Alright - finally decided to get around to writing one of these blog posts!

Today’s fun-fact of poor development comes to you from the fun world of GCC and the beauty that is macros.

Intro

For the unindoctrinated, turning a .c file into a functioning and runable program can be broken down into ~4 separate stages:

1. Preprocessing
2. Compiling
3. Assembling
4. Linking

The scope of this post is limited to the 1st stage, but if you want to learn more about the other 3 stages, you can search for it on the internet like everyone else.

Preprocessing

The Preprocessing stage is responsible for the pre-processing of a given source file (as the name might suggest 😉 ). Before moving on to the next stage, the compiler:

• brings in external source files
• runs code in a limited language
• strips comments
• changes some human-readable syntax to more of what the computer expects to see

The code that is run in that limited language? That’s where most of today’s fun is going to reside!

Macros

Macros and preprocessor directives look similar, but perform different actions/purposes for the preprocessor.

// These are directives
#include <stdio.h>
#if !__unix__
#  error Use a real operating system!
#endif /* !__unix__ */

// These are macros
#define my_macro 1
#define another_macro(p,x) something_function_##x((p))
#undef my_macro

Directives tell the preprocessor to do something - or to conditionally do something (in the case of #if, #elif, and #else). Macros are ways of dynamically filling things in throughout the code

Simple Example

Macros can be useful to avoid having to change constants all over a block of code, and limit the changes to ONE place.

Here’s two examples. One using macros, and one not:

Without

#include <stdio.h>

int main(void)
{
    int i;
    for(i=0;i<50;i+=5)
    {
        printf("I+%d*n is: %d\n", 5, i);
    }
    return 0;
}

With

#include <stdio.h>

#define INCREMENT 5

int main(void)
{
    int i;
    for(i=0;i<INCREMENT*10;i+=INCREMENT)
    {
        printf("I+%d*n is: %d\n", INCREMENT, i);
    }
    return 0;
}

So What?

It’s a simple example here - changing the increment value isn’t too hard. But, I’m a shitty dev. I want to do less work when someone decides they want to change a number. Changing one number, instead of 3 (i<60, i+=6, and the printf line) makes much less work for maintaining the code and makes it less bug prone too!

Several Useful Examples

Macros are pretty powerful, and save a lot of work on the behalf of the developer. I’ve included a few useful examples that I use when I write code

Debug Printing!

I use log() for debugging/production logging. When debugging, I add -DDEBUG=1 to the Makefile and that suddenly prints all debugging messages with the .c file, function it was called from, and line number the print statement was on.

#include <stdio.h>

#ifndef DEBUG_FD
// If you want to use a different file descriptor than stderr, #define it before #including this file
#define DEBUG_FD 2
#endif /* DEBUG_FD */

#ifdef DEBUG
#   define log(...)                                                     \
{                                                                       \
    dprintf(DEBUG_FD, "%s:%d:%s: ", __FILE__, __LINE__, __func__);      \
    dprintf(DEBUG_FD, __VA_ARGS__);                                     \
}
#else
#   define log(...)
#endif /* DEBUG */

Function and Variable Attributes

These are more legible/prettier to look at!

/* Variable Attributes */
#define PACKED __attribute__((packed))

/* Function Attributes */
#define INLINE __attribute__((always_inline))
#define DEPRECATED __attribute__((deprecated))
#define NOINLINE __attribute__((noinline))
#define NORETURN __attribute__((noreturn))

/* BOTH */
#define ALIGNED(n) __attribute__(( aligned(n) ))
#define HIDDEN __attribute__((visibility("hidden")))
#define UNUSED __attribute__((unused))

/* Examples */
//#if 0
typedef struct PACKED {
    unsigned char a;  // 1-byte char
    unsigned short b; // 2-byte short
    unsigned int c;   // 4-byte int
} seven_byte_struct;

void NORETURN exit_func(void);
//#endif /* 0 */

Conclusion

What’s been covered here today is a very brief introduction to the preprocessor and what you do to make GCC do your work for you. I’ll get around to covering some more complicated uses of the preprocessor/compiler in a future blog post.

For now, stay 💩y.

Hello world!