Table of Contents

1. About the GNU Coding Standards
2. Keeping Free Software Free

2.1 Referring to Proprietary Programs
2.2 Accepting Contributions
2.3 Trademarks

3. General Program Design

3.1 Which Languages to Use
3.2 Compatibility with Other Implementations
3.3 Using Non-standard Features
3.4 Standard C and Pre-Standard C
3.5 Conditional Compilation

4. Program Behavior for All Programs

4.1 Writing Robust Programs
4.2 Library Behavior
4.3 Formatting Error Messages
4.4 Standards for Interfaces Generally
4.5 Standards for Graphical Interfaces
4.6 Standards for Command Line Interfaces
4.7 Table of Long Options
4.8 Memory Usage
4.9 File Usage

5. Making The Best Use of C

5.1 Formatting Your Source Code
5.2 Commenting Your Work
5.3 Clean Use of C Constructs
5.4 Naming Variables, Functions, and Files
5.5 Portability between System Types
5.6 Portability between CPUs
5.7 Calling System Functions
5.8 Internationalization
5.9 Mmap

6. Documenting Programs

6.1 GNU Manuals
6.2 Doc Strings and Manuals
6.3 Manual Structure Details
6.4 License for Manuals
6.5 Manual Credits
6.6 Printed Manuals
6.7 The NEWS File
6.8 Change Logs

6.8.1 Change Log Concepts
6.8.2 Style of Change Logs
6.8.3 Simple Changes
6.8.4 Conditional Changes
6.8.5 Indicating the Part Changed

6.9 Man Pages
6.10 Reading other Manuals

7. The Release Process

7.1 How Configuration Should Work
7.2 Makefile Conventions

7.2.1 General Conventions for Makefiles
7.2.2 Utilities in Makefiles
7.2.3 Variables for Specifying Commands
7.2.4 Variables for Installation Directories
7.2.5 Standard Targets for Users
7.2.6 Install Command Categories

7.3 Making Releases

8. References to Non-Free Software and Documentation
A. Copying This Manual

A.1 GNU Free Documentation License

A.1.1 ADDENDUM: How to use this License for your documents

Index