terminology: zero character vs. null character

terminology: zero character vs. null character

[Roland Illig]

Hi,

I am currently translating GCC into German. During that, I noticed that
in some places the term "zero character" means '\0'. The official term
though is "null character", as per the C standard.

Since it is confusing to have two different terms for the same concept,
the term "zero character" should be dropped entirely, both because it is
uncommon and because it can be confused with '0'.

Since this affects several places in the code, I think it's better to
start a small discussion first instead of writing several PRs.

Regards,
Roland

Re: terminology: zero character vs. null character

[Manuel López-Ibáñez]

On 06/03/17 21:15, Roland Illig wrote:
> Hi,
>
> I am currently translating GCC into German. During that, I noticed that
> in some places the term "zero character" means '\0'. The official term
> though is "null character", as per the C standard.
>
> Since it is confusing to have two different terms for the same concept,
> the term "zero character" should be dropped entirely, both because it is
> uncommon and because it can be confused with '0'.
>
> Since this affects several places in the code, I think it's better to
> start a small discussion first instead of writing several PRs.

I don't see anything explicit here: https://gcc.gnu.org/codingconventions.html 
But I believe we follow standards' language and it should always be "null 
character". Having a discussion first is likely to get nowhere. It sounds too 
much like "maybe we should" (point 11: https://gcc.gnu.org/wiki/Community).

Please send a patch fixing it:

https://gcc.gnu.org/wiki/GettingStarted#Basics:_Contributing_to_GCC_in_10_easy_steps

You can also send a patch changing https://gcc.gnu.org/codingconventions.html. 
Once that is accepted, obvious changes to match the coding conventions are 
usually considered pre-approved.

Cheers,

	Manuel.

Re: terminology: zero character vs. null character

[Gerald Pfeifer]

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On Fri, 10 Mar 2017, Manuel López-Ibáñez wrote:
>> I am currently translating GCC into German. During that, I noticed that
>> in some places the term "zero character" means '\0'. The official term
>> though is "null character", as per the C standard.
> I don't see anything explicit here: https://gcc.gnu.org/codingconventions.html
> But I believe we follow standards' language and it should always be "null
> character".

Agreed.

Joseph, do you also agree (and with the patch below to document this)?

Gerald

Index: codingconventions.html
===================================================================
RCS file: /cvs/gcc/wwwdocs/htdocs/codingconventions.html,v
retrieving revision 1.79
diff -u -r1.79 codingconventions.html
--- codingconventions.html	1 Mar 2017 12:53:57 -0000	1.79
+++ codingconventions.html	12 Mar 2017 21:26:56 -0000
@@ -439,6 +439,11 @@
     <td></td>
   </tr>
   <tr>
+    <td>"null character"</td>
+    <td>"zero character"</td>
+    <td></td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
     <td>"Objective-C"</td>
     <td>"Objective C"</td>
   </tr>

Re: terminology: zero character vs. null character

[Joseph Myers]

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On Sun, 12 Mar 2017, Gerald Pfeifer wrote:

> On Fri, 10 Mar 2017, Manuel López-Ibáñez wrote:
> >> I am currently translating GCC into German. During that, I noticed that
> >> in some places the term "zero character" means '\0'. The official term
> >> though is "null character", as per the C standard.
> > I don't see anything explicit here: https://gcc.gnu.org/codingconventions.html
> > But I believe we follow standards' language and it should always be "null
> > character".
> 
> Agreed.
> 
> Joseph, do you also agree (and with the patch below to document this)?

Yes.

-- 
Joseph S. Myers
joseph@codesourcery.com