follows:
- </p>
- <div class="smallexample">
- <pre class="smallexample">struct command
- {
- char *name;
- void (*function) (void);
- };
- </pre><pre class="smallexample">
-
- </pre><pre class="smallexample">struct command commands[] =
- {
- { "quit", quit_command },
- { "help", help_command },
- …
- };
- </pre></div>
-
- <p>It would be cleaner not to have to give each command name twice, once in
- the string constant and once in the function name. A macro which takes the
- name of a command as an argument can make this unnecessary. The string
- constant can be created with stringizing, and the function name by
- concatenating the argument with ‘<samp>_command</samp>’. Here is how it is done:
- </p>
- <div class="smallexample">
- <pre class="smallexample">#define COMMAND(NAME) { #NAME, NAME ## _command }
-
- struct command commands[] =
- {
- COMMAND (quit),
- COMMAND (help),
- …
- };
- </pre></div>
-
- <hr>
- <div class="header">
- <p>
- Next: <a href="Variadic-Macros.html#Variadic-Macros" accesskey="n" rel="next">Variadic Macros</a>, Previous: <a href="Stringizing.html#Stringizing" accesskey="p" rel="prev">Stringizing</a>, Up: <a href="Macros.html#Macros" accesskey="u" rel="up">Macros</a> [<a href="index.html#SEC_Contents" title="Table of contents" rel="contents">Contents</a>][<a href="Index-of-Directives.html#Index-of-Directives" title="Index" rel="index">Index</a>]</p>
- </div>
-
-
-
- </body>
- </html>
|