CODEWITHSUNDEEP
csyntaxescaping
PARTHA SARATHI Ravi
PARTHA SARATHI Ravi

Reputation: 99

What is the use of backslash in C program initialization?

  1. Without backslash 

    unsigned char a=5;

  2. With backslash

    unsigned char a=\
5;

Given that both are working identically, then what is the actual use of backslash?

Upvotes: 1

Views: 1231

Answers (2)

chqrlie
chqrlie

Reputation: 144780

The C Standard describes the second phase of program translation this way:

5.1.1.2 Translation phases

...

  1. Each instance of a backslash character (\) immediately followed by a new-line character is deleted, splicing physical source lines to form logical source lines. Only the last backslash on any physical source line shall be eligible for being part of such a splice. A source file that is not empty shall end in a new-line character, which shall not be immediately preceded by a backslash character before any such splicing takes place.

Hence there is no semantic difference between the 2 code fragments posted. These backslash new-line sequences can occur in the middle of a token too:

\
u\
ns\
ign\
ed c\
har a\
 = 5;/\
/comment

Upvotes: 1

Mureinik
Mureinik

Reputation: 311428

A \ character at the end of a line means that the following line should be treated as the continuation of the previous line.

Since you're allowed to have whitespaces after the assignment (=) operator, it's pointless in this case.

Upvotes: 4

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