Newsgroups: comp.arch
Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!uupsi!ficc!peter
From: peter@ficc.ferranti.com (Peter da Silva)
Subject: Re: Segmented Architectures ( formerly Re: 48-bit computers)
Message-ID: <ZTGAK5E@xds13.ferranti.com>
Organization: Xenix Support, FICC
References: <1991Mar27.172325.10800@sj.nec.com> <7920@uceng.UC.EDU> <3310@crdos1.crd.ge.COM>
Date: Wed, 3 Apr 91 21:03:41 GMT

In article <3310@crdos1.crd.ge.COM>, davidsen@crdos1.crd.ge.COM (Wm E Davidsen Jr) writes:
>   Not unless someone just added PC emulation to the Cray2... lots of net
> code assumes 32 bits, assumes int {same as} long, assumes 2's complement
> arithmetic, and assumes you can get exactly four chars in an int.

Yes, and porting this code to an 80286 is unlikely to be any easier than
porting it to a 64-bit machine... and probably harder since *you* can at
least fit 32-bit values into a 64-bit integer. And then on top of all
that we have all the segmentation woes.

>   It's possible to do tricky stuff in a portable way, and if you think
> about it when writing the code it's even easy. When you try to port
> someone else's code it gets to be a nightmare.

Compared to Xenix 286 it's a mere melodrama.
-- 
Peter da Silva.  `-_-'  peter@ferranti.com
+1 713 274 5180.  'U`  "Have you hugged your wolf today?"
