[comp.sys.ibm.pc] Turbo C

esa@msdc.UUCP (02/14/87)

It seems that Borland has released (well, announced/advertized at least)
a Turbo C compiler.  According to the ad, it produces linkable object
modules and comes with its own make utility; also, it appears to support
the plethora of Intel memory models.  Lists for $99.95, probably less at
mail order houses.  So far, so good.

What concerns me is that unlike most C compiler ads, this one did NOT
mention K&R or the "standard" C library.  I wonder if Turbo C is Borland's
vision of what C "should" be, much like Turbo Pascal was.   They got away
with it for Turbo Pascal because the language needed what they provided,
but I think the situation is different with C.

Comments?  Has anyone seen or used Turbo C yet?

-- 
    Esa Ahola,  Medical Systems Development Corp, Atlanta, GA
    esa@msdc.UUCP,  ...{akgua, gatech, ihnp4, mcnc}!msdc!esa

jjc@sdiris1.UUCP (02/17/87)

In article <203@msdc.b.msdc.UUCP>, esa@msdc.UUCP (Esa T. Ahola) writes:
> 
> .. What concerns me is that unlike most C compiler ads, this one did NOT
> mention K&R or the "standard" C library. ..

I have not seen Turbo C, but :

Turbo C will likely turn a lot of people on as the "standard" for C if
they havn't already been using C.  I hope Turbo C is K&R, Many
of the Borland products are not fashioned after any particular
"standard".  Don't get me wrong, Borland products are good quality.
They seem to make more money selling products which sell, rather than
deem the "standard" stamp.
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Work : +1 619 450 6516                 |  Control Data Corporation (CIM)
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ccs016@deneb.UUCP (02/17/87)

> In article <203@msdc.b.msdc.UUCP>, esa@msdc.UUCP (Esa T. Ahola) writes:
> > 
> > .. What concerns me is that unlike most C compiler ads, this one did NOT
> > mention K&R or the "standard" C library. ..
> 
> I have not seen Turbo C, but :
>

Well... What I'm worried about is that it is a ONE pass compiler. Doesn't
this mean we have to conform to the top down design? If it is infact a
one pass compiler as mentioned a couple postings ago then there is no
way in my opinion that it will become the standard compiler, plus most
C'ers are very defensive of K&R.

Patrick Tully
ucdavis!deneb!ccs016
 

bright@dataio.UUCP (02/18/87)

In article <168@ucdavis.UUCP> ccs016@ucdavis.UUCP (Patrick Tully) writes:
>Well... What I'm worried about is that it is a ONE pass compiler. Doesn't
>this mean we have to conform to the top down design? If it is infact a
>one pass compiler as mentioned a couple postings ago then there is no
>way in my opinion that it will become the standard compiler, plus most
>C'ers are very defensive of K&R.

There is no obstacle to creating a 1-pass compiler that is full K+R or
ANSIC C. The compiler I wrote (Datalight C) is two pass mainly to
reduce memory requirements.

The Greenhills C compiler is 1 pass.

kent@ncoast.UUCP (02/20/87)

s/*** REPLACE THIS LINE WITH YOUR MESSAGE ***/YOUR MESSAGE/g

A number of people have posted inquiries about Borland's Turbo C.  The
following is an editorial of sorts, along with some biased and unsolicited
opinions of MS-DOS C compilers.  I am associated with NONE of the companies
discussed.

My opinion is : don't bother with Turbo C.  There are other products out there
that must be just or good (or better), and by all indications, Borland's Turbo
C will share all of the drawbacks of the other Borland Products, to wit:

1. Non-standard (in troubling and non-trivial ways) implementations.  Borland
says that Turbo C will adhere to ANSI Standard C, but don't expect it to
be any closer than Microsoft C 4.0.  My bet is that it will be as close to
ANSI C as Turbo Pascal is to ISO Pascal.  Is this a fatal flaw? Depends on your
point of view.  It is definitely fatal in a professional, production
environment.

2. A lack of a batch mode for compiles.  Ever try to run Turbo Prolog from make?

3. Bugs.  I found several in Turbo Prolog, just screwing around for a day or
so (V1.0).  Borland was nice enough to send me 1.1 unsolicited, but I haven't
verified that the bugs are gone.  Why go with a new, untested product when there
are mature products around?

