Newsgroups: comp.lang.c
Path: utzoo!henry
From: henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer)
Subject: Re: "Numerical Recipes in C" is nonportable code
Message-ID: <1988Sep17.212012.8809@utzoo.uucp>
Organization: U of Toronto Zoology
References: <867@osupyr.mast.ohio-state.edu> <3200@geac.UUCP> <1430@ficc.uu.net> <1988Sep15.145026.20325@ateng.uucp> <16041@ism780c.isc.com>
Date: Sat, 17 Sep 88 21:20:12 GMT

In article <16041@ism780c.isc.com> marv@ism780.UUCP (Marvin Rubenstein) writes:
>But consider what might have happened had dpANS mandated that the compution
>of a pointer to x[-1] be a valid operation.  Then machines for wich the
>mandated behavior is slow would be not used by people interested in high
>performance.  The net effect could be salubrious for the computer industry in
>the long run.

No.  A much more probable result would be widespread rejection of the C
standard, making things worse than before.  ANSI does not have the power
to legislate conformance to standards -- that has to be voluntary.  If
too many manufacturers, especially big ones, decline to conform to a
standard, it falls into disuse and is forgotten.  Let us not forget that
the machine whose segmented architecture causes the biggest headaches for
pointer trickery is also the biggest-selling computer of all time.  To get
a standard accepted (by the world, not just by ANSI), it is necessary --
distasteful, but necessary -- to restrain desires for social engineering,
and produce something that will work even on systems one does not like.
-- 
NASA is into artificial        |     Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology
stupidity.  - Jerry Pournelle  | uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry henry@zoo.toronto.edu