English Dictionary: gotcha | by the DICT Development Group |
2 results for gotcha | |
From Jargon File (4.2.0, 31 JAN 2000) [jargon]: | |
gotcha n. A {misfeature} of a system, especially a programming language or environment, that tends to breed bugs or mistakes because it both enticingly easy to invoke and completely unexpected and/or unreasonable in its outcome. For example, a classic gotcha in {C} is the fact that `if (a=b) {code;}' is syntactically valid and sometimes even correct. It puts the value of `b' into `a' and then executes `code' if `a' is non-zero. What the programmer probably meant was `if (a==b) {code;}', which executes `code' if `a' and `b' are equal. | |
From The Free On-line Dictionary of Computing (15Feb98) [foldoc]: | |
gotcha programming language or environment, that tends to breed {bug}s or mistakes because it both enticingly easy to invoke and completely unexpected and/or unreasonable in its outcome. For example, a classic gotcha in {C} is the fact that if (a=b) {code;} is syntactically valid and sometimes even correct. It puts the value of "b" into "a" and then executes "code" if "a" is non-zero. What the programmer probably meant was if (a==b) {code;} which executes "code" if "a" and "b" are equal. [{Jargon File}] (1995-04-17) |