[comp.windows.x] Why is XtPointer a char *?

nazgul@alphalpha.COM (Kee Hinckley) (09/02/90)

Wouldn't a void * make more sense and avoid a lot of casting?  Or was
the feeling that since some compilers don't support void it was better
to force everyone to cast and thus make the code compatible?

						-kee

moraes@cs.toronto.edu (Mark Moraes) (09/03/90)

nazgul@alphalpha.COM (Kee Hinckley) writes:
>Wouldn't a void * make more sense and avoid a lot of casting?  Or was
>the feeling that since some compilers don't support void it was better
>to force everyone to cast and thus make the code compatible?

Worse, many pcc-based compilers will get badly confused by void *foo
(they see the declaration but don't recognize it as a pointer variable,
producing a "foo not declared" later when foo is used) -- eg.
Ultrix3.x (Vax) cc and MIPS 1.31 compilers.  Very confusing error
message when you encounter it the first time.