I have been working for three years with C compilers daily, and have the 
following two-bit reviews to offer:

1. MSC 4.0.  Love codeview (but it has annoying bugs!), love the extensive
library.  Code generation good to excellent.  I haven't found any library bugs
myself, but supposedly if malloc fails, it will sometimes clobber DS.
ROM support sucks - regardless of the source they give you to startup.

2. Aztec C86 - good to excellent code generation.  Occasionally you will
still hit ugly code generation bugs in large models.  Excellent ROM support.
Nice package of development tools, (make diff vi clone etc), but there are

them

klotz@aicchi.UUCP (02/22/87)

In article <168@ucdavis.UUCP> ccs016@ucdavis.UUCP (Patrick Tully) writes:
>> > .. What concerns me is that unlike most C compiler ads, this one did NOT
>> > mention K&R or the "standard" C library. ..

Are all of the Borland nay-sayers blind or do they not just refuse to read?
The add says:

[/] ANSI C compatible!!!!!!!

ted@imsvax.UUCP (02/22/87)

kent@ncoast of Cleveland Public Access UNIX, Cleveland, OH writes:

>My opinion is : don't bother with Turbo C.  There are other products out there
>that must be just or good (or better), and by all indications, Borland's Turbo
>C will share all of the drawbacks of the other Borland Products, to wit:

>1. Non-standard (in troubling and non-trivial ways) implementations.  Borland
>says that Turbo C will adhere to ANSI Standard C, but don't expect it to
>be any closer than Microsoft C 4.0.  My bet is that it will be as close to
>ANSI C as Turbo Pascal is to ISO Pascal. Is this a fatal flaw? Depends on your
>point of view.  It is definitely fatal in a professional, production
>environment.

I've used Turbo Pascal in a professional production environment quite a lot.
It speeds up the professional production something like 10 to 1 over
using the C compilers which are available for PCs.  Normally, all things
being equal, I would prefer C to any other programming language, however,
aside from programs which must be ported to other architectures, I have
switched my PC programming almost entirely to Turbo Pascal simply
because I view the available C compilers as retarded by comparison.
There are a number of reasons:

   1.   Price:   at a  retail price of around $70 and a street price
        of around $55, Turbo Pascal is nearly free.   Reasonable DOS
        C compilers  go for  around $300  and the  only reasonable C
        INTERPRETER available  until now  has been  going for around
        $450.   Keep this point in mind;  compilers and interpreters
        both have their place in  the  scheme  of  things  and Turbo
        products function  as both.   Few if any other packages make
        this claim.

   2.   Turbo  Pascal    produces  very  fast  code.    Further, the
        compiler itself  is almost supernaturally fast, typical 2000
        line programs compiling in  15 seconds  on 6mh  ATs.   A CCI
        Power-6 (rated  10 times VAX 780 compute power) cannot match
        this with one user on the system.   Present DOS  C compilers
        don't come anywhere close to this.

   3.   Turbo has the only completely believable debugging system in
        the  Micro  world.    All  other  debugging  systems amongst
        micros,  to  my  knowledge,  involve  breakpoints and single
        stepping.  In real life, blowups usually occur on the 876'th
        pass of  some 200  line logical  loop;  who in hell wants to
        single step through all of that?  The ONLY thing I ever want
        to know  when a program blows up is the line number on which
        it blew;  I figure I'm  bright enough  to figure  out WHY it
        blew.   Turbo not  only tells  me that,  it puts me right on
        that line in its editor.    It  is  the  only  realistic and
        helpful debugging  aid I  have ever  found in the mini-micro
        world (the ideal being something like  the debug  feature on
        the UNIVAC 1100 series 10R1 Fortran, of course).

