Funky C for literate programming

• 1 Main ideas
• 2 Lack of tuples
• 3 Folding over arrays
• 4 Deallocating stuff
• 5 Discriminated unions
• 6 Main data structure
• 7 Tokenizer
• 8 Parser
• 9 Flattener
• 10 Define the phases
• 11 Parsing the command line
• 12 Not freeing memory (again)
• 13 Summary

1 Main ideas

This is a port of LLIte in C. The reason for it is to experiment with writing functional code in standard C and compare the experience with using a functional language like F#. It is in a way a continuation of this and this posts.

I will be using glib and an header of convenient macros/functions to help me (lutils.h). I don’t think that is cheating. Any modern C praticoner has its bag of tricks …

Don’t tell me this is not idiomatic C. I already know that.

#include <string.h>
#include <stdbool.h>

#include <glib.h>
#include <glib/gprintf.h>

#ifdef ARENA
#include "arena.h"
#endif

#include "lutils.h"

2 Lack of tuples

In the snippet below I overcomed such deficiency by declaring a struct. Using the new constructor syntax makes initializing a static table simple.

typedef struct LangSymbols { char language[40]; char start[10]; char end[10];} LangSymbols;

static
LangSymbols* s_lang_params_table[] = {
    &(LangSymbols) {.language = "fsharp",   .start = "(*" "*", .end = "*" "*)"},
    &(LangSymbols) {.language = "c",        .start = "/*" "*", .end = "*" "*/"},
    &(LangSymbols) {.language = "csharp",   .start = "/*" "*", .end = "*" "*/"},
    &(LangSymbols) {.language = "java",     .start = "/*" "*", .end = "*" "*/"},
    NULL
};

3 Folding over arrays

I need to gather all the languages, aka perform a fold over the array. You might have noticed the propensity to add a NULL terminator marker to arrays (as for strings). This allows me to avoid passing a size to functions and makes simpler writing utility macros (as foreach below) more simply.

In the rest of the program, every time I end a function with _z, it is because I consider it generally usable and I add a version of it without the _z to lutils.h.

#define array_foreach_z(p) for(; *symbols != NULL; ++symbols)

static
char* summary(LangSymbols** symbols) {

    GString* langs = g_string_sized_new(20);
    array_foreach(symbols) g_string_append_printf(langs, "%s ", (*symbols)->language);

    g_string_truncate(langs, strlen(langs->str) - 1);

    GString* usage = g_string_sized_new(100);

    g_string_printf(usage,
        "You should specify:nt. either -l or -o and -pn"
        "t. either -indent or -P and -Cn"
        "t. -l supports: %s"
        ,langs->str);

    return usage->str;
}

Find an item in an array based on some expression. Returns NULL if not found. Again, this is a common task, hence I’ll abstract it out with a macro (that ends up being a cute use of gcc statment expressions).

#define array_find_z(arr, ...)                          
    ({                                                  
        array_foreach(arr) if (__VA_ARGS__) break;      
        *arr;                                           
    })

static
LangSymbols* lang_find_symbols(LangSymbols** symbols, char* lang) {
    g_assert(symbols);
    g_assert(lang);

    return array_find(symbols, !strcmp((*symbols)->language, lang));
}

4 Deallocating stuff

You might wonder why I don’t seem overly worried about deallocating the memory that I allocate. I haven’t gone crazy(yet). You’ll see.

