Chapter 15. Pitfalls

IN THIS CHAPTER

• Algorithmic Pitfalls

• Typos that Compile

• Other Pitfalls

Pitfalls in software development come about because developers expect a certain behavior from, for instance, the compiler, the operating system, or the hardware. Because of differences between compilers, different versions of programming languages, interpretation of standards, and typos that may coincidentally compile, these expectations are not always valid. This explains why bugs resulting from falling for pitfalls are so very hard to find. When examining the code during a bug search, developers are likely to overlook the pitfall time and again. This chapter deals with common and not-so-common pitfalls of programming in C/C++.