🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <1992Nov3.211427.21777@nntpd.lkg.dec.com>, critz@star.enet.dec.com (Richard Critz) writes:
> 
> In article <1992Nov3.093855.5816@ais.com>, bruce@ais.com (Bruce C. Wright) writes:
> |>I would be very skeptical about changes that, for example, hid the number
> |>of registers from the programmer, and inserted extra instructions to save
> |>and restore registers, etc -- I can forsee too many possible problems in
> |>driver-level code where you often have to use specific instruction types
> |>when you refer to device space, or where timing can be very important.
> [...] 
> 
> This has effectively already happened.  MACRO32 is a compiled language on
> OpenVMS AXP(tm)* (known in the real world as Alpha).  The compiler does all
> sorts of things behind your back including the allocation of scratch
> registers.  Some assumptions about stack layout and about where and how
> one can legally exit a routine which are valid on the VAX are not valid
> on the new architecture.

Yes, but we were talking about versions of MACRO32 for the VAX
architecture too.  And on that architecture there are some situations
where you have to be very careful about what you can do in device
space, particularly.

The same goes for the byte/word displacements, and for the I^ and S^
literals.

> |>But why bring this up now, when the VAX is almost history?  Some of us
> |>have wanted this type of thing for over 10 years, but DEC has never done
> |>anything about it.  I suspect that the problem is the typical DEC attitude
> |>of NIH (= Not Invented Here) -- a certain other competing operating system
> |>for the VAX has had this since forever.
> 
> If you read the original message again, you'll see that he brought it up
> in response to the fact that MACRO32 is a compiled language on OpenVMS AXP.
> To the original poster, it's still an assembled language on OpenVMS VAX and
> the assembler is in maintenance mode and has been for years.

This is a perfect example of exactly what I was saying -- DEC is not
interested in listening to what customers want, nor in what anyone
outside of DEC has done.

It pains me to say it since I've been working with DEC gear for over
15 years, but with an attitude like that you deserve to lose.

Bruce C. Wright