Why is #if 0 && (_MSC_VER > 1000) defined?

Question

I found this strange codes in winnt.h file in VS2013.

#ifdef STRICT
typedef void *HANDLE;
#if 0 && (_MSC_VER > 1000)  // strange code is here...
#define DECLARE_HANDLE(name) struct name##__; typedef struct name##__ *name
#else
#define DECLARE_HANDLE(name) struct name##__{int unused;}; typedef struct name##__ *name
#endif

Based on my understanding, when _MSC_VER is defined larger than 1000 or less than 1000 , this line #if 0 && (_MSC_VER > 1000 should equal to #if 0 . Why #if 0 && (_MSC_VER > 1000 is this defined in such a strange way?

Answer 1

Most likely, it is generated code, with the 0 injected by some stage of the build or packaging process that has discovered the feature is unnecessary on your platform.

Why does it not instead remove the whole #if and keep only the #else body Because (in general) that would be a lot more difficult and error-prone for a simple tool to do: replacing something that probably looks like #if <placeholder> with #if 0 is easy.

I almost considered trying to figure out precisely what's going on in this specific case, but then I noticed it's WinNT code and decided maintaining whatever remains of my sanity was more important.