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While we wait for this year’s event, we’re featuring videos of some of the 100+ talks from CppCon 2016 for you to enjoy. Here is today’s feature:

Garbage In, Garbage Out: Arguing about Undefined Behavior...

by Chandler Carruth

(watch on YouTube) (watch on Channel 9)

Summary of the talk:

There has been an overwhelming amount of tension in the programming world over the last year due to something that has become an expletive, a cursed and despised term, both obscene and profane: **undefined behavior**. All too often, this issue and the discussions surrounding it descend into unproductive territory without actually resolving anything.

In this talk, I'm going to try something very bold. I will try to utterly and completely do away with the use of the term "undefined behavior" in these discussions. And I will unquestionably fail. But in the process of failing, I will outline a framework for understanding the actual root issues that the software industry faces here, and try to give constructive and clear paths forward, both for programmers and the programming language.

And, with luck, I will avoid being joined on stage by any unruly nasal demons.