Question

Do you prefer to see something like t_byte* (with typedef unsigned char t_byte) or unsigned char* in code?

I’m leaning towards t_byte in my own libraries, but have never worked on a large project where this approach was taken, and am wondering about pitfalls.

Answer 1

If you’re using C99 or newer, you should use stdint.h for this. uint8_t, in this case.

C++ didn’t get this header until C++11, calling it cstdint. Old versions of Visual C++ didn’t let you use C99’s stdint.h in C++ code, but pretty much every other C++98 compiler did, so you may have that option even when using old compilers.

As with so many other things, Boost papers over this difference in boost/integer.hpp, providing things like uint8_t if your compiler’s standard C++ library doesn’t.