   4.   Turbo  is  a  large  super-set  of  standard  Pascal, with a
        tremendously good interface into  DOS and  PC functionality,
        things which  lie outside  of any  of the ANSI standards for
        programming languages.    It  actually  allows machine-coded
        routines  to  be  imbedded  right into Turbo routines (Turbo
        inline code), allows DOS calls  with  the  use  of  only one
        simple  register   structure,  and   has  easy  systems  for
        addressing segments and offsets  of Turbo  variables, labels
        etc.   Such code can be made as fast as is possible on 80x86
        devices.  Masm interfaces  for the  various C  compilers are
        not as  clean or  elegant.   I am assuming Turbo C will also
        have this feature.

   5.   Turbo has several good  systems  for  dealing  with graphics
        applications,   including   the   "turtle"  system.    These
        capabilities go beyond those of other  programming languages
        available for DOS machines.  I assume Turbo C will also have
        these features as well.

   6.   Turbo is heavily  supported  by  after-market  and free-ware
        packages and  applications.   Typical bulletin boards in the
        DC area will have  20  C-related  files  on  hand,  45 Basic
        files, and  200 Turbo  files.  C programmers end up spending
        an extra $100 or $200 for a new function library  every time
        they  turn  around.    For Turbo, an unbelieveable number of
        such items  are lying  around free.   Things  of this nature
        which are  lying about  on the  various D.C. area  BBS's and
        from the PC SIG (and which are, hence, free) include:

             a.   A sprite editor and very clean  and elegant system
                  for producing  animation and cartoon effects using
                  Turbo.

             b.   An assembler which generates accurate Turbo inline
                  code.   This is  a biggie  and could be used to do
                  nearly anything which could ever be done on a PC.

             c.   A good screen font creation and editing system for
                  Turbo.

             d.   A system for handling Dbase3 files.

             e.   A system for handling Lotus (wks) files.

             f.   A good  asynchronous line handling routine for use
                  in writing communications packages.

             g.   Several  very  good  general  purpose  window  and
                  menuing   packages   etc.,   including   one,  the
                  QWIK21 library, which is actually better than  any
                  I've seen for C.

             h.   A system  for dealing  with music exactly as Basic
                  does;    one  simply  changes  the   Basic  "play"
                  statements to  "pibplay", a  global editor change,
                  and includes the handler .INC program in his code.

             i.   A fast-fourrier transform system.

             j.   A system  for writing  memory-resident programs in
                  Turbo.

             k.   A system  for executing other programs from within
                  a Turbo program.

   The driving force behind all of this is the $70  price tag, which
   has had the effect of generating 700,000 users out there, many of
   whom have bright  ideas  to  contribute  to  the  common  pool of
   knowledge.   This will  also be  true of  Turbo C after a year or
   two.

[whew, sorry to be so long-winded with that list, back to the original
article]

>2. A lack of a batch mode for compiles.  Ever try to run Turbo Prolog from
make?

Ever try to run anybody else's Prolog from make?  Correct me if I'm
wrong, but I thought Borlands was the ONLY Prolog compiler and that all
other implementations of Prolog were essentially interpreters, this
being necessary to allow for the so-called "metalinguistic" features,
the lack of which causes the hard-core AI freaks to decry TurboProlog
the way they do.  Have I missed something?

>3. Bugs.  I found several in Turbo Prolog, just screwing around for a day or
>so (V1.0).  Borland was nice enough to send me 1.1 unsolicited, but I haven't
>verified that the bugs are gone.  Why go with a new, untested product when there
>are mature products around?

The $100 price tag, speed (the up side of a compiled Prolog), module
connectivity with other Turbo Languages, the good turtle graphics
system, Philippe Kahn's winning smile......  By the way, have you ever
gotten free upgrades to any other software products unsolicited?  I know
I never have.

>I have been working for three years with C compilers daily, and have the
>following two-bit reviews to offer:

>1. MSC 4.0.  Love codeview (but it has annoying bugs!), love the extensive
>library.  Code generation good to excellent.  I haven't found any library bugs
>myself, but supposedly if malloc fails, it will sometimes clobber DS.
>ROM support sucks - regardless of the source they give you to startup.

I regard 3.0 as satisfactory for small programs.  Programs beyond 400
lines of code have always generated "module too large for
post-optimization step" and other fun kinds of things, and I have
encountered numerous failings which I regard as major.  I haven't tried
4.0.

