Path: csiph.com!3.us.feeder.erje.net!feeder.erje.net!news.linkpendium.com!news.linkpendium.com!news.iecc.com!.POSTED.news.iecc.com!nerds-end From: "Nick Maclaren" Newsgroups: comp.compilers Subject: Language standards vs. implementation, was Re: A right alternative to IEEE-754's format Date: 9 Apr 2018 16:45:12 -0000 Organization: Old Fogies Society Lines: 38 Sender: news@iecc.com Approved: comp.compilers@iecc.com Message-ID: <18-04-013@comp.compilers> References: <0d4dc7f8-1819-43e5-8082-6ff7aee5f41b@googlegroups.com> Reply-To: nmm1@cam.ac.uk Injection-Info: gal.iecc.com; posting-host="news.iecc.com:2001:470:1f07:1126:0:676f:7373:6970"; logging-data="51297"; mail-complaints-to="abuse@iecc.com" Keywords: standards Posted-Date: 10 Apr 2018 11:06:25 EDT X-submission-address: compilers@iecc.com X-moderator-address: compilers-request@iecc.com X-FAQ-and-archives: http://compilers.iecc.com Originator: nmm@wheeler.UUCP (Nick Maclaren) Xref: csiph.com comp.compilers:2041 [[ this string is copied from comp.arch because your moderation found it interesting ]] In article , Walter Banks wrote: >On 2018-04-09 7:48 AM, David Brown wrote: > >>> GCC tools are for the most part using old compiler technology. >>> Some of is decades old. >> >> You are fond of saying that, but I don't remember hearing any >> details or examples. > >- Strategy passes to determine how an applications should be compiled >this time. Yes. Yuck. It's a nightmare for debugging, and makes it damn-near impossible to tune code that is going to be run by someone else. >- Direct compiling to machine code and not using intermediate assembler >to get away from the two copy problem with code generation ISA restrictions. Well, er, yes, in theory. But suitable intermediate non-text languages (assembler is, I agree, outdated) are a vast simplification of compilers that are designed for multiple source languages and multiple target machines. gcc is one such. >- Whole application building. Why is linking still being done when its >purpose was to get around computer limitations? No, it wasn't. That was ONE purpose. A far more important one was to allow and support separate compilation, as needed when an application uses a library built by someone else. And how many large and serious programs DON'T do that? Regards, Nick Maclaren.