Re: Special memory access words

From	Krishna Myneni <krishna.myneni@ccreweb.org>
Newsgroups	comp.lang.forth
Subject	Re: Special memory access words
Date	2026-05-01 13:28 -0500
Organization	A noiseless patient Spider
Message-ID	<10t2rd5$1k7kf$1@dont-email.me> (permalink)
References	(7 earlier) <2026May1.081638@mips.complang.tuwien.ac.at> <20260501102253.00007757@tin.it> <2026May1.105706@mips.complang.tuwien.ac.at> <10t2g9m$1ge30$1@dont-email.me> <2026May1.173518@mips.complang.tuwien.ac.at>

Show all headers | View raw

On 5/1/26 10:35 AM, Anton Ertl wrote:
> Krishna Myneni <krishna.myneni@ccreweb.org> writes:
>> IIUC, to do an explicit signed word fetch on little endian system one
>> would write using the current proposal
>>
>> W@ WLE W>S
> 
> If you have a 16-bit signed number stored in little-endian format,
> that's the way to get it on the stack, whether your hardware is
> little-endian or big-endian.
> 
>> and on a little-endian system, one could get away with writing
>>
>> W@ W>S
> 
> If you have a 16-bit signed number stored in the byte order of your
> hardware, that's the way to fetch it.
> ...

Ok. I understand. Thanks for the clarification.

I would prefer W@ and similar words which do unsigned fetch be prefixed 
with 'U', because some systems have used W@ for unsigned and some for 
signed word fetch (LMI 80386 UR/Forth and kForth-32/64).

Using the U prefix prevents breaking of older code and keeps the number 
of memory words the same as in the current proposal. The 'U' prefix also 
has the advantage of providing a hint to the programmer, helping to 
prevent programming mistakes.

The rest of the proposal is fine with me.

--
Krishna

Back to comp.lang.forth | Previous | Next — Previous in thread | Next in thread | Find similar

Thread

GNU Forth has a floating point floor word, but not floating point ceiling word? Buzz McCool <buzz_mccool@yahoo.com> - 2026-04-23 16:11 -0700
  Re: GNU Forth has a floating point floor word, but not floating point ceiling word? dxf <dxforth@gmail.com> - 2026-04-24 11:14 +1000
    Re: GNU Forth has a floating point floor word, but not floating point ceiling word? Buzz McCool <buzz_mccool@yahoo.com> - 2026-04-24 08:29 -0700
    Re: GNU Forth has a floating point floor word, but not floating point ceiling word? Krishna Myneni <krishna.myneni@ccreweb.org> - 2026-04-27 17:39 -0500
      Re: GNU Forth has a floating point floor word, but not floating point ceiling word? peter <peter.noreply@tin.it> - 2026-04-28 13:40 +0200
        Re: GNU Forth has a floating point floor word, but not floating point ceiling word? minforth <minforth@gmx.net> - 2026-04-28 14:01 +0200
        Re: GNU Forth has a floating point floor word, but not floating point ceiling word? Krishna Myneni <krishna.myneni@ccreweb.org> - 2026-04-28 19:25 -0500
          Re: GNU Forth has a floating point floor word, but not floating point ceiling word? dxf <dxforth@gmail.com> - 2026-04-29 11:20 +1000
            Re: GNU Forth has a floating point floor word, but not floating point ceiling word? Krishna Myneni <krishna.myneni@ccreweb.org> - 2026-04-29 08:30 -0500
              Re: GNU Forth has a floating point floor word, but not floating point ceiling word? Krishna Myneni <krishna.myneni@ccreweb.org> - 2026-04-29 20:15 -0500
                Re: GNU Forth has a floating point floor word, but not floating point ceiling word? Krishna Myneni <krishna.myneni@ccreweb.org> - 2026-05-02 15:56 -0500
          Re: GNU Forth has a floating point floor word, but not floating point ceiling word? dxf <dxforth@gmail.com> - 2026-04-29 11:47 +1000
      Re: GNU Forth has a floating point floor word, but not floating point ceiling word? Krishna Myneni <krishna.myneni@ccreweb.org> - 2026-04-30 04:40 -0500
        Re: GNU Forth has a floating point floor word, but not floating point ceiling word? Krishna Myneni <krishna.myneni@ccreweb.org> - 2026-04-30 05:37 -0500
          Re: GNU Forth has a floating point floor word, but not floating point ceiling word? peter <peter.noreply@tin.it> - 2026-04-30 15:55 +0200
            Re: GNU Forth has a floating point floor word, but not floating point ceiling word? Krishna Myneni <krishna.myneni@ccreweb.org> - 2026-04-30 20:49 -0500
              Special memory access words (was: GNU Forth has a ...) anton@mips.complang.tuwien.ac.at (Anton Ertl) - 2026-05-01 06:16 +0000
                Re: Special memory access words (was: GNU Forth has a ...) peter <peter.noreply@tin.it> - 2026-05-01 10:22 +0200
                Re: Special memory access words (was: GNU Forth has a ...) anton@mips.complang.tuwien.ac.at (Anton Ertl) - 2026-05-01 08:57 +0000
                Re: Special memory access words Krishna Myneni <krishna.myneni@ccreweb.org> - 2026-05-01 10:19 -0500
                Re: Special memory access words anton@mips.complang.tuwien.ac.at (Anton Ertl) - 2026-05-01 15:35 +0000
                Re: Special memory access words Krishna Myneni <krishna.myneni@ccreweb.org> - 2026-05-01 13:28 -0500
                Re: Special memory access words Krishna Myneni <krishna.myneni@ccreweb.org> - 2026-05-01 13:30 -0500
                Re: Special memory access words anton@mips.complang.tuwien.ac.at (Anton Ertl) - 2026-05-02 05:54 +0000
                Re: Special memory access words Krishna Myneni <krishna.myneni@ccreweb.org> - 2026-05-02 15:49 -0500
                Re: Special memory access words Hans Bezemer <the.beez.speaks@gmail.com> - 2026-05-01 13:28 +0200
              Re: GNU Forth has a floating point floor word, but not floating point ceiling word? peter <peter.noreply@tin.it> - 2026-05-01 10:18 +0200

csiph-web