Using modern ANSI C development tools to increase productivity and ensure test and measurement application reliability

Over the past few decades, the ANSI C language has become one of the most popular test and measurement programming languages due to its power and flexibility. ANSI C applications can be optimized for improved performance because of the developer´s ability to have low level control through direct access to memory and hardware specific function calls. Although the ANSI C language provides low level control of application development resulting in the freedom to optimize source code for improved execution performance, it can also lead to programming mistakes. Some examples of the most common ANSI C programming mistakes are syntax errors, incorrect array indexing, memory leaks and inefficient function implementation, which can cause sluggish execution speeds on deployed test systems. Unlike high-level language developers, ANSI C developers are challenged with the added responsibility of ensuring that low level details are handled appropriately in order to ensure that applications are reliable and stable. Modern tools are becoming available to help ANSI C developers face these challenges and, often, integrate directly into existing development environments. This paper examines how and why ANSI C developers commonly make programming mistakes related to syntax, memory allocation and inefficiencies in application source code, and focuses on overcoming these challenges with modern development tools. Some of these modern ANSI C development tools include run-time debugging, resource tracking and run-time analysis and help to increase developer productivity and ensure the reliability of test systems.