Jim Meyering wrote: > These days, I prefer to use assert(e) over "if (!e) abort();". > We used to have to avoid using assert due to portability issues, > but those went away many years ago.
I disagree. The reason why I never use 'assert(e)' is to make sure the safety checks are actually present. There are two kinds of assertions: 1) Assertions at the entry of some function or module. Here, the purpose of 'if (!e) abort();' in production code is to limit the effects of buggy code or invalid data that comes into _our_ modules but originated outside our modules. If invalid data is present, I prefer it to be caught before it enters my module, than to have complaints that my module produced wrong output. 2) Assertions in the middle or at the end of some function. Here, when someone uses 'assert', it may happen that deployed, supposedly "production quality" code runs into bugs that the developer thought he had guarded against. But the guard was defined away by someone who compiled with -DNDEBUG. It is ironic: in the development environment, where consequences of buggy code would be minor, we want to have safety checks. But in production code, where the consequences of bugs can be major, some people want to be able to remove the safety checks? And when the bug then hits, of course, the responsibility is with us, the developers! Bruno
