Editing Assertion (software development) (section)

=== Assertions in production environment ===
When a program is deployed to [[production environment|production]], assertions are typically turned off, to avoid any overhead or side effects they may have. In some cases assertions are completely absent from deployed code, such as in C/C++ assertions via macros. In other cases, such as Java, assertions are present in the deployed code, and can be turned on in the field for debugging.<ref>[http://docs.oracle.com/javase/8/docs/technotes/guides/language/assert.html Programming With Assertions], [http://docs.oracle.com/javase/8/docs/technotes/guides/language/assert.html#enable-disable Enabling and Disabling Assertions]</ref>

Assertions may also be used to promise the compiler that a given edge condition is not actually reachable, thereby permitting certain [[compiler optimizations|optimizations]] that would not otherwise be possible. In this case, disabling the assertions could actually reduce performance.