5 Discriminated unions

Here are the discriminated unions macros from a previous blog post of mine. I’ll need a couple of these and pre-declare two functions.

union_decl(CodeSymbols, Indented, Surrounded)
    union_type(Indented,    int indentation;)
    union_type(Surrounded,  char* start_code; char* end_code;)
union_end(CodeSymbols);

typedef struct Options {
    char*           start_narrative;
    char*           end_narrative;
    CodeSymbols*    code_symbols;
} Options;

static
gchar* translate(Options*, gchar*);

union_decl(Block, Code, Narrative)
    union_type(Code,        char* code)
    union_type(Narrative,   char* narrative)
union_end(Block);

6 Main data structure

We want to use higher level abstractions that standard C arrays, hence we’ll pick a convenient data structure to use in the rest of the code. A queue lets you to insert at the front and back, with just a one pointer overhead over a single linked list. Hence it is my data structure of choice for this program.

static
GQueue* blockize(Options*, char*);

There is already a function in glib to check if a string has a certain prefix (g_str_has_prefix). We need one that returns the remaining string after the prefix. We also define a g_slow_assert that is executed just if G_ENABLE_SLOW_ASSERT is defined

static
char* str_after_prefix(char* src, char* prefix) {
    g_assert(src);
    g_assert(prefix);
    g_slow_assert(g_str_has_prefix(src, prefix));

    while(*prefix != '0')
        if(*src == *prefix) ++src, ++prefix;
        else break;

    return src;
}

7 Tokenizer

The structure of the function is identical to the F# version. The big bread-winners are statement expressions and local functions …

It is interesting how you can replicate the shape of an F# function by substituting ternary operators for match statements.

It is nothing magic, just a way to have a case statment as an expression, but it is suggestive of its more functional counterpart.

#define NL "n"

union_decl(Token, OpenComment, CloseComment, Text)
    union_type(OpenComment, int line)
    union_type(CloseComment,int line)
    union_type(Text,        char* text)
union_end(Token);

GQueue* tokenize(Options* options, char* source) {
    g_assert(options);
    g_assert(source);

    struct tuple { int line; GString* acc; char* rem;};

    bool is_opening(char* src)      { return g_str_has_prefix(src, options->start_narrative);}
    bool is_closing(char* src)      { return g_str_has_prefix(src, options->end_narrative);}
    char* remaining_open (char* src){ return str_after_prefix(src, options->start_narrative);}
    char* remaining_close(char* src){ return str_after_prefix(src, options->end_narrative);}

    struct tuple text(char* src, GString* acc, int line) {
        inline struct tuple stop_parse_text()
            { return (struct tuple) {.line = line, .acc = acc, .rem = src};}

        return  str_empty (src)? stop_parse_text() :
                is_opening(src)? stop_parse_text() :
                is_closing(src)? stop_parse_text() :
                                ({
                                  int line2         = g_str_has_prefix(src, NL) ? line + 1
                                                                                : line;
                                  GString* newAcc   = g_string_append_c(acc, *src);
                                  char* rem         = src + 1;
                                  text(rem, newAcc, line2);
                                });
    }

    GQueue* tokenize_rec(char* src, GQueue* acc, int line) {
        return  str_empty(src)  ?   acc                     :
                is_opening(src) ?   tokenize_rec(remaining_open(src),
                                        g_queue_push_back(acc, union_new(
                                                    Token, OpenComment, .line = line)),
                                        line)        :
                is_closing(src) ?   tokenize_rec(remaining_close(src),
                                               g_queue_push_back(acc, union_new(
                                                    Token, CloseComment, .line = line)),
                                        line)        :
                                ({
                                    struct tuple t = text(src, g_string_sized_new(200), line);
                                    tokenize_rec(t.rem,
                                        g_queue_push_back(acc, union_new(
                                                    Token, Text, .text = t.acc->str)), t.line);
                                 });
    }

    return tokenize_rec(source, g_queue_new(), 1);
}

8 Parser

This again has a similar structure to the F# version, just longer. It is very long because it contains 3 (nested) functions which are on the verbose side in C.

The creation of a error macro is unfortunate. I just don’t know how to adapt g_assert_e so that it works for not pointer returning functions.

I also need a simple function report_error to exit gracefully giving a message to the user. I didn’t found such thing in glib (?)

