Can you spot the error in the following Delphi code? It is an error that will NOT manifest itself as a runtime error. Instead it will quietly pass by unobserved, which is even worse...
function GetNet(Yield, Balance : Integer) : Integer; var ModBalance, ExtraYield : Integer; begin Result := 0; ModBalance := Balance + GetDiffs(Yield); ExtraYield := GetExtraYield(Yield); Inc(Yield, ExtraYield); Result := ModBalance + ExtraYield; end;
OK, not too hard, was it?
Solution: The parameter Yield is passed by value to the function. It is however modified inside the function code. This modified value will not be returned to the caller, and thus is pointless. The parameter should have been passed as "var", if the value was intended to be modified.
Not so hard to spot! But imagine finding this problem among thousands of lines of code spread over hundreds of units! And consider also a code base that is evolving all the time, so the code must constantly be rechecked.
The good news is that with Pascal Analyzer, our popular static code analyzer, you can automatically find these and many other kinds of coding issues. This particular error above is detected by the Warnings Report, in a section WARN11 "Value parameters that are set".
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