>2. Aztec C86 - good to excellent code generation.  Occasionally you will
>still hit ugly code generation bugs in large models.  Excellent ROM support.
>Nice package of development tools, (make diff vi clone etc), but there are

Failed every test I put it to, utterly failed to compile several
standard UNIX items which the Mark Williams and Lattice compilers can
readily handle, including the standard "cb.c".  I didn't consider the
Aztec compiler worth pursuing after that.

I hate to say it;  I see the Lattice and Mark Williams C compilers as
the two best so far, which is pitiful.

I plan to get a copy of Turbo C as close as I can to the first day it is
available and put every copy of every other DOS C compiler which I have
access to in the Potomac river where they belong.

Ted Holden,
IMS

gervers@gpu.utcs.toronto.edu (02/23/87)

in <619@imsvax.UUCP> ted@imsvax.UUCP writes
>kent@ncoast of Cleveland Public Access UNIX, Cleveland, OH writes:
>
>>My opinion is : don't bother with Turbo C.  There are other products out there
>>that must be just or good (or better), and by all indications, Borland's Turbo
>>C will share all of the drawbacks of the other Borland Products, to wit:
>
>>1. Non-standard (in troubling and non-trivial ways) implementations.  Borland
>>says that Turbo C will adhere to ANSI Standard C, but don't expect it to
>>be any closer than Microsoft C 4.0.  My bet is that it will be as close to
>>ANSI C as Turbo Pascal is to ISO Pascal. Is this a fatal flaw? Depends on your
>>point of view.  It is definitely fatal in a professional, production
>>environment.
>
>I've used Turbo Pascal in a professional production environment quite a lot.
>It speeds up the professional production something like 10 to 1 over
>using the C compilers which are available for PCs.  Normally, all things
Like comparing oranges with apples (the fruit).  Ever tried to write Turbo
Pascal with :
	var s : array [1..255] of string255
            t : array [1..255] of string255
?
>
>   1.   Price:   at a  retail price of around $70 and a street price

Yup, the price is great, and Turbo Pascal is a great product.  Even I
use it lots of time, but when anything BIG has to be done, it is always

>   3.   Turbo has the only completely believable debugging system in
>        the  Micro  world.    All  other  debugging  systems amongst

PLUG for U of T Turing Compiler and Interpreter : :-)
has anybody tried the Turing programming environment?  It's an
editor that highlights ALL errors upon compile instead of just
one.
>   4.   Turbo  is  a  large  super-set  of  standard  Pascal, with a

Only a few extra commands.  What about large memory model?  I know a few
(2?3?) packages are written to support large memory model with TP, but
this is at BEST kludgy.

>        tremendously good interface into  DOS and  PC functionality,

You got to be kidding!!  Ever try to write external asm routines to
use with TP?

>        things which  lie outside  of any  of the ANSI standards for
>        programming languages.    It  actually  allows machine-coded
>        routines  to  be  imbedded  right into Turbo routines (Turbo
>        inline code), allows DOS calls  with  the  use  of  only one

This method of programming involves either of :
	1 . asm, link, exe2bin, hexdump
OR      2 . MANUALLY translating the opcodes into things like $90 (NOP)
            \$CD\$21   (INT 21H) etc (you get the picture).
>        devices.  Masm interfaces  for the  various C  compilers are

NOT AS CLEAN?  You got to be kidding.
>        not as  clean or  elegant.   I am assuming Turbo C will also
>        have this feature.
>
>   5.   Turbo has several good  systems  for  dealing  with graphics
>        applications,   including   the   "turtle"  system.    These
>        capabilities go beyond those of other  programming languages
>        available for DOS machines.  I assume Turbo C will also have
>        these features as well.

You got to be kidding.  The turtle system is fine as a toy to impress your
kids, but can you write a commercial product based on it?
[comments follow, which I would probably agree]

Parting notes :

I love TP, but I'm afraid you have made it into something it's not. 

If Turbo C is like TP, I'm sure I will buy a copy, but, I will treat
it as an interpreter/debugging tool.  

Meanwhile, I use TP for any small program with minimal data, when it 
comes to large arrays, sorry.

