Communities

Writing
Writing
Codidact Meta
Codidact Meta
The Great Outdoors
The Great Outdoors
Photography & Video
Photography & Video
Scientific Speculation
Scientific Speculation
Cooking
Cooking
Electrical Engineering
Electrical Engineering
Judaism
Judaism
Languages & Linguistics
Languages & Linguistics
Software Development
Software Development
Mathematics
Mathematics
Christianity
Christianity
Code Golf
Code Golf
Music
Music
Physics
Physics
Linux Systems
Linux Systems
Power Users
Power Users
Tabletop RPGs
Tabletop RPGs
Community Proposals
Community Proposals
tag:snake search within a tag
answers:0 unanswered questions
user:xxxx search by author id
score:0.5 posts with 0.5+ score
"snake oil" exact phrase
votes:4 posts with 4+ votes
created:<1w created < 1 week ago
post_type:xxxx type of post
Search help
Notifications
Mark all as read See all your notifications »
Q&A

Welcome to Software Development on Codidact!

Will you help us build our independent community of developers helping developers? We're small and trying to grow. We welcome questions about all aspects of software development, from design to code to QA and more. Got questions? Got answers? Got code you'd like someone to review? Please join us.

Comments on Should I cast to (void) when I do not use the return value

Parent

Should I cast to (void) when I do not use the return value

+8
−0

I saw at least one compiler (Codewarrior for HC12) warn me if I use a function without using it's return value. Other compilers (clang/gcc) do not issue a warning though, even when using the std=90 argument.

So should I generally cast the unused return value of a function to (void)?

History
Why does this post require attention from curators or moderators?
You might want to add some details to your flag.
Why should this post be closed?

0 comment threads

Post
+1
−1

I saw at least one compiler (Codewarrior for HC12) warn me if I use a function without using it's return value. [...]

Ye, for that's the right choice.

[...] Other compilers (clang/gcc) do not issue a warning though, even when using the std=90 argument.

It will, provided that the function is correctly marked warn_unused_result (https://gcc.gnu.org/onlinedocs/gcc-4.6.0/gcc/Warning-Options.html). The software is should be edited as making results use mandatory. Else functions are to return void.

So should I generally cast the unused return value of a function to (void)?

Never. The returned value is always meaningful and has always to be treated.

History
Why does this post require attention from curators or moderators?
You might want to add some details to your flag.

1 comment thread

General comments (3 comments)
General comments
Kami‭ wrote about 4 years ago

I highly doubt your last statement. A function like strcpy has no meaningful return value, it is just there to be able to chain function calls afaik.

Lundin‭ wrote about 4 years ago · edited about 4 years ago

warn_unused_result is pretty useless, since it doesn't work unless you pollute your code with non-standard __attribute__ crap. There is no reason why they can't check for it in standard C.

Lundin‭ wrote about 4 years ago

"Never. The returned value is always meaningful and has always to be treated." That kind of depends on how the function is written, yeah? Take strcpy as one example of a function with an often useless return value.