2 Dec
2010
2 Dec
'10
12:34 p.m.
"A REAL programmer can write a FORTRAN program in any language."
:-)
I wonce tranlated a piece of 6502 assembly language line-for-line into
Pascal (with interger variables called A,X,Y, a boolean called carryflag,
and procedures with names like ADC, etc). This led one of my frieds to
observe that 'a hacker can write assembler code in any language' :-)
(FWIW, I was working out how the checksum routing in a firmware ROM
worked, so I could correclty update the checksum after modifyign some of
the code).
Assembly language is necessary if one is to get full optimization of
performance. Many people don't agree with that, and insist that throwing
Actually, i disagree with it. I don't see why, in principle, a compiler
can;t produce as tight code as a good programmer.
more hardware at it is easier, particularly for people
in a big hurry.
I think you all know my views on throwing procssor power at a problem.
("The hardware is done. Now you can start
writing the OS. You have 6
weeks")
"Nobody programs in assembly language any more,
nor ever will again" - Clancy and Harvey
Sinec I hand-assembled a bit of machine code a couple of days ago, that
is clearly false :-)
But "language of choice" was rarely an
edict,
and there are many reasons
why many products were written in languages other
than the current "language of choice".
Personal preference
greater familiarity with something else
best fit to the hardware
tool availability
reuse of some old code
overly-specific specs
"Baby duck syndrome"
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
What is this?
Acxtually, just about all those arguements apply to using, say, a Z80 +
memory+peripheral chips rahter than an all-one-one-chip microcontroller...
-tony