#define report_error_z(...) G_STMT_START { g_print(__VA_ARGS__); exit(1); } G_STMT_END                                                            

union_decl(Chunk, NarrativeChunk, CodeChunk)
    union_type(NarrativeChunk,  GQueue* tokens)
    union_type(CodeChunk,       GQueue* tokens)
union_end(Chunk);

static
GQueue* parse(Options* options, GQueue* tokens) {
    g_assert(options);
    g_assert(tokens);

    struct tuple { GQueue* acc; GQueue* rem;};

    #define error(...) 
        ({ report_error(__VA_ARGS__); (struct tuple) {.acc = NULL, .rem = NULL}; })

    struct tuple parse_narrative(GQueue* acc, GQueue* rem) {

        bool isEmpty    = g_queue_is_empty(rem);
        Token* h        = g_queue_pop_head(rem);
        GQueue* t       = rem;

        return  isEmpty                 ?
                                    error("You haven't closed your last narrative comment") :
                h->kind == OpenComment  ?
                    error("Don't open narrative comments inside narrative comments at line %i",
                          h->OpenComment.line)                                              :
                h->kind == CloseComment ? (struct tuple) {.acc = acc, .rem = t}             :
                h->kind == Text         ? parse_narrative(g_queue_push_back(acc, h), t)     :
                                          error("Should never get here");
    };

    struct tuple parse_code(GQueue* acc, GQueue* rem) {

        bool isEmpty    = g_queue_is_empty(rem);
        Token* h    = g_queue_pop_head(rem);
        GQueue* t   = rem;

        return  isEmpty                 ? (struct tuple) {.acc = acc, .rem = t}         :
                h->kind == OpenComment  ?
                    (struct tuple) {.acc = acc, .rem = g_queue_push_front(rem, h)}      :
                h->kind == CloseComment ? parse_code(g_queue_push_back(acc, h), rem)    :
                h->kind == Text         ? parse_code(g_queue_push_back(acc, h), rem)    :
                                          error("Should never get here");
    };
    #undef error

    GQueue* parse_rec(GQueue* acc, GQueue* rem) {

        bool isEmpty    = g_queue_is_empty(rem);
        Token* h    = g_queue_pop_head(rem);
        GQueue* t   = rem;

        return  isEmpty                 ? acc                                           :
                h->kind == OpenComment  ? ({
                                           GQueue* emp = g_queue_new();
                                           struct tuple tu = parse_narrative(emp, t);
                                           Chunk* ch = union_new(
                                                Chunk, NarrativeChunk, .tokens = tu.acc );
                                           GQueue* newQ = g_queue_push_back(acc, ch);
                                           parse_rec(newQ, tu.rem);
                                           })                                            :
                h->kind == CloseComment ?
                    report_error_e(
                        "Don't insert a close narrative comment at the start of your"
                        " program at line %i",
                                            h->OpenComment.line)                         :
                h->kind == Text         ?
                                        ({
                                           GQueue* emp = g_queue_new();
                                           struct tuple tu =
                                                parse_code(g_queue_push_front(emp, h), t);
                                           parse_rec(g_queue_push_back
                                            (acc,
                                             union_new(Chunk, CodeChunk, .tokens = tu.acc)),
                                             tu.rem);
                                          })                                                               :
                                          g_assert_no_match;
    }

    return parse_rec(g_queue_new(), tokens);
}

9 Flattener

This follows the usual practice of representing fold as foreach statments (and maps to). Pheraps I shall build better abstractions for them at some point. I also introduce a little macro to simplify writing of GFunc lambdas, given how pervasive they are.

