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Date:	Sat, 2 Aug 2003 12:12:14 PDT7
From:	Peter Skye <pskye@peterskye.com >
Reply-To:	scoug-programming@scoug.com
To:	scoug-programming@scoug.com
Subject:	SCOUG-Programming: Re: Warpstock 2003 Presentation

Content Type: text/plain

Tom Novelli wrote:
>
> I've been lurking for a while

Well hiya Tom, I guess I'll have to straighten up my act if others are
reading my explosions.

> The Abrash book was pretty helpful . . . all you really
> need is instruction set documentation, some nifty
> examples, and lots of practice. It's easy.

Abrash's columns and book gave me insight I didn't have, for example
that the optimizations of certain code were _different_ on different
80xx processors. He also had some great ellipse drawing routines.

> an HLL is mathematical notation and a processor is a
> machine (sort of a nano-abacus) with some parts that
> don't match up cleanly to any HLL.

Yes, I agree more-or-less. The purposes are different, though -- a high
level language (such as English) is for communication (in our current
case it's used to describe a solution) whereas a processor (whether
hardware or software, a Turing machine is a good example) is something
you can control to create logical output.

> C comes close (it's basically a terse and generic
> assembler). I have a hunch that it'd be simpler to use a
> little assembly here and there rather than some super-HLL.

Yes again. In a number of my Borland Pascal programs I tossed in a
smattering of inline assembler because I wanted to tell the processor
exactly what to do.

But "there's the rub". With a high-level language you aren't supposed
to care about the exact commands performed. You just want the work
done.

Strategy versus logistics. What's best versus what can we do right now?

> Maybe the best use of assembly is in writing
> special-purpose compilers for things like pattern
> matching, for the fastest possible execution with
> the least amount of code.

Cheaper Faster Better. "Pick any two," goes the common saying. But
good heavens, we often can't even get one! Apply this to HLL
development with caution.

- Peter

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