Reference

[Rhodri James]

On Tue, 04 Mar 2014 05:24:03 -0000, Chris Angelico <rosuav at gmail.com>  
wrote:

> Code should look like its intent. Warping it around performance is
> hardly ever worthwhile.

That depends.  In Python, I'd agree with you; if I'm worrying about  
performance in Python, I'm worrying at the level of the algorithms I'm  
using.  In a constrained embedded C environment, which is where I spend  
most of my working life, writing your code so that the compiler chooses  
the right optimisation is critical.  Sometimes it matters a great deal to  
me that something like "x *= 5" compiles to a single ARM instruction, or  
that splitting a loop into two to avoid a conditional test will let an  
DSP's optimiser double the speed of a section of code.

-- 
Rhodri James *-* Wildebeest Herder to the Masses