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From: brnstnd@kramden.acf.nyu.edu (Dan Bernstein)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.c
Subject: Re: Memory allocation/deallocation for tree? Any good way?
Message-ID: <20872:Jan1017:54:3891@kramden.acf.nyu.edu>
Date: 10 Jan 91 17:54:38 GMT
References: <1991Jan7.034619.4449@portia.Stanford.EDU> <MCDANIEL.91Jan9102148@dolphin.adi.com> <14805@smoke.brl.mil>
Organization: IR
Lines: 14

In article <14805@smoke.brl.mil> gwyn@smoke.brl.mil (Doug Gwyn) writes:
> In article <MCDANIEL.91Jan9102148@dolphin.adi.com> mcdaniel@adi.com (Tim McDaniel) writes:
> >A free() that did nothing would satisfy ANSI C, ...
> Not strictly true, as the standard specifies that the storage is made
> available for subsequent allocation.  However, there is no strictly
> conforming way to test for this behavior.

Doesn't as-if kick in here? A conforming program cannot figure out that
a no-op is different from the definition of free(); therefore the no-op
works as if it were a free() satisfying the literal definition;
therefore the no-op is a valid implementation of free(). Where's the
mistake?

---Dan