Unchecked Return Value from Critical Operations

Description

Detects critical operations (file system, database, authentication) whose return values are not checked. Ignoring return values can lead to silent failures, data corruption, and security vulnerabilities. Critical operations that must have their return values checked include: - File system operations (write, delete, chmod) - Database operations (insert, update, delete) - Authentication/authorization checks - Cryptographic operations

What Shoulder detects

How to fix

Always check return values from critical operations:

```javascript
// ✅ SAFE - Check return value
const result = await fs.writeFile(path, data);
if (!result.success) {
  logger.error('Write failed');
  throw new Error('Failed to write file');
}
```

Applies to

References

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