5 ms·

> What I don't understand is the !void at the end of the declaration, if we're meant to be returning an int, surely !int would be the expected syntax (although

> What I don't understand is the !void at the end of the declaration, if we're meant to be returning an int, surely !int would be the expected syntax (although I would prefer returns int instead). `!void` means the function can return an error (e.g. return error.BadArgument) but doesn't produce any value itself. In the case of an error in the main function, the process will exit with 1, otherwise 0. The main function can also return a value directly (return type u8 / !u8).

fragmede 2y ago
> In the case of an error in the main function, the process will exit with 1, otherwise 0. The main function can also return a value directly (return type u8 / !u8). We know that by convention, but how do we know that from pub fn main() !void { If if write pub fn foo() !void { will that function also get to return a u8? Also, what happened to argv/argc?
- frankjr 2y ago
  > will that function also get to return a u8? No, the main function (the entry point of the entire program) is special cased. Have a look at the source code. There you can see it's calling the user defined main function and handling its return value / error. https://github.com/ziglang/zig/blob/2d888a8e639856e8cb6e4c6f9e6a27647b464952/lib/std/start.zig#L607 https://github.com/ziglang/zig/blob/2d888a8e639856e8cb6e4c6f... > Also, what happened to argv/argc? You can access argv with std.os.argv which is a slice of null terminated strings. It's better to go with std.process.argsAlloc though (requires an allocation but works on all supported platforms).