Re: [tlug] Re: tlug-digest Digest V2004 #194

["Stephen J. Turnbull" <stephen@example.com>]

>>>>> "Joe" == Joe Larabell <larabell@?jp> writes:

    Joe> Assembly is not any faster than C unless you have a really
    Joe> dumb compiler or you're bit-twiddling at the hardware
    Joe> level. Those cases *are* rare.

Have you ever seen "Duff's device"?  C _is_ just an assembler on
steroids, as far as I can tell.

I agree that assembler is rarely useful, but that's not entirely
because optimizing compilers are smart (although they are pretty
smart).  An important reason is that the common places where you can
take advantage of special machine instructions have been hidden in the
standard C library for decades (especially in the string.h library).

-- 
Institute of Policy and Planning Sciences     http://turnbull.sk.tsukuba.ac.jp
University of Tsukuba                    Tennodai 1-1-1 Tsukuba 305-8573 JAPAN
               Ask not how you can "do" free software business;
              ask what your business can "do for" free software.