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From: ForthNet@willett.pgh.pa.us (ForthNet articles from GEnie)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.forth
Subject: Memory Management/PIC
Message-ID: <2792.UUL1.3#5129@willett.pgh.pa.us>
Date: 19 May 91 01:55:23 GMT
Organization: (n.) to be organized.  But that's not important right now.
Lines: 73

Category 10,  Topic 36
Message 22        Sat May 18, 1991
R.BERKEY [Robert]            at 03:52 PDT
 
 

"All because of a few names."  (from "Essay on X3.J14 Address Alignment",
GEnie Category 10, Topic 36, Message 20, 91-04-28)



<[wheels] S.WHEELER> I can ... <[wheels] S.WHEELER> guarantee you that many
simple things which will ... <[wheels] S.WHEELER> work on the 8088 and 80286
will kill a 68000 or 80196 ... <[wheels] S.WHEELER> as for example, non-
aligned addresses, which ... <[wheels] S.WHEELER> have become subject to a
flurry of messages lately ... <[wheels] S.WHEELER> by PC-based programmer who
don't want to be restricted ... <[wheels] S.WHEELER> in what they do, but seem
to have no care that the ... <[wheels] S.WHEELER> requirement for aligned
addresses will allow a ... <[wheels] S.WHEELER> standard portable across
processors.
 (from "Minutes of a special GEnie Forth RoundTable Conference with Bradford
    J. Rodriguez", BRAD-R.TXT, GEnie Forth Software Library, Date: 05/16/91)



As the author of a recent message on address alignment I choose to rebut S.
Wheeler's above-quoted comments.  The message "Essay on X3.J14 Address
Alignment" takes no position on the benefit or non-benefit of aligned
addresses.  Rather it cites "name jealousy", and notes that the complex of
portability problems involving X3.J14's proposal for address alignment is
resolvable by standardized names for aligned address operators.

By inference, "Essay on X3.J14 Address Alignment" takes a position against the
non-standard usage of the @ word, as well as a position against de-
standardizing @ .

-----

Besides being an implementor of Forth's both with and without address
alignment requirements, I can cite professional programming experience with a
critical application need for speed optimization on a 68000.  The situation
had AT&T withholding payment of a low-six-figure dollar amount due to non-
performance of a delivery agreement.  The amount of difference that the speed
of implementation of @ could have made to the application level code in
fulfilling the contract was not a factor.

If the TC chooses to agree that inefficient programs are a problem in the
world, I think the most productive approach is toward a standardized timing
utility/capability that programmers can use to find critically slow sections
of code.



----------




Now, forgeting everything else that I've said here for a moment, I sense that
the deeper issue is, "Is Forth becoming a Tower of Babel?"




----------

Robert

-----
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