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From: cik@l.cc.purdue.edu.UUCP
Newsgroups: comp.lang.c
Subject: Re: Types
Message-ID: <533@l.cc.purdue.edu>
Date: Wed, 20-May-87 12:27:11 EDT
Article-I.D.: l.533
Posted: Wed May 20 12:27:11 1987
Date-Received: Sat, 23-May-87 00:53:21 EDT
References: <7264@brl-adm.ARPA> <734@sdchema.sdchem.UUCP>, <293@osupyr.UUCP> <8024@utzoo.UUCP>
Organization: Purdue University Statistics Department
Lines: 34

In article <8024@utzoo.UUCP>, henry@utzoo.UUCP (Henry Spencer) writes:
> But this sure doesn't sound like C, and C is what X3J11 is standardizing.

Okay, let me stick to nasty problems with C.

	1.  Have the compiler substitute locations in -asm- statements.
	Other than editing the assembler output, I do not believe there
	is any way to insert asm statements which can be expected to
	survive a change from one compiler to another.

	2.  Require that the compiler honor, whenever possible, assignments
	to registers.				      ^^^^^^^^

	3.  Allow the programmer to force non-promotion of floating to double,
	whenever the programmer feels there is a good reason to do this.
	I know when there is no point in using double; the compiler cannot.
	Also, on some machines, one cannot print out a floating number in hex.
	(Okay, I can finagle it.  But I had an occasion where this would have
	been a problem.  I edited the assembler code, as the easiest option.)

	4.  Allow floating point numbers to be given in hex.  Try putting in
	2^-32 as a floating point or double constant.  Why should one have to
	risk computer roundoff when it is totally unnecessary?

	5.  Require that the compiler honor parentheses.  When I want a   
	subroutine to return (x - y - k*c) + f(y), I most emphatically do
	not want the compiler to do the "obvious" rearrangement to combine
	the two terms with y; this can be a major loss of accuracy.  To set
	a variable equal to the parenthetical expression is a significant
	loss of time.
-- 
Herman Rubin, Dept. of Statistics, Purdue Univ., West Lafayette IN47907
Phone: (317)494-6054
hrubin@l.cc.purdue.edu or pur-ee!stat-l!cik or hrubin@purccvm.bitnet