On June 20, Matthias Buelow wrote:
> >   So you're suggesting that the fact that some modern compilers are
> > bloated and slow is "just ok" because SOME computers are fast enough
> > to run them acceptably that it's not an issue?  Faster systems are an
> > excuse for shoddy programming?
> 
> No, I'm saying that you cannot judge today's software by yesterday's
> standards (in the case of VAX, of ~15 years ago.)  Not because they have
> inherently become slow by "shoddy programming" but simply because
> faster systems also allow for more sophisticated technologies being
> incorporated in those softwares.  There are softwares of course where
> that doesn't matter much, like for example text editors but you simply
> cannot throw enough CPU at compilers when you want to do really
> sophisticated code transformations (whether in gcc in particular this
> accounts for all of its slowness is debatable but the comparison with
> pcc2 probably shows that quite a lot of things are being done "under
> the hood" in order to improve the resulting object code, apart from
> the fact that you're compiling apples with oranges here since pcc
> doesn't even accept the same language(s) as gcc does.)

  While I agree in principle with your points, I cannot and will not
accept the notion that modern GCC "gives back" enough additional
functionality to justify its increased size and decreased speed over,
say, v1.38, the first release GCC I ran.

  Shouldn't that relationship be a bit closer to linear?  Sure,
there's a lot of, say, Pentium optimization crap in there...but is
that even being executed when I run it on a VAX?

  Good, clean, high-performance programming isn't a standard of
"yesterday".

          -Dave

-- 
Dave McGuire                  "Needing a calculator indicates that
St. Petersburg, FL              your .emacs file is incomplete." -Joshua Boyd