How to fix “for loop initial declaration used outside C99 mode” GCC error

We have two files, foo.c and bar.c.

Here is foo.c

#include <stdio.h>

volatile unsigned int stop_now = 0;
extern void bar_function(void);

int main(void)
{
  while (1) {
     bar_function();
     stop_now = 1;
  }
  return 0;
}

Now, here is bar.c

#include <stdio.h>

extern volatile unsigned int stop_now;

void bar_function(void)
{
   if (! stop_now) {
      printf("Hello, world!\n");
      sleep(30);
   }
}

As you can see, we have no shared header between foo.c and bar.c , however bar.c needs something declared in foo.c when it's linked, and foo.c needs a function from bar.c when it's linked.

By using 'extern', you are telling the compiler that whatever follows it will be found (non-static) at link time; don't reserve anything for it in the current pass since it will be encountered later. Functions and variables are treated equally in this regard.

It's very useful if you need to share some global between modules and don't want to put / initialize it in a header.

Technically, every function in a library public header is 'extern', however labeling them as such has very little to no benefit, depending on the compiler. Most compilers can figure that out on their own. As you see, those functions are actually defined somewhere else.

In the above example, main() would print hello world only once, but continue to enter bar_function(). Also note, bar_function() is not going to return in this example (since it's just a simple example). Just imagine stop_now being modified when a signal is serviced (hence, volatile) if this doesn't seem practical enough.

Externs are very useful for things like signal handlers, a mutex that you don't want to put in a header or structure, etc. Most compilers will optimize to ensure that they don't reserve any memory for external objects, since they know they'll be reserving it in the module where the object is defined. However, again, there's little point in specifying it with modern compilers when prototyping public functions.

Hope that helps :)

Several tips:

1. Put inserts/updates in a transaction.
2. For older versions of SQLite - Consider a less paranoid journal mode (pragma journal_mode). There is NORMAL, and then there is OFF, which can significantly increase insert speed if you're not too worried about the database possibly getting corrupted if the OS crashes. If your application crashes the data should be fine. Note that in newer versions, the OFF/MEMORY settings are not safe for application level crashes.
3. Playing with page sizes makes a difference as well (PRAGMA page_size). Having larger page sizes can make reads and writes go a bit faster as larger pages are held in memory. Note that more memory will be used for your database.
4. If you have indices, consider calling CREATE INDEX after doing all your inserts. This is significantly faster than creating the index and then doing your inserts.
5. You have to be quite careful if you have concurrent access to SQLite, as the whole database is locked when writes are done, and although multiple readers are possible, writes will be locked out. This has been improved somewhat with the addition of a WAL in newer SQLite versions.
6. Take advantage of saving space...smaller databases go faster. For instance, if you have key value pairs, try making the key an INTEGER PRIMARY KEY if possible, which will replace the implied unique row number column in the table.
7. If you are using multiple threads, you can try using the shared page cache, which will allow loaded pages to be shared between threads, which can avoid expensive I/O calls.
8. Don't use !feof(file)!

I've also asked similar questions here and here.