[metadata]
id = "MSC14-C"
type = "recommendation"
category = "MSC"
number = 14
title = 'Do not introduce unnecessary platform dependencies'
description = '''
Platform dependencies may be introduced to improve performance on a particular
platform. This can be a dangerous practice, particularly if these dependencies
are not appropriately documented during development and addressed during
porting. Platform dependencies that have no performance or other benefits should
consequently be avoided because they may introduce errors during porting.
The C Standard identifies four different kinds of nonportable behavior. Each
section of Annex J of the C Standard enumerates distinct instances of behaviors
of each kind.
An example of undefined behavior is passing a null char* pointer as an argument
to the printf function corresponding to the %s format specification. Although
some implementations (such as the GNU C Library ) provide well-defined semantics
for this case, others do not, causing programs that rely on this behavior to
fail abnormally.
'''
severity = "Low"
likelihood = "Unlikely"
priority = "P1"
level = "L3"
cert_version = "2016 Edition (Wiki)"
last_modified = "Unknown"
[rules.cert_c.MSC14-C]
enabled = true
[references]
wiki = "https://cmu-sei.github.io/secure-coding-standards/sei-cert-c-coding-standard/recommendations/miscellaneous-msc/msc14-c"
cwe = []
related = ["INT13-C"]