In what versions of C is a block inside parenthesis used to return a value valid?

Question

If I do:

int j = ({int x = 7; x+3;});

In i686-apple-darwin10-gcc-4.2.1 (GCC) 4.2.1 (Apple Inc. build 5646) gcc it compiles just fine. The block in question ({int x = 7; x+3;}) returns the value of the last statement as the value of the block. If you remove the parenthesis it doesn't compile. Can I expect this to work in most C compilers?

Additionally, what is the name for this construct? I have had a lot of trouble searching for it because search engines don't index () or {} and C is a terrible search term. I also haven't been able to find anything about it in any of my books, probably because I don't know what to look for.

Answer 1

It's a GCC extension:

A compound statement enclosed in parentheses may appear as an expression in GNU C. This allows you to use loops, switches, and local variables within an expression.

Recall that a compound statement is a sequence of statements surrounded by braces; in this construct, parentheses go around the braces. For example:

 ({ int y = foo (); int z;
    if (y > 0) z = y;
    else z = - y;
    z; })

is a valid (though slightly more complex than necessary) expression for the absolute value of foo ().

The last thing in the compound statement should be an expression followed by a semicolon; the value of this subexpression serves as the value of the entire construct. (If you use some other kind of statement last within the braces, the construct has type void, and thus effectively no value.)...