Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!ncrlnk!ncrcae!hubcap!gatech!purdue!bu-cs!dartvax!northstar!earleh
From: earleh@northstar (Earle Horton)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac.programmer
Subject: Re: Aztec C for the Mac
Message-ID: <12610@dartvax.Dartmouth.EDU>
Date: 10 Mar 89 20:52:04 GMT
References: <1391@unccvax.UUCP> <847@dinl.mmc.UUCP>
Sender: news@dartvax.Dartmouth.EDU
Reply-To: earleh@northstar (Earle Horton)
Organization: Thayer School of Engineering.
Lines: 50

In article <847@dinl.mmc.UUCP> snow@dinl.uucp (john snow) writes:
>I can't make a comparasion with other products such as the
>ever popular LSC since I have never seen them, I opted for the Aztec
>because of my good experiences with the DOS version.  In general I would
>say that their documentation is weak, their tech support is poor, but
>their software is excellent.

     Well, I can make the comparison between MPW C and Aztec, and to a
lesser extent LSC.  The Aztec compiler is "source code compatible"
with MPW.  This means that all the header files have the same names,
and the ToolBox data structures are declared the same way.  The
documentation I got with my copy says the company plans to maintain
compatibility with MPW C.  The Aztec compiler is not 100% pure
compatible, but is so close that some rather large C source files
which I have will compile under either compiler without any
conditional compilation to allow for compiler differences.  This to me
is amazing: it says that at long last SOMEBODY out there is making an
effort to be compatible with somebody else.  The folks at Manx deserve
a lot of credit for this.

     Before Manx did this, porting a C program between any two
Macintosh development systems was about as much trouble as porting a
program from UNIX or DOS to the Mac!  Since Apple does, in fact,
manufacture the computer, I wish all C compiler writers for the Mac
would get on the ball and make their compilers MPW-compatible!
(Yesterday wouldn't be soon enough.)

     Aztec also works under the MPW shell.  I don't recommend using
the Aztec shell at all unless you have a floppy based system or are a
masochist.  You can produce MPW Tools with the Aztec system.

The present version does not support function prototypes, either
Pascal or C, so it cannot do parameter checking as do MPW or LSC.
This is the main, perhaps the only, thing I do not like about it.

It seems to produce code somewhere between MPW and LSC:  The code size
of your finished application is smaller than with LSC and bigger than
with MPW, and the time to get there falls in the middle, too.

The compiler produces assembler source, which you then assemble with
the supplied assembler.  Neither of the other systems do this.  This
can be of benefit because a) You get to look at the code if you want
and b) The compiler runs in less memory than the other two.

I have used Aztec for about 6 months now, and I really like it.  I
prefer it to MPW, and I VASTLY prefer it to LSC.  I mean, I won't even
LOOK at LSC source code now.  I have Aztec, MPW, and LSC compilers on
my hard disk, and I am seriously thinking of deleting two of them to
make some more room.  You shouldn't have much trouble guessing which
two are headed for the trash can!