910725 - where's _DEBUG?
 

in Windows, applications usually are deployed in two versions, debug and release. in case of debug, _DEBUG is defined. in Linux, it's a good idea to have such a variable, eg. for when we want to log some info in some cases. this should happen only in debug mode.
is there such a thing in Linux?
thx

Bruce Schneier and Neils Ferguson say in Practical Cryptography that you should not have a separate debug and release version of your software and they provide several good reasons for this.
Once again, this is not a good idea.
You could create "debug" and "release" targets in your Makefile and pass "-D _DEBUG" in the debug target. However, the real solution is to have only one target and enable logging using a command line switch or a variable in a configuration file. When your software is deployed in some remote location, and you get a request for support, you can ask your customer to enable debug logging. You won't regret it and your customer will thank you.

thanx 4 replying
i didn't know that and i got curious to know what might have been the reasons.
then i thought about that. using a config file or a command line switch is a good idea. it even gives more flexibility to customize the behavior of programs. for example, instead of logging or not logging, user may decide to define a debug level and decide what to be logged. sounds a good idea.
thx