Wholly unnecessary flame. (was Re: pyXML!)

[Bjorn Pettersen]

Fredrik Lundh wrote:
> 
> Bjorn Pettersen wrote:
> > Every compiler has it's set of bugs, however I still haven't seen the ms
> > compiler lay down incorrect assembly (not accepting legal code is a
> > different issue ;-).
> 
> MSVC 5.0 without all service packs can generate some
> really strange things...
> 
> ...and I still remember good old MSC 6's loop optimizer,
> which once changed:
> 
>     result = 0
>     for x in range(large number):
>         for y in range(large number):
>             get pixel at (x, y)
>             result = result + do some math
> 
> to
> 
>     get pixel at random coordinate
>     result = do some math
>     for x in range(large number):
>         for y in range(large number):
>             pass
> 
> ("hey, you asked me to optimize for speed, didn't you?")
> 
> MSVC 6 seems to be pretty solid, though...

Yes, MS has had it's share of interesting compiler quirks through the
years. As you point out MSVC 6 with SP4 is relatively good unless you
try to do too fancy things with namespaces combined with templates (and
don't even mention partial specializations ;-)

Their 64 bit compiler for Win64/Itanium seems to be pretty good too (and
they've even fixed bugs that we've reported ! :-)

just-doing-my-part-to-keep-this-thread-off-topic'ly y'rs
-- bjorn