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From: ccplumb@watnot.UUCP
Newsgroups: comp.arch
Subject: Re: Byte Order: On Holy Wars and a Plea for Peace
Message-ID: <12250@watnot.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 2-Dec-86 18:16:40 EST
Article-I.D.: watnot.12250
Posted: Tue Dec  2 18:16:40 1986
Date-Received: Wed, 3-Dec-86 02:35:43 EST
References: <1509@ihlpl.UUCP> <1335@hoptoad.uucp> <1364@hoptoad.uucp> <399@viper.UUCP> <228@watcgl.UUCP>
Reply-To: ccplumb@watnot.UUCP (Colin Plumb)
Organization: U of Waterloo, Ontario
Lines: 16

Some people have argued that little-endian byte order is better for multi-
precision arithmetic.  I don't think this is true.

If you're only using a few bytes, you add the low bytes, and then add the high
bytes - with no change in efficiency for either order.  But if you need to
use a loop to do the addition,  on the vast majority of CPU's it's quicker
to start at the highest address and go down to zero, saving a comparison
each time 'round the loop. (Of course, if you're counting from a to b,
neither of which are zero, then you have equality again.)

Thus big-endian order is better.

	-Colin Plumb (ccplumbwatnot.UUCP)

Zippy says:
I was making donuts and now I'm on a bus!