You may think so, and I may even agree. But those opinions do not control what compilers actually implement. For example, in void f() { volatile char se

You may think so, and I may even agree. But those opinions do not control what compilers actually implement. For example, in void f() { volatile char sekrit[256]; sekrit[0] = 0; } a compiler may reason that, since sekrit is on the stack, and no hardware device could know where it is, it may elide the whole block. And, some do.