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Avoiding Problem Areas with Multithread Programs

There are several problems you might encounter in creating, linking, or executing a multithread C program. Some of the more common problems are described in the following table. (For a similar discussion from the MFC point of view, see Multithreading: Programming Tips.)

Problem

Probable cause

You get a message box showing that your program caused a protection violation.

Many Win32 programming errors cause protection violations. A common cause of protection violations is the indirect assignment of data to null pointers. Because this results in your program trying to access memory that does not belong to it, a protection violation is issued.

An easy way to detect the cause of a protection violation is to compile your program with debugging information and then run it through the debugger in the Visual C++ environment. When the protection fault occurs, Windows transfers control to the debugger and the cursor is positioned on the line that caused the problem.

Your program generates numerous compile and link errors.

You can eliminate many potential problems by setting the compiler's warning level to one of its highest values and heeding the warning messages. By using the level 3 or level 4 warning level options, you can detect unintentional data conversions, missing function prototypes, and use of non-ANSI features.

See Also

Concepts

Multithreading with C and Win32