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Editorial Team
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Asked: 2026-06-10T23:30:47+00:00

I’m unable to comment-out and compile the following line of code with /* */,

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I’m unable to comment-out and compile the following line of code with /* */, within the XCode editor. I distilled this example down from a more complex string used in an XPath query:

the string itself seems fine:

NSString* s = @"//*//";

won’t compile for me:

/*
NSString* s = @"//*//";
*/

XCode 4.4. I’ll file a radar if anyone can confirm I’m not being stupid.

EDIT: nice to see that the SO syntax highlighter also exhibits an issue with this…

EDIT: okay, I filed a bug report with Apple. Thanks.

EDIT: Per Rob’s answer below, this is NOT a bug 🙂 Thanks for explaining it, Rob; totally makes sense now.

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1 Answer

  1. Editorial Team

    This is not a compiler bug. The double-quote character " has no special meaning inside a comment, so the preprocessor doesn’t pay any attention to it. The preprocessor just ends the comment as soon as it sees the */ characters.

    The best way to comment out a section of code is to put // at the beginning of each line. A // comment ends at the next newline. Xcode has a menu command (shortcut: ⌘/) that will comment or uncomment your selected lines by inserting or removing // at the start of each line.

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