[Freeciv-Dev] (PR#6216) Assertion `punit->transported_by != -1' failed

["John Wheeler" <jdwheeler42@xxxxxxxxx>]

[glip - Sun Sep 21 14:53:43 2003]:

> On Sat, 20 Sep 2003, John Wheeler wrote:
> In the future, please refrain from sending savegames so big.  You can 
> always upload it directly to RT via "Comment" command.


D'oh! :-[   Sorry about that.... I would have never sent such a big file
via email, but I did use RT -- and out of habit used the "Reply"
command.  I'll give myself forty lashes with a wet noodle for that.
 
 
> > On a related note, is there a philosophical reason why there are so many
> > 'assert's used, instead of using freelog(LOG_FATAL, ... ); or is it just
> > a matter of not enough programmer time?
> 
> In some parts of the code assert checks something which is assumed
> later and if not fulfilled would lead to a crash anyway.  But in
> some parts it's just a bad tradition, I think.

I quite understand the need to exit the program if something gets really
screwed up, but I think it would be much easier to handle reported bugs
if the error messages were much more descriptive than assert gives. 
die() is the perfect function for that; I'm not sure, but was that just
written?  (LXR didn't find it in the 1.14.0 code.)

I quite understand a programmer using assert for quick debugging.  While
working with a temporary copy of the code, that's fine.  But, before the
patch gets committed, the error messages should be made more useful.  I
have a copy of gdb, but quite frankly when I tried using it, it was much
simpler to use freelog(LOG_FATAL, ... ); (especially since in this case
the error was not otherwise fatal).  Since there are so many more neat
features in CVS than 1.14.0, (and since the directions at getting a CVS
copy are so excellent,) I'll bet a lot of people playing CVS aren't
wizards at programming.

-- 

++JohnWheeler