Standard headers and reserved names

Very early in the standardization process, the ANSI Standards Committee chose to include library functions, macros, and header files as part of ANSI C. These macros, header files, and functions are necessary to write truly portable C programs, however, they also produce a large set of reserved names.

This section presents the various categories of reserved names and some rationale for their reservations. At the end is a set of rules to follow that can steer your programs clear of any reserved names.

This section is organized as follows:

• ``Balancing process''

• ``Standard headers''

• ``Names reserved for implementation use''

• ``Names reserved for expansion''

• ``Names safe to use''