1. Thou shalt run lint frequently and study its pronouncements
with care, for verily its perception and judgment oft exceed
thine.
2. Thou shalt not follow the NULL pointer, for chaos and madness
await thee at its end.
3. Thou shalt cast all function arguments to the expected type if
they are not of that type already, even when thou art
convinced that this is unnecessary, lest they take cruel
vengeance upon thee when thou least expect it.
4. If thy header files fail to declare the return types of thy
library functions, thou shalt declare them thyself with the
most meticulous care, lest grievous harm befall thy program.
5. Thou shalt check the array bounds of all strings (indeed, all
arrays), for surely where thou typest "foo" someone someday
shall type "supercalifragilisticexpialidocious."
6. If a function be advertised to return an error code in the
event of difficulties, thou shalt check for that code, yea,
even though the checks triple the size of thy code and produce
aches in thy typing fingers, for if thou thinkest "it cannot
happen to me," the Gods shall surely punish thee for thy
arrogance.
7. Thou shalt study thy libraries and strive not to re-invent
them without cause, that thy code may be short and readable
and thy days pleasant and productive.
8. Thou shalt make thy program's purpose and structure clear to
thy fellow man by using the One True Brace Style, even if thou
likest it not, for thy creativity is better used in solving
problems than in creating beautiful new impediments to
understanding.
9. Thy external identifiers shall be unique in the first six
characters, though this harsh discipline be irksome and the
years of its necessity stretch before thee seemingly without
end, lest thou tear thy hair out and go mad on that fateful
day when thou desirest to make thy program run on an old
system.
10. Thou shalt foreswear, renounce, and abjure the vile heresy
which claimeth that "All the world's a RS/6000," and have no
commerce with the benighted heathens who cling to this
barbarous belief, that the days of thy program may be long
even though the days of thy current machine be short.