Re: [PATCH Outreachy 1/2] format: create pretty.h file

From: Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com>
Date: Dec 10, 2017, 22:36 UTC
Message-ID: <xmqq8tea5hxi.fsf@gitster.mtv.corp.google.com>
In-Reply-To: <20171210145354.GA20367@sigill.intra.peff.net>

Jeff King <peff@peff.net> writes:

Show 12 quoted lines

> On Fri, Dec 08, 2017 at 09:40:09AM -0800, Junio C Hamano wrote:
>
>> I see you've "standardized" to drop "extern" from the declarations
>> in the header; I have an impression that our preference however is
>> to go in the other direction.
>
> Can we revisit that?
>
> I haven't see any compelling reason to include the "extern" in a
> declaration. And all things being equal, I'd prefer the thing that makes
> the source code shorter, and is one less thing for authors to remember
> to do.

Surely, but there is no point revisiting. I simply misremembered what we did at around 1354c9b2 ("refs: remove unnecessary "extern" keywords", 2016-03-31).

As long as we know which way we are standardizing, I personally do not have strong preference either way. I appreciate shorter-to-type (i.e. missing "extern") but I also appreciate the more familiar and logical declaration in a header file that indicates something exists somewhere (i.e. explicit "extern") ;-).

Thanks.