Again, note how heavy ternary operated this is …

#define g_func_z(type, name, ...) lambda(void,                                              
                                        (void* private_it, G_GNUC_UNUSED void* private_no){ 
                                       type name = private_it;                              
                                       __VA_ARGS__                                          
                                })

static
GQueue* flatten(Options* options, GQueue* chunks) {
    GString* token_to_string_narrative(Token* tok) {
        return  tok->kind == OpenComment ||
                tok->kind == CloseComment   ?
                    report_error_e("Cannot nest narrative comments at line %i",
                                   tok->OpenComment.line)                                   :
                tok->kind == Text           ? g_string_new(tok->Text.text)                  :
                                              g_assert_no_match;
    }
    GString* token_to_string_code(Token* tok) {
        return  tok->kind == OpenComment    ?
                report_error_e(
                    "Open narrative comment cannot be in code at line %i."
                    " Pheraps you have an open comment "
                    "in a code string before this comment tag?"
                    , tok->OpenComment.line)                                                :
                tok->kind == CloseComment   ? g_string_new(options->end_narrative)          :
                tok->kind == Text           ? g_string_new(tok->Text.text)                  :
                                              g_assert_no_match;
    }
    Block* flatten_chunk(Chunk* ch) {
        return  ch->kind == NarrativeChunk  ? ({
                               GQueue* tokens = ch->NarrativeChunk.tokens;
                               GString* res = g_string_sized_new(256);
                               g_queue_foreach(tokens, g_func(Token*, tok,
                                                g_string_append(
                                                    res,
                                                    token_to_string_narrative(tok)->str);
                                                ), NULL);
                               union_new(Block, Narrative, .narrative = res->str);
                                               })   :
                ch->kind == CodeChunk       ? ({
                               GQueue* tokens = ch->CodeChunk.tokens;
                               GString* res = g_string_sized_new(256);
                               g_queue_foreach(tokens, g_func(Token*, tok,
                                                        g_string_append(
                                                            res,
                                                            token_to_string_code(tok)->str);
                                                        ), NULL);
                               union_new(Block, Code, .code = res->str);
                                               })   :
                               g_assert_no_match;
    }

    GQueue* res = g_queue_new();
    g_queue_foreach(chunks, g_func(Chunk*, ch,
                                Block* b = flatten_chunk(ch);
                                g_queue_push_tail(res, b);
                                ) ,NULL);
    return res;
}

Now we can tie everything together to build blockize, which is our parse tree.

static
GQueue* blockize(Options* options, char* source) {
    GQueue* tokens  = tokenize(options, source);
    GQueue* blocks  = parse(options, tokens);
    return flatten(options, blocks);
}

10 Define the phases

In C you can easily forward declare function, so you don’t have to come up with some clever escabotage like we had to do in F#.

static
GQueue* remove_empty_blocks(Options*, GQueue*);
static
GQueue* merge_blocks(Options*, GQueue*);
static
GQueue* add_code_tags(Options*, GQueue*);

static
GQueue* process_phases(Options* options, GQueue* blocks) {

    blocks          = remove_empty_blocks(options, blocks);
    blocks          = merge_blocks(options, blocks);
    blocks          = add_code_tags(options, blocks);
    return blocks;
}

static
char* extract(Block* b) {
    return  b->kind == Code         ? b->Code.code          :
            b->kind == Narrative    ? b->Narrative.narrative:
                                      g_assert_no_match;
}

There must be a higher level way to write this utility function …

static
bool is_str_all_spaces(const char* str) {
    g_assert(str);
    while(*str != '0') {
        if(!g_ascii_isspace(*str))
            return false;
        str++;
    }
    return true;
}

static
GQueue* remove_empty_blocks(G_GNUC_UNUSED Options* options, GQueue* blocks) {

    g_queue_foreach(blocks, g_func(Block*, b,
        if(is_str_all_spaces(extract(b)))
            g_queue_remove(blocks, b);
                                   ), NULL);
    return blocks;
}

