[swift-evolution] [Pitch] #warning

[Christopher Kornher]

> On May 30, 2016, at 2:35 PM, Chris Lattner via swift-evolution <swift-evolution at swift.org> wrote:
> 
> 
>> On May 29, 2016, at 10:36 PM, Charlie Monroe <charlie at charliemonroe.net> wrote:
>> 
>>> As to #warning, Swift’s use of warnings are significant different than the use in C.  In C compilers, many of the warnings produced *should* be errors, but can’t be because that effects language conformance and could break a large body of code. 
>> 
>> The example I've mentioned with #error, doesn't necessarily lead to an error, but can just issue a #warning("Untested OS, proceed carefully.") - it IMHO doesn't necessarily be fatal.
> 
> This doesn’t make sense to me.  If the code is untested, then it should definitely be audited and check if it is enabled.  A #error is the perfect approach for this case.

I have used warnings in other languages when “bringing-up” large code bases. Using a #warning facility is helpful at these times. Counting the messages provides a metric for unresolved questions. I don’t fully understand Chris’s objection to a warning compiler directive, so I cannot comment on that. A ‘Mark’ - like comment format would be almost as good.

There is a problem with ‘magic’ comment formats, though. Recently I have had issues with mistyping “// MARK”. IIRC, “// mark” is not recognized. Compiler directives do not have this problem. In Objective-C “#pragma marl" is a compiler error. In swift, “// MARL” is silently treated as a plain comment.


> -Chris
> 
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