Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!lll-winken!lll-tis!ames!ll-xn!mit-eddie!killer!pollux!dalsqnt!rpp386!jfh
From: jfh@rpp386.UUCP (John F. Haugh II)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.c
Subject: Re: Shifting question
Message-ID: <4245@rpp386.UUCP>
Date: 22 Jul 88 00:42:17 GMT
References: <705@bnr-rsc.UUCP> <11556@steinmetz.ge.com> <60290@sun.uucp> <1818@spar.SPAR.SLB.COM> <11592@steinmetz.ge.com>
Reply-To: jfh@rpp386.UUCP (The Beach Bum)
Organization: Big "D" Home for Wayward Hackers
Lines: 19

In article <11592@steinmetz.ge.com> davidsen@crdos1.UUCP (bill davidsen) writes:
>  If I sound really disgusted about this, I am. Compilers on brain
>damaged hardware should work correctly.

i have to disagree.  the only way to inform the compiler that the shift
will always be by a positive amount is to cast the shift count to an
unsigned and the only way to inform the compiler the value is in range
is to have subranges ala pascal.

C does not have subranges as pascal has and expecting bounds checking on
all shift operations seems to deviate from the standard C idiom of little
or no run time checking.  C does not check array bounds, even where it is
possible, and it should not be forced to check shift counts.

- john.
-- 
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