Path: csiph.com!eternal-september.org!feeder.eternal-september.org!news.eternal-september.org!.POSTED!not-for-mail From: Keith Thompson Newsgroups: comp.lang.c Subject: Re: micro-architectural details Date: Fri, 09 Dec 2016 11:54:04 -0800 Organization: None to speak of Lines: 40 Message-ID: References: <8f359715-238c-42b4-b53f-5c5511725fdb@googlegroups.com> <1163d763-2725-4066-b03d-ee8bdd7f8e6f@googlegroups.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Injection-Info: mx02.eternal-september.org; posting-host="2ad4785427d430f26583540ef5e88668"; logging-data="8777"; mail-complaints-to="abuse@eternal-september.org"; posting-account="U2FsdGVkX1/wrqelQLgqU2mB+AxWmQSJ" User-Agent: Gnus/5.13 (Gnus v5.13) Emacs/23.1 (gnu/linux) Cancel-Lock: sha1:Nlr1ncl/9hFPPpW1ErZxwZsdAKY= sha1:f3fZ0IzKvJnjxUc/BUyL/KqBm4E= Xref: csiph.com comp.lang.c:98604 supercat@casperkitty.com writes: > On Thursday, December 8, 2016 at 4:59:50 PM UTC-6, Noob wrote: >> On 08/12/2016 23:34, supercat wrote: >> > On Thursday, December 8, 2016 at 4:25:24 PM UTC-6, Noob wrote: >> >> "A proposal to add binary constants was rejected due to lack of >> >> precedent and insufficient utility." >> >> >> >> Perhaps after a few decades of gcc, clang, and icc having that >> >> particular extension, WG14 will accept it? >> > >> > Not to mention a huge variety of embedded compilers. Statements like the >> > above make me wonder if anyone on the Committee does anything with embedded >> > or systems programming. >> >> In Linux, it seems arch/arm64/kvm uses a few binary constants, >> but I don't see other uses. Either programmers don't find them >> useful enough, or they've grown used to not having them. > > If the authors of the Standard had neglected to add binary literals on the > basis that the implementations where they would be useful were already > supporting them even without the Standard mandating such support, and there > was insufficient cause to mandate that all other implementations do so as > well, I would have disagreed with their judgment but respected it. It is > their claim of insufficient precedent that I find implausible. I can't > really imagine how much more precedent the Committee could want, unless they > are blind to the world of embedded compilers. That statement is in the C99 Rationale http://www.open-std.org/jtc1/sc22/wg14/www/C99RationaleV5.10.pdf which was published in 2003 but refers to decisions made several years earlier. How much precedent was there for binary constants in the mid-to-late 1990s? I don't know when the proposal was made and rejected; it doesn't seem to be one of the C90 DRs at http://www.open-std.org/jtc1/sc22/wg14/www/docs/dr.htm -- Keith Thompson (The_Other_Keith) kst-u@mib.org Working, but not speaking, for JetHead Development, Inc. "We must do something. This is something. Therefore, we must do this." -- Antony Jay and Jonathan Lynn, "Yes Minister"