Expressions "j = ++(i | i); and j = ++(i & i); should be a lvalue error?

Question

I was expecting that in my following code:

#include<stdio.h>  int main(){     int i = 10;      int j = 10;      j = ++(i | i);     printf("%d %d\n", j, i);      j = ++(i & i);     printf("%d %d\n", j, i);      return 1; } 

expressions j = ++(i | i); and j = ++(i & i); will produce lvalue errors as below:

x.c: In function ‘main’: x.c:6: error: lvalue required as increment operand x.c:9: error: lvalue required as increment operand    

But I surprised that above code compiled successfully, as below:

~$ gcc x.c -Wall ~$ ./a.out  11 11 12 12    

Check the above code working correctly.

While other operators produce error (as I understand). Even bitwise operator XOR causes of an error j = ++(i ^ i); (check other operators produce an lvalue error at compilation time).

What is the reason? Is this is unspecified or undefined ? or bitwise OR AND operators are different?

compiler version:

gcc version 4.4.5 (Ubuntu/Linaro 4.4.4-14ubuntu5) 

_{But I believe compiler version shouldn't reason for non-uniform behavior. If ^ not compiled then | and & also not. otherwise should work for all}

Its not an error with this compiler in c99 mode: gcc x.c -Wall -std=c99.

Answer 1

You are right that it should not compile, and on most compilers, it does not compile.
(Please specify exactly which compiler/version is NOT giving you a compiler error)

I can only hypothesize that the compiler knows the identities that (i | i) == i and (i & i) == i and is using those identities to optimize away the expression, just leaving behind the variable i.

This is just a guess, but it makes a lot of sense to me.