<Opinions are entirely mine>
no smart comments here.

root@hobbes.UUCP (02/24/87)

> [lots of wide eyed drivel about Borland's New Turbo C]

Whoa!  What's great about Turbo C?
    It's made by Borland and it cost's $99.
What's not so great about it?
  It's not shipping yet (April 1, if we are 'lucky')
  You must order before July 1 to get the $99 price
  It only will run on "IBM PC, XT, AT, or true compatibles"

ALTERNATIVE:

Why don't you take a look at the Datalight C compiler?
This $99 / $139 package includes:
    library source code,
    .obj, exe, and com program generation,
    Full Unix System 5 language plus ANSI extentions
    Global DATA FLOW optimization including 12 optimization parameters!
    DOS Wildcard support
    Compatable with Lattice C version 2.x
    Interrupt handling IN C
    ROMable code + Startup source,
    Mouse support,
	etc

If I was spending ~$100, guess what I'd buy?

  John

brandon@tdi2.UUCP (02/27/87)

Quoted from <691@imsvax.UUCP> ["Re: Turbo C"], by ted@imsvax.UUCP (Ted Holden)...
+---------------
| kent@ncoast of Cleveland Public Access UNIX, Cleveland, OH writes:
| 
| >1. Non-standard (in troubling and non-trivial ways) implementations.  Borland
| >says that Turbo C will adhere to ANSI Standard C, but don't expect it to
| >be any closer than Microsoft C 4.0.  My bet is that it will be as close to
| >ANSI C as Turbo Pascal is to ISO Pascal. Is this a fatal flaw? Depends on your
| >point of view.  It is definitely fatal in a professional, production
| >environment.
+---------------

For all practical purposes, there *is* no such thing as Standard Pascal.  The
ISO Pascal standard and Jensen/Wirth both define a language which lacks just
about everything needed for real-world applications.  So I can't port the
program I wrote in the TOPS-20 ``souped-up Touretzki'' Pascal compiler to
Turbo pascal?  Well, I can't port it to Berkeley ``pc'' either.  And maybe
not even to VAX Pascal.

Turbo Pascal has *finally* defined a practical standard for Pascal.  Don't
knock it.

+---------------
| >2. A lack of a batch mode for compiles.  Ever try to run Turbo Prolog from
| make?
| 
| Ever try to run anybody else's Prolog from make?  Correct me if I'm
| wrong, but I thought Borlands was the ONLY Prolog compiler and that all
| other implementations of Prolog were essentially interpreters, this
| being necessary to allow for the so-called "metalinguistic" features,
| the lack of which causes the hard-core AI freaks to decry TurboProlog
| the way they do.  Have I missed something?
+---------------

You can't run Turbo Pascal in batch mode, either.  But the data sheet from
Borland, as posted on the net, says that Turbo C *can* be used in Makefiles.
(Standard Pascal doesn't make sense in Makefiles, anyway.  Pascal doesn't
support multiple modules, guys!  Even Turbo's {$I filename.ext} directive is
non-standard.

+---------------
| >3. Bugs.  I found several in Turbo Prolog, just screwing around for a day or
| >so (V1.0).  Borland was nice enough to send me 1.1 unsolicited, but I haven't
| >verified that the bugs are gone.  Why go with a new, untested product when there
| >are mature products around?
| 
| The $100 price tag, speed (the up side of a compiled Prolog), module
| connectivity with other Turbo Languages, the good turtle graphics
| system, Philippe Kahn's winning smile......  By the way, have you ever
| gotten free upgrades to any other software products unsolicited?  I know
| I never have.
+---------------

So Version 1.0 of *any* product won't have bugs?
Also, Prolog is not what I would call a compileable language.  That it can be
done at all is surprising.

+---------------
| >1. MSC 4.0.  Love codeview (but it has annoying bugs!), love the extensive
| >library.  Code generation good to excellent.  I haven't found any library bugs
| >myself, but supposedly if malloc fails, it will sometimes clobber DS.
| >ROM support sucks - regardless of the source they give you to startup.
+---------------

See the recent discussion on MSC license policy.  Borland doesn't restrict your
rights with programs compiled using their products.  Like h*ll I'm going to
stick a *Microsoft* copyright on my whiz-bang program compiled with MSC -- *I*
wrote the part of the program that does the interesting stuff.

