Path: utzoo!utgpu!watserv1!watmath!att!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!cs.utexas.edu!asuvax!noao!ncar!mephisto!mcnc!rti!sheol!throopw
From: throopw@sheol.UUCP (Wayne Throop)
Newsgroups: comp.arch
Subject: Re: 64 bits--why stop there?
Summary: wouldn't change sizeof semantics
Message-ID: <0921@sheol.UUCP>
Date: 9 Sep 90 20:54:30 GMT
References: <6106@vanuata.cs.glasgow.ac.uk> <2437@crdos1.crd.ge.COM> <CHUCK.PHILLIPS.90Aug30120102@halley.FtCollins.NCR.COM> <1791@tuvie>
Lines: 17

> From: hp@vmars.tuwien.ac.at (Peter Holzer)
> What should sizeof (bit) be? 0.125? [...]
> You would have to insert lots of sizeof (char) in mallocs [...]

It would probably be a better idea to preserve backwards compatibility,
and have "sizeof" remain ambiguous as to the bit size, introduce a new
operator (say) "bitsize" and a new function "bitalloc".

Further, extend the ":" bitfield syntax to apply to arrays'n'such.

This would all be backwards compatible, and would allow C to do the
sorts of things the Pascal can now do with packed subrange types.

Just a thought.
--
Wayne Throop <backbone>!mcnc!rti!sheol!throopw or sheol!throopw@rti.rti.org