If you've ever looked at the VAX instruction set,...
...and lived to tell the tale....
Yeah. The polynomial evaluation instruction on early Vaxen was slower and larger than DIY evaluation, as I recall. (This may have been microcode version and/or VAX model dependent). It made me laugh many a time.
( But then, I actually liked the nasty complexity of early DCL quoting, so,... )
For a long time I thought the early RISC proponents just had a sour grapes attitude because they weren't smart enough to write a compiler that could make use of the VAX instruction set. :)
no subject
...and lived to tell the tale....
Yeah. The polynomial evaluation instruction on early Vaxen was slower and larger than DIY evaluation, as I recall. (This may have been microcode version and/or VAX model dependent). It made me laugh many a time.
( But then, I actually liked the nasty complexity of early DCL quoting, so,... )
no subject
For a long time I thought the early RISC proponents just had a sour grapes attitude because they weren't smart enough to write a compiler that could make use of the VAX instruction set. :)