Python's garbage collection was Re: Python reliability

Steve Holden steve at holdenweb.com
Fri Oct 14 00:25:11 EDT 2005


Paul Rubin wrote:
> "Diez B. Roggisch" <deets at nospam.web.de> writes:
> 
>>>Yes, that would describe just about every cpu for the past 30 years
>>>that's a plausible Python target.
>>
>>No. The later 68K (>68020) could address on odd adresses. And AFAIK
>>all x86 can because of their 8080 stemming.
> 
> 
> Yes, "could" but not "does" in terms of what any reasonable actual
> compiler implmementations do.  You get a huge performance hit for
> using unaligned data.  The one exception is you could conceivably have
> character strings starting at odd addresses but it's no big deal to
> start them all on 4-byte (or even 2-byte) boundaries.

You made your original assertion in response to Diez saying

 >>And this presumes an architecture which byte-addresses and only
 >> uses "aligned" addresses.

He was talking about the arachiteecture, for Pete's sake, not a compiler.

I personally find it irritating that you continue to try and justify 
your assertions even when you are plainly on shaky ground, which tends 
to make the threads you are involved in endless. Sorry for the ad 
hominem remarks, which I normally try and avoid, but this (ab)uses 
newsgroup bandwidth unnecessarily.

Unwillingness to admit any mistake can be rather unattractive. Can't 
you, just once, say "I was wrong"? Or are you perchance related to 
President Bush? Better still, just let these small things go without 
further comment.

regards
  Steve
-- 
Steve Holden       +44 150 684 7255  +1 800 494 3119
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