Re: Portable replacement function for `trunc'?

[Bruno Haible]

Benoit SIGOURE wrote:
> The fact  
> that it said "Gnulib module: —" sounded weird to me, but I found that  
> since this was a single and simple function, it could be that there  
> is no need to make a whole module around it.  The "Portability  
> problems not fixed by Gnulib:" simply told me that the replacement  
> function wasn't working on the architectures listed but since I don't  
> target these for the time being, it didn't disturb me.

Thanks for explaining this. It is often hard to understand why a doc is bad.

> If the function is not available, why is it there in the first  
> place?  If the intent of the doc is to list all functions with  
> possible portability issues (sic!), why not write something more  
> explicit such as "Gnulib module: @emph{not available}."?

Whether "---" means that a module is not needed or not available, depends
on your evaluation of the severity of the portability problems. Therefore
I cannot write this explicitly for each module.

But what I can do, is to help explain this situation a bit:


2007-10-04  Bruno Haible  <address@hidden>

        * doc/gnulib.texi (Function Substitutes): Explain what an absent module
        means.
        Reported by Benoît Sigoure <address@hidden>.

*** doc/gnulib.texi.orig        2007-10-05 02:00:14.000000000 +0200
--- doc/gnulib.texi     2007-10-05 02:00:05.000000000 +0200
***************
*** 635,640 ****
--- 635,649 ----
  fixed by Gnulib, and which (known) portability problems are not worked around
  by Gnulib.
  
+ The notation ``Gnulib module: ---'' means that Gnulib does not provide a
+ module providing a substitute for the function.  When the list
+ ``Portability problems not fixed by Gnulib'' is empty, such a module is
+ not needed: No portability problems are known.  Otherwise, it indicates
+ that such a module would be useful but is not available: Noone so far
+ found this function important enough to contribute a substitute for it.
+ If you need this particular function, you may write to
+ @code{<bug-gnulib at gnu dot org>}.
+ 
  @menu
  * FD_CLR::
  * FD_ISSET::