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From: davis@unc.UUCP
Newsgroups: comp.arch
Subject: Re: catering to bad code
Message-ID: <975@unc.unc.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 19-Feb-87 19:31:04 EST
Article-I.D.: unc.975
Posted: Thu Feb 19 19:31:04 1987
Date-Received: Sat, 21-Feb-87 03:47:05 EST
References: <14833@amdcad.UUCP> <554@aw.sei.cmu.edu.sei.cmu.edu>
Reply-To: davis@unc.UUCP (Mark Davis)
Organization: CS Dept, U. of N. Carolina, Chapel Hill
Lines: 25

In article <554@aw.sei.cmu.edu.sei.cmu.edu> firth@bd.sei.cmu.edu.UUCP 
(Robert Firth) writes:
>Tricky code is one thing.  But, in my opinion, for truly "bad" code,
>ie code that explicitly violates the semantics of the language
>standard, the best remedy is to crash it disgustingly as hard and as
>soon as possible.  Then it gets fixed.

It is obvious you are only an operating system maker and don't ever
have to use code someone else wrote.  As a part time computer user (as
well as part time architect), I find any tool or operating system that
"crashes disgustingly" to be highly wasteful of my time.  Much of the
software that I use was written by somebody else at another site.
Getting him to fix his questionable practice may not be as easy as you
indicate.  I agree that it should be done right the first time, but
"two wrongs don't make a right."  

The other issue here is that the differences may not show up at compile
time.  You have now introduced a "bug" into the newly installed
software.  Not only will a lot of user time be wasted, but a lot of
system or applications programmer time will be spent chasing down this
bug.  How many guaranteed bugs are you willing to generate as a systems
programmer?

-------------------------------
Mark Davis  (davis@unc.cs.unc.edu)