Re: A solution for the allocation failures problem

Kelsey Bjarnason said:

On Wed, 06 Feb 2008 09:19:54 +0000, Herbert Rosenau wrote:

On Tue, 29 Jan 2008 11:47:27 UTC, jacob navia <jacob@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

1:
It is not possible to check EVERY malloc result within complex
software.

This is a lie!

No kidding. One wonders if they feel the same way about, oh, opening
files, or establishing network connections - is it impossible to check
every call to fopen, every call to connect? If not, why is memory
allocation so magically difficult to check?

The claim that it is not possible to check every malloc result within
complex software reminded me of a project in the mid-1990s where I was
fortunate enough to be in at the start, so I was able to have my say in
setting up project coding standards. Just about the first thing I
suggested was: "let's ensure that all the code clean-compiles at level 4"
(this is the highest warning level in Visual Studio 1.5, which we were
using for development before porting up to the mainframe for testing).

One of the others said, in a wonderfully broad Chicago accent, "Level FOUR?
That's IMPOSSIBLE!"

This came as news to me, since I had routinely been getting clean compiles
at level 4 for some years.

--
Richard Heathfield <http://www.cpax.org.uk>
Email: -http://www. +rjh@
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