Question

Write a short C program that prints all the numbers from 1 to 1000 on separate lines without using any explicit if-statements, gotos, loops, or conditional expressions.

Answer 1

I'm sure there are several creative ways to skin a cat.

Answer 2

I sure can't think of one. Maybe recursion but even there you'd have to use an if statement to terminate it, and it would overflow the stack on most platforms.

Answer 3

I hate questions like this. They're more parlor tricks than learning anything deep.

Answer 4

Right.

Answer 5

All I can come up with for this is either copy-pasting, some fancy editor trick, or preprocessor abuse.

Answer 6

or maybe even recursively calling main

Answer 7

Ugh, I hope it's not preprocessor abuse. That would be the opposite of teaching. And yeah, I was thinking about recursively calling main, or a binary tree of calls, but all of those require termination conditions.

Answer 8

who gave you this problem?

Answer 9

editor tricks would violate the "short c program"

Answer 10

#define PRINTONE(x) fprintf(stdout, "%d\n", x++);
#define TEN(x) x x x x x x x x x x
#define PRINT1000(x) TEN(TEN(TEN(PRINTONE(x))))

Answer 11

wow, yeah, that works but is exactly the opposite what a class should be teaching

Answer 12

right. at least after this question I'm done with the C preprocessor chapter.

Answer 13

yeah, i just ran it through the preprocessor and sure enough gave me 1000 fprintf lines

Answer 14

#include <stdio.h>
int i = 0;
p() { printf("%d\n", ++i); }
a() { p();p();p();p();p(); }
b() { a();a();a();a();a(); }
c() { b();b();b();b();b(); }
main() { c();c();c();c();c();c();c();c(); return 0; }
:D

Answer 15

lol

Answer 16

#include <stdio.h>

void printNumber( int number )
{
number ? printNumber( --number ) : printf( "%d\n", number );
}

void main()
{
printNumber( 1000 );
return 0;
}

Off the top of my head, not tested at all.

Answer 17

@rsmith

but that uses a conditional expression :(

Answer 18

I read the no "if", not the no conditionals. I have GOT to stop skipping!