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From: klein@gravity.UUCP
Newsgroups: comp.arch
Subject: Re: catering to bad code
Message-ID: <13602@sun.uucp>
Date: Wed, 18-Feb-87 22:01:23 EST
Article-I.D.: sun.13602
Posted: Wed Feb 18 22:01:23 1987
Date-Received: Fri, 20-Feb-87 02:07:27 EST
References: <14833@amdcad.UUCP>
Sender: news@sun.uucp
Lines: 17

In article <14833@amdcad.UUCP>, phil@amdcad.UUCP (Phil Ngai) writes:
> In a Unix system I am designing, I am considering catering to bad
> code. That is, like the VAX I propose to make location 0 contain a
> readable 0. I think that code which gets ported to a Sun machine often
> has to have this kind of thing cleaned up. 
> 
> What do people think of this? Is it kind of disgusting?

It's not just an issue of porting to a Sun or other machine, it's an issue of
relying on code to do something that it does only on a subset of machines.  A
well-written program does not read at location 0 because some potential
platforms do not allow it.  A system that allows location 0 to be read
(or written) only encourages bad programming.  My vote is an emphatic NO!
--
	Mike Klein		klein@sun.{arpa,com}
	Sun Microsystems, Inc.	{ucbvax,hplabs,ihnp4,seismo}!sun!klein
	Mountain View, CA