Mail Archives: djgpp/2001/06/28/23:15:03
On Thu, 28 Jun 2001 14:01:12 -0400, DJ Delorie <dj AT delorie DOT com> sat on
a tribble, which squeaked:
>
>> >It's all in the Intel manuals; please read them.
>>
>> Or what?
>
>Or you won't get the answer. Not every question is easy to answer in
>a few sentences, and we (as volunteers) cannot be expected to explain
>everything in detail when we can point you at much better
>documentation instead.
Then please do so; but keep in mind that the most usable such response
will invariably be a URL and the least usable will be a book ISBN for
some obscure volume that no bookstore carries except for one
technical-specialty store in Brooklyn, NY, where 99% of the readership
can't get without a $4000 plane ticket, and that is quite probably out
of print anyway. And no, URLs to amazon.com or barnesandnoble.com are
not going to be very useful...
>The manuals are freely downloadable at Intel's web site. I've *never*
>had to pay for Intel manuals. Here's the URL:
>
>http://developer.intel.com/design/pentium4/manuals/index.htm
Oh.
Still, I doubt I can give these an intelligent query and get an
intelligent answer rather than slog through them from cover to cover.
(Maybe one day, with XML...)
>If the people weren't worried about these things, this thread wouldn't
>have started.
Sheesh, I was just startled that we were already seeing systems
sensitive to 256 bit alignments when the usual CPUs are only 32 and 64
bit.
>The Intel manuals are freely downloadable.
Your previous remarks produced images of large thick tomes, with large
price tags on them. :-)
>Correct. All one can do if one doesn't agree to the "way things
>happen" is either to refrain from responding, or to leave the group.
What, as in if they question the compiler's intelligence in
rearranging that loop they wrote? Or as in peoples' behavior?
>All in all, I'm pretty happy about the level of calmness and support
>we (comp.os.msdos.djgpp) provide compared to what I've heard about
>come other groups.
comp.lang.c, you mean? *grin* Yes, this place seems relatively quiet,
at least at the moment. I can't, you understand, assume too much from
a few weeks' observation and a few claims that the group never has
flames. A year ago I lurked around a group that had had no flames the
whole time I was watching and where the FAQ said the group was largely
flame-free. Sure enough, after a few more weeks a flamewar was
observed to erupt, reach a peak of intensity, and die down over a
period of over one month. During that war, references to hot tempers
and a prior flamewar with a distinct but overlapping set of
participants arose; my arrival apparently had me miss seeing that one
end by a matter of days. I rather suspect that every newsgroup with
regulars has some regulars with nuclear tempers and a button somewhere
that occasionally gets pushed. If it's also unmoderated, and there are
2 or more nuclear tempers...
>We don't `require' English. People often post in other languages, and
>get responses in that language.
Not too surprising. The English language posts obviously will get more
results, though. Whether you like it or not (and the French for one
sure don't) English seems to be becoming the de facto lingua franca of
the world (ironic given the origin of the latter term) -- though the
other major European imperial languages have widespread but scattered
use in global commerce, along with Chinese and Japanese, and all the
languages are used preferentially in their own associated cultures'
interiors. As for why, seems to go with having major economic powers
prefer the language -- English got a double dose of that effect from
first British imperialism, then a daughter colony becoming a
superpower, and the language also has a historic tendency to
assimilate, like the Borg, instead of competing with other languages
-- perhaps why it's feared so much in some places?
It's a tool though, and its large "user base" makes it the one of
choice where it's available, and those seem to merely be the facts.
>I, personally, don't like that and ask (again - sigh) that people be
>civil and refrain from responding if they don't have a useful answer.
>Of course, that doesn't mean that the OP *likes* the answer, but we
>give what we can. Of course, this is only my opinion.
A URL is better than nothing. Heck, a non-free reference is better
than nothing, but only if you're desperate for an answer -- either to
give or to receive.
--
Bill Gates: "No computer will ever need more than 640K of RAM." -- 1980
"There's nobody getting rich writing software that I know of." -- 1980
"This antitrust thing will blow over." -- 1998
Combine neo, an underscore, and one thousand sixty-one to make my hotmail addy.
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