static
GQueue* merge_blocks(G_GNUC_UNUSED Options*options, GQueue* blocks) {
    return  g_queue_is_empty(blocks)            ? blocks            :
            g_queue_get_length(blocks) == 1     ? blocks            :
                ({
                 Block* h1 = g_queue_pop_head(blocks);
                 Block* h2 = g_queue_pop_head(blocks);
                 h1->kind == Code && h2->kind == Code ? ({
                     char* newCode =
                        g_strjoin("", h1->Code.code, NL, h2->Code.code, NULL);
                     Block* b = union_new(Block, Code, .code = newCode);
                     merge_blocks(options, g_queue_push_front(blocks, b));
                                                         })         :
                 h1->kind == Narrative && h2->kind == Narrative ? ({
                     char* newNarr =
                        g_strjoin(
                            "", h1->Narrative.narrative, NL, h2->Narrative.narrative, NULL);
                     Block* b = union_new(Block, Narrative, .narrative = newNarr);
                     merge_blocks(options, g_queue_push_front(blocks, b));
                                                         })         :
                                                         ({
                     GQueue* newBlocks =
                        merge_blocks(options, g_queue_push_front(blocks, h2));
                     g_queue_push_front(newBlocks, h1);
                                                         });
                 });
}

This really should be in glib …

inline static
gint g_asprintf_z(gchar** string, gchar const *format, ...) {
	va_list argp;
	va_start(argp, format);
	gint bytes = g_vasprintf(string, format, argp);
	va_end(argp);
    return bytes;
}

static
char* indent(int n, char* s) {
    g_assert(s);

    char* ind       = g_strnfill(n, ' ');
    char* tmp;
    g_asprintf(&tmp, "%s%s", ind, s);

    char* withNl;
    g_asprintf(&withNl, "n%s", ind);

    return g_strjoinv(withNl, g_strsplit(tmp, NL, -1));
}

And finally I ended up defining map. See if you like how the usage looks in the function below.

#define g_queue_map_z(q, type, name, ...) ({                                
        GQueue* private_res = g_queue_new();                                
        g_queue_foreach(q, g_func(type, name,                               
            name = __VA_ARGS__;                                             
            g_queue_push_tail(private_res, name);                           
            ), NULL);                                                       
        private_res;                                                        
                                      })

static
GQueue* add_code_tags(Options* options, GQueue* blocks) {

    GQueue* indent_blocks(GQueue* blocks) {
        return g_queue_map(blocks, Block*, b,
                b->kind == Narrative ? b                                                                                                    :
                b->kind == Code      ?
                    union_new(Block, Code, .code =
                        indent(options->code_symbols->Indented.indentation, b->Code.code))    :
                    g_assert_no_match;);
    }

    GQueue* surround_blocks(GQueue* blocks) {
        return g_queue_map(blocks, Block*, b,
                b->kind == Narrative ?
                    union_new(Block, Narrative, .narrative =
                        g_strjoin("", NL, g_strstrip(b->Narrative.narrative), NL, NULL))   :
                b->kind == Code      ?
                    union_new(Block, Code, .code = g_strjoin("",
                                                 NL,
                                                 options->code_symbols->Surrounded.start_code,
                                                 NL,
                                                 g_strstrip(b->Code.code),
                                                 NL,
                                                 options->code_symbols->Surrounded.end_code,
                                                 NL,
                                                 NULL))    :
                                       g_assert_no_match;);

    }

    return  options->code_symbols->kind == Indented     ?   indent_blocks(blocks)   :
            options->code_symbols->kind == Surrounded   ?   surround_blocks(blocks) :
                                                            g_assert_no_match;
}

char* stringify(GQueue* blocks) {
    GString* res = g_string_sized_new(2048);
    g_queue_foreach(blocks, g_func(Block*, b,
        g_string_append(res, extract(b));
    ), NULL);
    return g_strchug(res->str);
}

void deb(GQueue* q);

static
char* translate(Options* options, char* source) {
    g_assert(options);
    g_assert(source);

    GQueue* blocks  = blockize(options, source);
    blocks          = process_phases(options, blocks);
    return stringify(blocks);
}

11 Parsing the command line

In glib there is a command line parser that accept options in unix-like format and automatically produces professional --help messages and such. We shoudl really have something like this in .NET. Pheraps we do and I’m not aware of it?

