Adding Reflection to C

#1

Post by telotortium » Thu, May 28, 2026, 2:55 PM UTC

Adding Reflection to C
davidpriver.com

Re: Adding Reflection to C

#2

Post by tliltocatl » Thu, May 28, 2026, 6:48 PM UTC

Been there… Pendantic nitpick: it's more akin to introspection, reflection would be self-modifying code.

Re: Adding Reflection to C

#3

Post by uecker » Thu, May 28, 2026, 7:26 PM UTC

Here is my proposal with a lot of similarities: https://www.open-std.org/JTC1/SC22/WG14/www/docs/n3212.pdf

Re: Adding Reflection to C

#4

Post by cozzyd » Thu, May 28, 2026, 9:51 PM UTC

BTF or DWARF info in principle contain the information needed, though working with them is cumbersome...

Re: Adding Reflection to C

#5

Post by teo_zero » Fri, May 29, 2026, 4:36 AM UTC

Nice. But you've just invented Zig!

Re: Adding Reflection to C

#6

Post by accelbred » Fri, May 29, 2026, 5:02 PM UTC

teo_zero wrote: post #5

Nice. But you've just invented Zig!

C with Zig's comptime is compelling though. Zig doesnt allow you to access all the features your C compiler does, and puts you in the LLVM ecosystem. I've been working on something similar; extending C with both Zig/C++ inspired reflection and linear types, with a compiler that compiles to a subset of C to allow you to leverage GCC and all its extenstions.