Sean 'Captain Napalm' Conner wrote:
> > Why would anyone outside the UNIX/APPLE world care about postscript files?
> > That was once a popular format, but things change.
>
> PDF seems to be a very popular format these days and that's based upon
> PostScript. You can still get printers that support PostScript but hey, if
> PostScript isn't your bag, then there are programs to convert the output
> from TeX/LaTeX into your favorite printer format (as long as documentation
> exists for it that is).
>
PS/PDF is mostly portable between systems and printable!
Also most old manuals endup being in this format.
> You can either manage the test scores on paper, or on a computer. While
> it may seem to be cheaper to do it by hand, there are benefits to going the
> computer route, expense or not. Storage space is one consideration. Speed
> of processing is another. Unless you really advocate going back to paper
> records for everything?
Or punched cards for that matter. How ever the computer is a
tool like anything else it is not the do-all-endall tool. It makes
a lousy hammer.
> You're going to have to write an assembler too, else you end up with a
> useless piece of silicon. Face it---without software, programmable hardware
> isn't going to do much other than be an expensive paperweight. I would
> contend that without software, then who in their right mind is going to use
> your hardware?
True, but the fine art bootstrapping has been forgotten.
> And it's not like you, as the hypothetical hardware chip maker, have to
> start from scratch and generate a compiler from the ground up. GCC can be
> configured to compile code for your chip, and while such a task isn't
> trivial, it's easier than having to generate a compiler from the ground up
> (and yes, documentation exists for this although how good it is, I'm not
> sure). And with GCC, you get not only a C compiler, but C++, Fortran and
> Ada as well. And if GCC is not to your liking, there is also LCC, which was
> designed from the ground up to be an easily retargettable C compiler (and
> that comes with extensive documentation).
GCC's output model is a register to register model I belive. A memory to
accumulator architecture just don't map right.
> -spc (Guess its back to using the abacus to keep business records ... )
Nah ... paper tape :)
--
Ben Franchuk - Dawn * 12/24 bit cpu *
www.jetnet.ab.ca/users/bfranchuk/index.html
Received on Mon Apr 22 2002 - 22:02:57 BST