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From: page@ulowell.cs.ulowell.edu (Bob Page)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga
Subject: Writing High-Level code (was Re: The Next Amiga)
Message-ID: <1198@ulowell.cs.ulowell.edu>
Date: Thu, 16-Apr-87 15:16:12 EST
Article-I.D.: ulowell.1198
Posted: Thu Apr 16 15:16:12 1987
Date-Received: Sun, 19-Apr-87 09:22:03 EST
References: <3367@udenva.UUCP> <6248@ukmj.ukma.ms.uky.csnet> <15999@amdcad.AMD.COM> <594@plx.UUCP> <16093@amdcad.AMD.COM>
Reply-To: page@ulowell.cs.ulowell.edu (Bob Page)
Organization: University of Lowell
Lines: 27

tim@amdcad.UUCP (Tim Olson) wrote in article <16093@amdcad.AMD.COM>:
>QUESTION FOR AMIGA CODE DEVELOPERS: What is the ratio of high-level
>language programming to assembly-level programming that you are using
>on your projects (i.e. how much do you actually see the CPU structure)?

Hmmm.  While I certainly don't speak for all coders, I know that many
of the C programmers that are doing "commercial" type software (whether
or not the program is for "sale") are using C with the knowledge of
what the compiler is going to compile down to.

Thus, sadly I guess, I code C differently when I'm using Lattice vs Manx,
or when I'm using a 68000 vs a VAX.  To squeeze performance, you have
to  really know the compiler and the host machine architecture.  I've
seen (not written!) this one line of C that was so hairy you'd feel bald.
Fact is, it turned out to be one instruction on the 68K and VAX (although
pcc wasn't smart enough to optimize it down to one instruction on the VAX,
the Sun C compiler was).  It was not intuitive at all, but it was FAST.

For MOST applications and programmers, I doubt that the underlying machine
and compiler matter at all.  And C might well be the only language where
people even think about it.

Still, I'd love to see the new AMD chip in an Amiga.

..Bob
-- 
Bob Page, U of Lowell CS Dept.   page@ulowell.{uucp,edu,csnet}