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From: Tim Rentsch <tr.17687@z991.linuxsc.com>
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Subject: Re: Computer architects leaving Intel...
Date: Sat, 07 Sep 2024 16:45:45 -0700
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anton@mips.complang.tuwien.ac.at (Anton Ertl) writes:

> Stefan Monnier <monnier@iro.umontreal.ca> writes:
>
>>> Specifications are an agreement between the supplier and the client.  The
>>
>> The problem here is that the C standard, seen as a contract, is unfair
>> to the programmer, because it's so excruciatingly hard to write code
>> that is guaranteed to be free from UB.
>
> For programs there is no conformance level "free from UB" in the C
> standard.

The C standard doesn't define any conformance "levels":  it defines
the term "strictly conforming program", for its own convenience in
defining the language;  it also defines the term "conforming
program", for no apparent purpose at all.  In both cases however
what is given are simply definitions;  there is no reason an
interested party couldn't give a definition of some other term, for
the purpose of identifying a class of C programs that have some
particular property -- such as being free from undefined behavior --
where membership in the class is completely determined by statements
in the C standard, being used as a reference document.

> There are two conformance levels for programs:
>
> 1) A strictly conforming program shall use only those features of the
>    language and library specified in this International Standard.
>    This excludes all programs that terminate, including the "Hello,
>    World" program.  [...]

I don't know why you say this.  Which aspects of the definition for
"strictly conforming program" do you think are violated by a typical
'Hello, World' program?  I'm confident the people who wrote the C
standard would say such a program is strictly conforming.