Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!ames!oliveb!apple!rutgers!att!ihlpy!wolfordj
From: wolfordj@ihlpy.ATT.COM (452is-Wolford)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.ibm.pc
Subject: Re: High- vs. low-level languages (Was: Re: Why unix doesn't catch on)
Message-ID: <12683@ihlpy.ATT.COM>
Date: 5 May 89 14:02:55 GMT
References: <360013@hplvli.HP.COM>
Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories - Naperville, Illinois
Lines: 43

From article <360013@hplvli.HP.COM>, by boyne@hplvli.HP.COM (Art Boyne):
> davidsen@steinmetz.ge.com (Wm. E. Davidsen Jr) writes:
>>	Having coded some fairly large (20-100k line) programs in
I think you better look again.  What C compiler are you using, sounds
better than anything I have ever seen or herd of  or you need to look
at your assembly language skills.

> 
> Wouldn't it be nice if this were really true for all of us.  I work
> in the Motorola 68000 world, not the Intel 80x86 world, and I have
> yet to see a C compiler that I can't beat 2:1 in total code size and up
> to 8:1 in speed in tight loops when coding in assembler.  I just finished
>.....
> 
> Art Boyne, boyne@hplvla.hp.com

Totally agree.  Many times I write a program in C or PASCAL and then run
a performance analyzer on it and then write several of the critical
routines in assembly.  I get a good 2:1 (atleast if not more) code
size reduction and many times > 10 times the performance. 

I have System V C, Green Hills C, BSD C, Micro Soft C, Turbo C, 
MANX's AZTEC C,...
BSD "pc" compiler and Turbo PASCAL.

But then I started programing in "assembly".  I know Z80, VAX ASM, 3B2 ASM,
8080/8085, 8086, 80186, 80286 assembly, all of these I can make "smoke"
a "C" compiler performance.

Don't get me wrong I like to work in "C", and it is the language of choice
when I want to write a program to run on several diff. computers, but
it does not take much effort to partial compile a few of the critical 
routines and then modify the insides.

Jeff Wolford
att!iwsag!jww
att!ihlpa!wolfordj

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