If the first sub-expression checks whether an expensive computation is needed and the check evaluates to false, one can eliminate expensive computation in the second argument.
# It permits a construct where the first expression guarantees a condition without which the second expression may cause a run-time error.

Both are illustrated in the following C snippet where minimal evaluation prevents both null pointer dereference and excess memory fetches:bool isFirstCharValidAlphaUnsafe(const char* p) { return isalpha(p[0]); // SEGFAULT highly possible with p == NULL}