typedef struct CmdOptions { char* input_file; char* output_file; Options* options;} CmdOptions;

static
CmdOptions* parse_command_line(int argc, char* argv[]);

static char *no = NULL, *nc = NULL, *l = NULL, *co = NULL, *cc = NULL, *ou = NULL;
static char** in_file;

static int ind = 0;
static bool tests = false;

// this is a bug in gcc, fixed in 2.7.0 not to moan about the final NULL
#pragma GCC diagnostic push
#pragma GCC diagnostic ignored "-Wmissing-field-initializers"

static GOptionEntry entries[] =
{
  { "language"          , 'l', 0, G_OPTION_ARG_STRING, &l ,
                                "Language used", "L"  },
  { "output"            , 'o', 0, G_OPTION_ARG_FILENAME, &ou,
                                "Defaults to the input file name with mkd extension", "FILE" },
  { "narrative-open"    , 'p', 0, G_OPTION_ARG_STRING, &no,
                                "String opening a narrative comment",   "NO" },
  { "narrative-close"   , 'c', 0, G_OPTION_ARG_STRING, &nc,
                                "String closing a narrative comment",   "NC" },
  { "code-open"         , 'P', 0, G_OPTION_ARG_STRING, &co,
                                "String opening a code block",          "CO" },
  { "code-close"        , 'C', 0, G_OPTION_ARG_STRING, &cc,
                                "String closing a code block",          "CC" },
  { "indent"            , 'i', 0, G_OPTION_ARG_INT,    &ind,
                                "Indent the code by N whitespaces",    "N"  },
  { "run-tests"         , 't', G_OPTION_FLAG_HIDDEN, G_OPTION_ARG_NONE,   &tests,
                                "Run all the testcases", NULL },
  { G_OPTION_REMAINING  ,   0, 0, G_OPTION_ARG_FILENAME_ARRAY, &in_file,
                                "Input file to process",   "FILE" },
  { NULL }
};
#pragma GCC diagnostic pop

Brain damaged way to run tests with a -t hidden option. Not paying the code size price in release.

#ifndef NDEBUG
#include "tests.c"
#endif

Here is my big ass command parsing function. It could use a bit of refactoring …

void destroy_arena_allocator();

static
CmdOptions* parse_command_line(int argc, char* argv[]) {

    GError *error = NULL;
    GOptionContext *context;

    context =
        g_option_context_new ("- translate source code with comemnts to an annotated file");
    g_option_context_add_main_entries (context, entries, NULL);
    g_option_context_set_summary(context, summary(s_lang_params_table));

    if (!g_option_context_parse (context, &argc, &argv, &error))
        report_error("option parsing failed: %s", error->message);

    CmdOptions* opt = g_new(CmdOptions, 1);
    opt->options = g_new(Options, 1);

    #ifndef NDEBUG
    if(tests) {
        int i = run_tests(argc, argv);
        exit(i);
    }
    #endif

    if(!in_file) report_error("No input file");
    opt->input_file = *in_file;

    // Uses input file without extension, adding extension .mkd (assume markdown)
    opt->output_file = ou ? ou :  ({
                                  char* output      = g_strdup(*in_file);
                                  char* extension   = g_strrstr(output, ".");
                                  extension ? ({
                                               *extension = '0';
                                               g_strjoin("", output, ".mkd", NULL);
                                                }) :
                                               g_strjoin("", output, ".mkd", NULL);
                                  });

    if(l) { // user passed a language
        LangSymbols* lang = lang_find_symbols(s_lang_params_table, l);
        if(!lang) report_error("%s is not a supported language", l);

        opt->options->start_narrative  = lang->start;
        opt->options->end_narrative    = lang->end;

