> From: Sean Conner
> I really think it's for *this* reason (the handler() example) that C
> doesn't allow nested functions.
I wouldn't be sure of that; I would tend to think that nested functions were
left out simply because they add complexity, and didn't add enough value to
outweigh that complexity. (In ~40 years of programming in C, I have never
missed them.)
C seems (well, until the standards committees got ahold of it) to have added
things as a demonstrated need was felt for them (see DMR's evolution of C
paper), and maybe they just never found a need for nested function
definitions?
I suspect that Ken probably knows; he's not (AFAIK) on the Unix History list
(TUHS), but several of his early co-workers (including Stephen Johnson, who
did PCC) are, and could relay a question to him, if it were asked over there
(if we really want to know).
Noel
