Do I need an extern “C” block to include standard POSIX C headers?

Question

Do I need an extern \"C\" {} block to include standard C headers in a C++ program. Only consider standard C headers which do not have counterparts in C++.

Answer 1

No, you should use the C++ wrapper headers (for instance like ). Those take care of all that for you.

If it's a header that doesn't have those, then yes, you'll want to wrap them in extern "C" {}.

ETA: It's worth noting that many implementations will include the wrapper inside the .h file like below, so that you can get away with not doing it yourself.

#ifdef  __cplusplus
extern "C" {
#endif

#ifdef  __cplusplus
}
#endif