Why can't we define a function using a type name?

Question

Any ideas why can't we define a function using type name:

typedef int functype(int arg1);


functype funcdefinition {
    ;
}

But we can declare one this way:

functype funcdeclaration;

Answer 1

Standard says that (C11 section 6.9.1):

The identifier declared in a function definition (which is the name of the function) shall have a function type, as specified by the declarator portion of the function definition ¹⁶²⁾

and the foot note 162 says:

162) The intent is that the type category in a function definition cannot be inherited from a typedef:

 typedef int F(void); // type F is ''function with no parameters // returning int'' F f,g; // f and g both have type compatible with FF f { /* ... */ } // WRONG: syntax/constraint error F g() { /* ... */ } // WRONG: declares that g returns a function int f(void) { /* ... */ } // RIGHT: f has type compatible with F int g() { /* ... */ } // RIGHT: g has type compatible with F F *e(void) { /* ... */ } // e returns a pointer to a function F *((e))(void) { /* ... */ } // same: parentheses irrelevant int (*fp)(void); // fp points to a function that has type FF *Fp; // Fp points to a function that has type F

Therefore,

functype funcdefinition;  

declares that funcdefinition is of type functype , which is correct. No need of the name of function parameters in function prototype. In case of

functype funcdefinition { ... }    

parameter names are needed and there is no way to declare the names of function parameters and therefore it is an incorrect syntax.

Answer 2

You can define a typedef for a function prototype, but not for a function body.

The typedef for functype (in the question above) is creating a typedef for a function prototype - not a function body. In the "C" language, the function with the function body included will not evaluate to a valid type. That is why the function body is not allowed.

• When exact type checking is used with a function body type, the only types that functype would have the as funcdefinition .functype也有funcdefinition 。
• With exact type checking, the function body data type could only point to a function with .的函数。
• If the function body were used in the type definition, then even a function with the same prototype (but a ) will technically result in a type mismatch.）的函数在技术上也会导致类型不匹配。 The current version of "C" is strongly typed. Because "C and C++ (do) not let you use one type when another type is expected.", even if the C compiler were to include function bodies in a type definition (which it does not), the compiler would have no way of resolving differences in the function body other than to report the types do not match.

---

Although it is not as useful as having a typedef with a body, you create a using this typedef - and the C++ compiler will still check the argument list;可以使用此 typedef 创建- C++ 编译器仍将检查参数列表； see below:

typedef int functype(int arg1);

int f1(int arg1) {
    return arg1;
}
int f2(int arg1) {
    return arg1;
}
int f3(int arg1, int arg2) {
    return 0;
}
int main(int argc, char* argv[])
{
    functype* pf1;
    pf1=&f1;           /* Compiles properly */
    pf1=&f3;           /* Will not compile, as expected */
                       /* because of an argument mismatch */
    return 0;
}

In this sense, using the typedef is helpful because it avoids the function pointer syntax.

REFERENCES:

http://www.drtak.org/teaches/modules/0027/module/node7.html

Answer 3

When you define a function as

xxx myfunction(...) {}

you are stating that myfunction is a function that returns a xxx. For example,

int myFunc()[]

says that myFunc returns an int. Therefore

functype funcdefinition() { ... }  

says that funcdefinition returns a functype, which (if your example were correct) would mean that it returns "a function that takes an integer argument and returns an int".