Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!husc6!bloom-beacon!bu-cs!purdue!i.cc.purdue.edu!j.cc.purdue.edu!pur-ee!uiucdcs!uxc.cso.uiuc.edu!urbsdc!aglew
From: aglew@urbsdc.Urbana.Gould.COM
Newsgroups: comp.arch
Subject: Re: negative addresses (really unsi
Message-ID: <28200145@urbsdc>
Date: 13 May 88 17:52:00 GMT
References: <11571@ut-sally.UUCP>
Lines: 15
Nf-ID: #R:ut-sally.UUCP:11571:urbsdc:28200145:000:654
Nf-From: urbsdc.Urbana.Gould.COM!aglew    May 13 12:52:00 1988


>> >[Wulf]: 
>> >...as far as I can tell, the primary (only?) use
>> >of unsigned arithmetic is for address computations.
>> [Brian Case]:
>> Yeah, same here, unless it's for some obscure purpose or is supported
>> directly by the source language.
>[Ed Nather]:
>Your CS background is showing, gentlemen.  When I gather data from stars, I
>count the precious photons one at a time, and use unsigned arithmetic to
>massage them, since there are no negative photons (unlike negative addresses).
>I wouldn't classify this as an obscure purpose, but someone else might.

What do you care if you are counting in a signed integer, and just
use half the range?