How Can We Simplify Compile-Time String Declaration in C ?

Declaring Compile-Time Strings in C

Compile-time string manipulation offers significant benefits, yet the current process for declaring such strings in C remains cumbersome. The existing approach requires declaring strings as variadic sequences of characters, a highly inconvenient syntax.

Challenges with Existing Approaches

Attempts to simplify compile-time string declaration have faced obstacles. Approaches utilizing sequence types face limitations due to the need for external linkage. User-defined literals are not viable as they lack a constexpr return type. Additionally, constexpr functions introduce non-constexpr parameters, hindering their use.

Unresolved Conveniences

Despite these challenges, there remains a strong desire for a convenient compile-time string declaration mechanism. Ideally, strings could be declared using simple syntax, such as:

using str1 = sequence<"Hello, world!">;

However, such a declaration is not currently supported.

Potential Solutions

One promising proposal involves defining a C preprocessor macro that accepts a string and its size as arguments and returns a sequence of its characters. This macro could leverage techniques like stringification and array subscripts to achieve the desired functionality.

Conclusion

While convenient compile-time string declaration remains an unresolved issue in C , the implementation of a C preprocessor macro offers potential for addressing this challenge. Until an official solution emerges, this approach provides a viable workaround, bridging the gap between aspiration and reality in compile-time string manipulation.

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