By default, when the assembler encounters an unqualified forward reference as the operand to a jump instruction, it makes a worst-case assumption that the target will not be close enough to allow generating the SHORT variation of the instruction. Enough space is reserved to generate the NEAR version, and if it is determined later that the target is close enough, the SHORT variation is generated and extra space is padded with NOP instructions. This helps insure that source files will assemble without "out of range" errors, but wastes space when the NOP instructions are generated.
Turning this switch on causes the assembler to assume that unqualified forward referenced jumps will always be reachable with the SHORT instruction variation; should this not be the case, an error is generated and the user may recode the instruction using the NEAR override.
┌────┬──────┬─────┬────┬──────────────────────────────────────────────────┐ │Type│Global│Group│File│Default │ ├────┼──────┼─────┼────┼──────────────────────────────────────────────────┤ │S │Yes │Yes │Yes │-Sfs (default distance is NEAR) │ └────┴──────┴─────┴────┴──────────────────────────────────────────────────┘