[jws]

A standards process is frequently about documenting what already exists in common implementations so that there is a specification for future implementations. POSIX was very much one of these processes.

[to3m]

OK... so how did junk like this ever get into enough implementations that people were forced to include it in the standard? ;)

[emmelaich]

tsearch/hsearch/lsearch have been around for at least 30 years. My guess is that they've been around for a lot longer.

Why not have these anyway? Otherwise people will make their own (probably buggy) equivalents.

I'm actually surprised that people aren't aware of them.

[to3m]

This is specifically about hcreate/hsearch, which are utterly useless, since you only get one hash table at a time. The reason you don't want crap like this is just that: it's crap.

The _r versions look perfectly sensible.