Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!samsung!uunet!crdgw1!crdos1!davidsen
From: davidsen@crdos1.crd.ge.COM (Wm E Davidsen Jr)
Newsgroups: comp.arch
Subject: Re: 64 bits--why stop there?
Message-ID: <2444@crdos1.crd.ge.COM>
Date: 23 Aug 90 21:37:33 GMT
References: <5539@darkstar.ucsc.edu> <13285@yunexus.YorkU.CA> <30728@super.ORG> <9660@ganymede.inmos.co.uk> <224@csinc.UUCP> <1263.26cdaecc@waikato.ac.nz> <6106@vanuata.cs.glasgow.ac.uk> <2437@crdos1.crd.ge.COM> <41004@mips.mips.COM> <1990Aug22.031911.7376@nlm.nih.go
Reply-To: davidsen@crdos1.crd.ge.com (bill davidsen)
Organization: GE Corp R&D Center, Schenectady NY
Lines: 14

In article <15249@drilex.UUCP> dricejb@drilex.UUCP (Craig Jackson drilex1) writes:

| I think C would be the chief offender here--few other languages expose
| the characters/word ratio quite as much.  Note, however, that at least
| one C compiler has been written for a 48-bit word machine.
| >>2) (Some) software inertia and (much) hardware inertia impels people
| >>to use 8-bit characters.

  Having run C on a 36 bit machine, I can say that there are programs
which break, but there are a lot which break on a Cray (64 bit) too, so
the assumption that "all the world's a VAX" causes problems in any case.
-- 
bill davidsen	(davidsen@crdos1.crd.GE.COM -or- uunet!crdgw1!crdos1!davidsen)
    VMS is a text-only adventure game. If you win you can use unix.