Too lazy to check return values? Feeling lazy? Carpel tunnel got you down? Just don't feel like typing all this? if ( unlink("filename") == -1 ) { diehorribly(); } if ( (bytes = read( fd, buffer, 100 )) < 0 ) { diehorribly(); } if ( ( fd = open( FILENAME, O_RDWR|O_EXCL|O_CREAT, 0666 ) ) == 0 ) { diehorribly(); }