Avoid operating-system-specific calls. Proposed UNIX-style portable operating system standards exist (POSIX, XOPEN), but their acceptance is limited. OpenEdge runs on operating systems that do not support these standards.
If you must make operating-system-specific calls, hide them behind a standard application interface of your own design. If possible, confine the interface definition and all operating-system-specific code to a single source module, where you can modify it easily.
Use the UNIX lint utility if it is available on your system. The lint utility flags C language statements in your code that are potential sources of portability problems. See your system documentation for information on using lint or its equivalent.
When you pass a value to a function, cast it to the data type the function expects. For example, the following function call casts the number 23 as a long:
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sample_function((long)23);
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Do not use C functions when you can use standard ABL code.
Do not write your own function if there is an HLC library function that provides the same functionality.