eps 3 hours ago

Nice.

Another neat comment-based construct is the good old:

  //*
     foo
  /*/
     bar
  //*/
It yields 'foo' as is, and 'bar' if the first slash is removed.
  • pwdisswordfishy 2 hours ago

    It's not as needed in C given that you can use #if 1

    It is handy in C derivatives, though.

p0w3n3d 5 hours ago

Quite a time ago, my colleague accidentally committed a Youtube url to our Java codebase (middle-click accidental paste, no code review at that time). We had some laughing moments when we discovered it, as it was compelling evidence that he was watching videos during work, and even we knew what he was watching at that time.

rplnt 3 hours ago

This puzzle would become extra trivial with syntax highlighting.

tromp 3 hours ago

You can only have one URL for each scheme though, else your compiler will report something like

error: redefinition of label 'https'

gblargg 6 hours ago

I do this to embed shell commands at the beginning of short one-file C/C++ programs to execute when hitting an F key in my text editor. I usually put very basic compile-and-run commands. It's wrapped in #if and #endif which are comments in many shells. I end the commands with exit so it doesn't try to execute the code as commands.

raverbashing 5 hours ago

Of all the (ahem, not as many as hoped) things C++ got right, // comments are one of the best ones

And I'm glad it now is part of C as well

askl an hour ago

At least when using -Wall the compiler will give you the warning

  <source>:5:5: warning: label 'https' defined but not used [-Wunused-label]
as a hint.
writebetterc 5 hours ago

This is why you should only use /* */ as your comment style.

  • dxroshan an hour ago

    It's a puzzle. Nobody is going to put a URL amid your code. There is no harm in using // for comments.

  • danhau 3 hours ago

    How is this related to the article?

    • wkjagt 3 hours ago

      Solve the puzzle and you'll know :-)

anonnon 5 hours ago

Clearly, the "http:" is parsed as a label (for goto), and the subsequent "//", as a C++ or C99 comment. This shouldn't give you more than a moment's pause if you know C.

  • pwdisswordfishy 2 hours ago

    Or if you use a syntax highlighter.

    • anonnon 2 hours ago

      Yes, I don't know why people are downvoting me. Have these people never seen C code using goto-based error handling?