[ACCEPTED]-What does #include actually do?-include
Logically, that copy/paste is exactly what 8 happens. I'm afraid there isn't any more 7 to it. You don't need the ;, though.
Your 6 specific example is covered by the spec, section 5 6.10.2 Source file inclusion, paragraph 3:
A preprocessing directive 4 of the form
# include"q-char-sequence"new-linecauses the replacement of that 3 directive by the entire contents of the 2 source file identified by the specified 1 sequence between the
"delimiters.
That (copy/paste) is exactly what #include "header.h" does.
Note 3 that it will be different for #include <header.h> or when the 2 compiler can't find the file "header.h" and it tries 1 to #include <header.h> instead.
Not really, no. The compiler saves the 5 original file descriptor on a stack and 4 opens the #included file; when it reaches the end 3 of that file, it closes it and pops back 2 to the original file descriptor. That way, it 1 can nest #included files almost arbitrarily.
The # include statement "grabs the attention" of 24 the pre-processor (the process that occurs 23 before your program is actually compiled) and 22 "tells" the pre-processor to include 21 whatever follows the # include statement.
While the 20 pre-processor can be told to do quite a 19 bit, in this instance it's being asked to 18 recognize a header file (which is denoted 17 with a .h following the name of that header, indicating 16 that it's a header).
Now, a header is a file 15 containing C declarations and definitions 14 of functions not explicitly defined in your 13 code. What does this mean? Well, if you 12 want to use a function or define a special 11 type of variable, and you know that these 10 functions/definition are defined elsewhere 9 (say, the standard library), you can just 8 include (# include) the header that you know contains 7 what you need. Otherwise, every time you 6 wanted to use a print function (like in 5 your case), you'd have to recreate the print 4 function.
If its not explicitly defined in 3 your code and you don't #include the header file 2 with the function you're using, your compiler 1 will complain saying something like: "Hey! I don't see where this function is defined, so I don't know what to with this undefined function in your code!".
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