That said, too many projects believe they have special needs, when they're better served just using e.g. apr in the first place.
- C is designed by committee, so proposals to expand the standard library move slowly.
- Specifications suitable for general computing may not be so for embedded micro-controllers. TBF this is slowly changing as well, given that a ARM CortexM can have double-digit kilobytes of memory now, and is almost as fast as a PII.
- Philosophical: some C users maintain that C's supposed to be a "portable assembler" and higher level abstractions are beyond the scope[0].
This may sound tongue-in-cheek but: you should use C++ instead. Yes it has a lot of flaws of its own, but IMHO it really lives up to the spirit of being a "better C". It has (almost?) everything you said wanted in it standard library. And just because you're using C++ doesn't mean you have to go all-in with template meta-programming, objects, etc. I've written very C-ish code in C++, and only used parts of the C++ standard library I absolutely needed. Last time I did that I was able to "un-C++" my code later to satisfy upstream requirement (no capes!^W C++) relatively easily, after iterating with C++ first.
[0] I know there are counterarguments that C's never been that and it's more a "convenient lie." Nonetheless the that's the spirit of the argument.
Nobody's making big money on C compilers, no huge company with deep pockets feels they would benefit significantly from a "stronger" C.