Path: utzoo!utgpu!watserv1!tom
From: tom@mims-iri (Tom Haapanen)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.ibm.pc.programmer
Subject: Re: Turbo C or MSC
Message-ID: <1468@watserv1.waterloo.edu>
Date: 14 Mar 90 13:11:04 GMT
References: <924@ns-mx.uiowa.edu>
Sender: daemon@watserv1.waterloo.edu
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Organization: University of Waterloo, WATMIMS Research Group
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>> Do you know of some real and important differences that could move
>> me to select Microsoft C instead of Turbo C ?

Kevin Trojanowski <troj@icon.weeg.uiowa.edu> writes:
>1)  Turbo-C costs lots less than full MSC, and about the same as Quick-C.
>
>2)  Borland's debugger is better than Codeview, though it costs extra.  For
>    a bit less than MSC alone would cost (approx $275 mail-order, I believe),
>    you can pick up Turbo-C professional (approx $200, I believe) which gives
>    you Turbo-C 2.0, Turbo Debugger 1.5, and Turbo Assembler 1.5.

In version 6.0 of Microsoft C (as of last week, unannounced, but previewed
in the March BYTE), Codeview has an improved data inspector, and can now
run in extended memory on 286/386/486 machines.  It also has more help.

>3)  Turbo-C compiles faster than MSC, though from what I've read, MSC performs
>    better optimization.

...and MSC 6.0 does better optimization yet.

>4)  I prefer Borland's documentation, though Microsoft's is very usable.

Doesn't Borland still use the paperback-style manuals?  If so, I'd galdly
pay $50 extra to get real binders as with MSC.  MSC has comprehensive
documentation, but I haven't used Turbo C, so I can't compare.

>5)  MSC consumes significantly more space on a hard drive than Turbo-C does.
>    When I switched from QuickC 1.0 (no HUGE model) to Turbo-C, my total drive
>    space used by the C compiler was actually reduced!  Full MSC takes even
>    more than QuickC.

6)   Microsoft C generates code for OS/2 and Windows as well as DOS, 
     including DLL's.

7)   MSC 6.0 includes a real Make, not the abomination in MSC 5.0, plus
     a makefile generator which looks for dependencies.

8)   MSC 6.0 has the Browser; this is something like a fancy interactive
     cross-referencer, which uses the information built by the compiler.

>Basically, in my opinion, you can't go wrong either way, but I definitely
>prefer Turbo-C.

Ditto, except I prefer MSC.  :)  Take a look at March BYTE, page 115.

[ \tom haapanen -- university of waterloo -- tom@mims-iris.waterloo.edu    ]
[ "i say what i say, but i say it for myself and myself only" -- me        ]
[ "i don't even know what street canada is on"                -- al capone ]