🚀 go-pugleaf

> From: thads@csn.net (Thad Smith)

Overall, you've several good points -- all will be incorporated
in the proposal.  There's a couple points that I wanted to clarify.

> General Impression
> ------------------
> I believe that the concept presented can aid in writing portable
> programs, especially those with concerns for optimization.  Further,
> usage of exact precision can simplify some coding by eliminating masking
> operations, thereby reducing programming and debugging time. Users
> should beware, however, of the additional hidden cost of exact
> precision, especially those sizes that do not correspond to a natural
> size in the target architecture.

I think users expect the same behavior with bit fields, too.

> Specified precision of expression
> ---------------------------------

This has been greatly simplified based on the feedback at the Copenhagen
meeting in 1995-06.  The new proposal will be out soon.  I'll summarize
the difference then.

> Integral Promotions
> -------------------
> In Standard C, types char, short int, or int bit-field, or signed or
> unsigned varieties undergo integral promotion to int or unsigned int.
> The SBEIR proposal discusses this briefly in section 2.2.2, but doesn't
> specify whether the promotion is to unoptimized int, fast int, or
> small int.  Is it always unoptimized int or does the specified
> optimization of the original type get inherited?  The proposal also does
> not add any words to the standard section on integral promotions to deal
> with extended ints.

The current SBEIR proposal drags the performance attributes into the
expressions.  At the Copenhagen meeting, we agreed to remove performance
attributes of temporaries -- similar to "const" and "volatile" not being
dragged into temporaries.

Thanx for your comments.

-FF
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