From 2d1fa1c896d7bc22b378ef142afcefeb3b142bbc Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
From: Rudy Celekli <47457359+rudycelekli@users.noreply.github.com>
Date: Mon, 5 Oct 2026 11:59:06 -0400
Subject: [PATCH] Handle queue and task allocation failures before starting
 sensor work

Signed-off-by: Rudy Celekli <47457359+rudycelekli@users.noreply.github.com>
---
 engineering/engineering-embedded-firmware-engineer.md | 11 ++++++++++-
 1 file changed, 10 insertions(+), 1 deletion(-)

diff --git a/engineering/engineering-embedded-firmware-engineer.md b/engineering/engineering-embedded-firmware-engineer.md
index 896bca3c..91265956 100644
--- a/engineering/engineering-embedded-firmware-engineer.md
+++ b/engineering/engineering-embedded-firmware-engineer.md
@@ -60,7 +60,16 @@ static void sensor_task(void *arg) {
 
 void app_main(void) {
     sensor_queue = xQueueCreate(8, sizeof(sensor_data_t));
-    xTaskCreate(sensor_task, "sensor", TASK_STACK_SIZE, NULL, TASK_PRIORITY, NULL);
+    if (sensor_queue == NULL) {
+        // Never start a task that will send to an invalid queue.
+        return; // Report allocation failure through the application's fault path.
+    }
+    if (xTaskCreate(sensor_task, "sensor", TASK_STACK_SIZE, NULL,
+                    TASK_PRIORITY, NULL) != pdPASS) {
+        vQueueDelete(sensor_queue);
+        sensor_queue = NULL;
+        return; // No task owns the queue; release it before reporting the fault.
+    }
 }
 ```