    } else {
        if(!no || !nc) report_error("You need to specify either -l, or both -p and -c");

        opt->options->start_narrative  = no;
        opt->options->end_narrative    = nc;
    }

    if(ind) { // user pass    g_option_context_free();
        opt->options->code_symbols = union_new(CodeSymbols, Indented, .indentation = ind);
    } else {
        if(!co || !cc) report_error("You need to specify either -indent, or both -P and -C");
        opt->options->code_symbols =
            union_new(CodeSymbols, Surrounded, .start_code = co, .end_code = cc);
    }

    return opt;
}

Some windows programs (i.e. notepad, VS, …) add a 3 bytes prelude to their utf-8 files, C doesn’t know anything about it, so you need to strip it. On this topic, I suspect the program works on UTF-8 files that contain non-ASCII chars, even if when I wrote it I didn’t know anything about localization.

It should work because I’m just splitting the file when I see a certain ASCII string and in UTF-8 ASCII chars cannot appear anywhere else than in their ASCII position.

char* skip_utf8_bom(char* str) {
    unsigned char* b = (unsigned char*) str;
    return  b[0] == 0xEF && b[1] == 0xBB && b[2] == 0xBF    ? (char*) &b[3]  : // UTF-8
                                                              (char*) b;
}

12 Not freeing memory (again)

The reason I haven’t been freeing memory all along is because I was planning on using an arena allocator (a kind of linear allocator).

Memory management is fully hortogonal to the style of programming described in this post. You can do it whatever way you prefer, but there is a certain affinity between an arena allocator (or garbage collection) and functional programming because of the temporary objects created in expressions. You could create the temporary objects explicitely, but that would diminish the conciseness of the paradigm.

I have an arena allocator implementation here. In the code below I comment it out so that you don’t have a dependency from that code if you want to try this. The program runs so quickly and it does so little that you can probably let the operating system reclame memory at the end of the process life.

If you ended up integrating this with an editor (i.e. literate programming editing), you’d need to be more careful.

#ifdef ARENA

Arena_T the_arena;

inline static
gpointer arena_malloc(gsize n_bytes) {
    return Arena_alloc(the_arena, n_bytes, __FILE__, __LINE__);
}

inline static
gpointer arena_calloc(gsize n_blocks, gsize n_block_bytes) {
    return Arena_calloc(the_arena, n_blocks, n_block_bytes, __FILE__, __LINE__);
}

inline static
gpointer arena_realloc(gpointer mem, gsize n_bytes) {
    return Arena_realloc(the_arena, mem, n_bytes, __FILE__, __LINE__);
}

void arena_free(G_GNUC_UNUSED gpointer mem) {
    // NOP
}

void set_arena_allocator() {
    GMemVTable vt = (GMemVTable) { .malloc = arena_malloc,      .calloc = arena_calloc,
                                   .realloc = arena_realloc,    .free = arena_free,
                                   .try_malloc = arena_malloc,  .try_realloc = arena_realloc};
    g_mem_set_vtable(&vt);

    the_arena = Arena_new();
}

void destroy_arena_allocator() {
    Arena_dispose(&the_arena);
}

#endif

13 Summary

I have to say, it didn’t feel too cumbersome to structure C code in a functional way, assuming that you can use GLib and a couple of GCC extensions to the language. It certainly doesn’t have the problems that C++ has in terms of debugging STL failures.

There are a couple of things I don’t like about GLib and I’m working on an hobby project to overcome them. Eventually I’ll post it.

int main(int argc, char* argv[])
{
#ifdef ARENA
    set_arena_allocator();
#endif

    CmdOptions* opt = parse_command_line(argc, argv);

    char* source    = NULL;
    GError* error   = NULL;

    if(!g_file_get_contents(opt->input_file, &source, NULL, &error))
        report_error(error->message);

    source = skip_utf8_bom(source);

    char* text              = translate(opt->options, source);

    if(!g_file_set_contents(opt->output_file, text, -1, &error))
        report_error(error->message);

#ifdef ARENA
    destroy_arena_allocator();
#endif

    return 0;
}