I'm interested in creating a macro for eliminating the unused variable warning.
This question describes a way to suppress the unused parameter warning by writing a macro inside the function code:
Universally compiler independent way of implementing an UNUSED macro in C/C++
But I'm interested in a macro that can be used in the function signature:
void callback(int UNUSED(some_useless_stuff)) {}
This is what I dug out using Google (source)
#ifdef UNUSED
#elif defined(__GNUC__)
# define UNUSED(x) UNUSED_ ## x __attribute__((unused))
#elif defined(__LCLINT__)
# define UNUSED(x) /*@unused@*/ x
#elif defined(__cplusplus)
# define UNUSED(x)
#else
# define UNUSED(x) x
#endif
Can this be further expanded for other compilers?
Edit: For those who can't understand how tagging works: I want a solution for both C and C++. That is why this question is tagged both C and C++ and that is why a C++ only solution is not acceptable.
The way I do it is like this:
#define UNUSED(x) (void)(x)
void foo(const int i) {
UNUSED(i);
}
I've not had a problem with that in Visual Studio, Intel, gcc
and clang
.
The other option is to just comment out the parameter:
void foo(const int /*i*/) {
// When we need to use `i` we can just uncomment it.
}
After testing and following the comments, the original version mentioned in the question turned out to be good enough.
Using: #define UNUSED(x) __pragma(warning(suppress:4100)) x
(mentioned in comments), might be necessary for compiling C on MSVC, but that's such a weird combination, that I didn't include it in the end.
Just one small thing, better using __attribute__((__unused__))
as __attribute__((unused))
, because unused could be somewhere defined as macro, personally I had a few issues with this situation.
But the trick I'm using is, which I found more readable is:
#define UNUSED(x) (void)x;
It works however only for the variables, and arguments of the methods, but not for the function itself.
Across many compilers I have used the following, excluding support for lint.
#if (__GNUC__ > 2) || (__GNUC__ == 2 && __GNUC_MINOR__ > 4)
# define PGM_GNUC_UNUSED __attribute__((__unused__))
#else
# define PGM_GNUC_UNUSED
#endif
Tested compilers: GCC, Clang, EKOPath, Intel C Compiler / Composer XE, MinGW32 on Cygwin / Linux / MSYS, MinGW-w64 on Cygwin / Linux, Sun ONE Studio / Oracle Solaris Studio, Visual Studio 2008 / 2010.
Example usage:
pgm_tsc_init (
PGM_GNUC_UNUSED pgm_error_t** error
)
{
...
}
PGM
is the standard prefix for this C based project. GNUC
is the convention from GLib for this attribute.
I think one compile warns about __attribute__
in certain circumstances but certainly no error.