Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!wuarchive!rex!ukma!hsdndev!bu.edu!polygen!jerry
From: jerry@polygen.uucp (Jerry Shekhel)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.apple2
Subject: Re: HLLs vs. Assembly
Message-ID: <1035@stewart.UUCP>
Date: 8 Apr 91 23:05:36 GMT
References: <13156@ucrmath.ucr.edu> <1991Mar30.080418.16299@ee.ualberta.ca> <1029@stewart.UUCP> <13345@ucrmath.ucr.edu>
Reply-To: jerry@stewart.UUCP (Jerry Shekhel)
Organization: Polygen Corporation, Waltham, MA
Lines: 38

In article <13345@ucrmath.ucr.edu> rhyde@ucrmath.ucr.edu (randy hyde) writes:
>
>All languages (included different assembly languages) have a "programming
>paradigm".  The differences between some languages is subtle (e.g., there
>are small, subtle, differences between languages like "C" and Pascal, there
>are considerable differences between languages like "C", Snobol4, ICON, LISP,
>Prolog, and SETL). Some languages are especially suited for certain apps.
>

I see your point; I guess I was just thinking of C.  I still don't see how
anything could be easier to code in assembly language than in C.  Maybe that's
why they say that C is not a real high-level language.

>
>Any application which requires bit pushing, assembly language wins hands
>down (a good example is a SCSI device driver I have been converting from C
>to 32532 assembly language).  The program will generally shorter by a factor
>of two or more and about 10-100 times faster.  Furthermore, in the hands of
>competent assembly and C programmers, the assembly language program will
>be easier to read and understand.  This is not an absolute assessment, but
>it has been true most of the time, in my experience.
>

I must disagree with this, again, keeping C in mind.  Any decent compiler
will optimize register usage, and C expressions like "a <<= 5" or
"a &= ~0x1234" will normally compile down to a single instruction.  So I
really don't see your "bit-pushing" argument here, and certainly not the
performance increase factors you quote.  Of course, you may have been
thinking of FORTRAN or LISP...
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