Subj : Re: Non-strictly-conforming and unspecified versus undefinedbehavior
To   : comp.programming.threads,comp.std.c
From : Douglas A. Gwyn
Date : Fri Feb 18 2005 08:55 pm

Keith Thompson wrote:
> Strict conformance is a very narrow concept, and few real-world
> programs are strictly conforming.  Strict conformance is useful mainly
> as a constraint on implementations, not on programs -- a conforming
> (hosted) implementation must accept any strictly conforming program.

However, that is what makes it an important concept -- it is
what the standard *guarantees* support for across all platforms
(those that conform to the standard, of course), and thus is
a desirable goal when cross-platform portability is, or might
become, important.  Code suitable for use by an s.c. program
is usually trivial to port (just recompile in the new
environment), which makes it economically important.
Even if not all of one's application can feasible be made
strictly conforming, if the platform dependencies are isolated
in a few modules with well-defined interfaces and all other
code is written in a s.c. manner, it really aids in adapting
the app to a new platform (only the system interface modules
have to be changed).

.