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From: doug@edge.UUCP (Doug Pardee)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.c
Subject: Re: Portable C vs Efficient C or "Cost of Portability"
Message-ID: <685@edge.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 27-Apr-87 16:33:42 EDT
Article-I.D.: edge.685
Posted: Mon Apr 27 16:33:42 1987
Date-Received: Thu, 30-Apr-87 03:15:56 EDT
References: <213@pyuxe.UUCP> <636@edge.UUCP> <1316@frog.UUCP> <658@edge.UUCP> <226@osupyr.UUCP>
Organization: Edge Computer Corporation, Scottsdale, AZ
Lines: 34

// Note to the net members:  I realize this discussion is getting pretty far
afield for a "C" discussion forum, and this posting doesn't help much.  I
rationalize it only in that it relates to when to use and when not to use C. //

I'd like to expand upon the comment

> ... The difficulty of writing good programs is the
> now unnecessary awkwardness of assembler constructs.  If an intelligently
> designed assembler, or even macro translator, were available, this could
> be done.

I kinda suspect this is one of the big reasons that many people think that
assembly programming is difficult: the assembler software they're using is
terrible.  In particular, most U*ix-based assemblers contain only the bare
minimum features needed in order to assemble the output of PCC.

Imagine if you had to use a C compiler which was designed only to compile
output from the FORTRAN compiler.  Six-character (all caps) variable names,
no char variables, no shifts or logical operations, no pointers, no unions
nor structures!!  And the coup de grace, *no preprocessor*.  If this
"brain-damaged" compiler was the only C compiler you'd ever seen, I wouldn't
be surprised if you thought that C was a difficult and cryptic language.

I have yet to see an assembler for a microprocessor which has the functionality
of mainframe assemblers written a quarter century ago.  The closest is the
Microsoft Macro Assembler for the PC, and it has the major deficiency of not
being able to deal with macro libraries (not to mention the fact that it
necessarily has to assemble iAPX86 code :-).  The best assembler translator
program that I've ever used was (cover your ears, kiddies, I'm gonna say a
naughty word) the IBM 360/370 OS assembler.  Just about everything you'd
ever want was in that assembler.  Not always in the nicest syntax, but at
least it was there.  But that assembler is 25 years old now!

-- Doug Pardee -- Edge Computer Corp. -- Scottsdale, Arizona