I am very much looking forward to Turbo C.  In the meantime, I use Turbo Pascal
for everything (including work on a rewrite of uuslave.c, via an assembler hook
to access the com ports directly; the DOS drivers are worse than useless).  And
consider also that for another $50, you can buy the heart of a DBMS (!) written
in Turbo Pascal (the Turbo Database Toolbox).  Try getting C-ISAM at that price
(worse, try getting Ingres).

Borland is changing the nature of commercial software.  Kudos to Phillipe Kahn
for providing a system better than $400 packages (i.e. Turbo Pascal) for $50!

++Brandon
-- 
``for is he not of the Children of Luthien?  Never shall that line fail, though
the years may lengthen beyond count.''  --J. R. R. Tolkien

Brandon S. Allbery	           UUCP: cbatt!cwruecmp!ncoast!tdi2!brandon
Tridelta Industries, Inc.         CSNET: ncoast!allbery@Case
7350 Corporate Blvd.	       INTERNET: ncoast!allbery%Case.CSNET@relay.CS.NET
Mentor, Ohio 44060		  PHONE: +1 216 255 1080 (home) +1 216 974 9210

leder@ihlpm.UUCP (05/28/87)

TURBO C IS ALIVE AND WELL!

By now, I am sure that most of you have plunked down your 69.95
(at Egghead in Chicago) or whatever demands your vendor has made to get
TURBO C.  If you have not, then you must because it is the fastest
compiler on the market.  It is as fast as BDS C (for those who remember
CP/M) and it is nice.  The only complaint that I have is that I have not
been able to find a way to set the stack size.

The exemod utility from the MSC 4.0 package reports that the requested
stack is 128 bytes.  Increasing this, using exemod helps some, but not
enough for the particular program I wanted to run.  I'm sure that the 
answer is just around the corner.

I have now ported 3 fairly large programs with minimal effort with the
exception of the stack problem.

For those people who don't want to use the integrated environment, the
same functuallity is available via command line commands for the compiler,
linker, and a make utility.

According to the documentation, the MS linker can read turbo .obj's but
because of undocumented record types, they cannot interpret the MS .obj's.

With one program that is a ~39K exe with MSC, it came out to ~35k with
turbo C.  The MSC options for program size reduction seem to make the
program larger.

If others want to send info (bugs, etc.) I will summarize on the net.

Bob Leder

bright@dataio.UUCP (05/29/87)

In article <1148@ihlpm.ATT.COM> leder@ihlpm.ATT.COM (Leder) writes:
-By now, I am sure that most of you have plunked down your 69.95
-(at Egghead in Chicago) or whatever demands your vendor has made to get
-TURBO C.  If you have not, then you must because it is the fastest
-compiler on the market.  It is as fast as BDS C (for those who remember
-CP/M) and it is nice.

I beg to differ. Datalight C compiles faster, according to benchmarks
we've run. DeSmet C also is fast at compiling. In Borland's ads, they
carefully benchmarked it only against relatively slow compilers.

ee163adj@sdcc18.ucsd.EDU (Steven "B.J." Martin) (06/12/87)

A bug in turbo c that hasn't yet been mentioned is a problem with huge
model.  In declaring an array greater than 64k or 2 arrays totaling greater
than 64k the compiler gives a message that it is out of memory.  I called
Borland and they know about the problemand say it can be aleviated with a
farmalloc.  I haven't tried this yet, and am not sure whether the problem
persists with structures other than arrays.

I read in last weeks PC week that Microsoft is coming out with Quick C and
MSC 5.0 and 5.0 will come with Quick C.  Looks like Microsoft is afraid
Borland will take over their compiler business (what's next Quick Pascal,
can you imagine Microsoft advertising it as compatible with Turbo).

Steven "B.J." Martin

todd@uhccux.UUCP (The Perplexed Wiz) (06/16/87)

In article <736@sdcc18.ucsd.EDU> ee163adj@sdcc18.ucsd.EDU (Steven "B.J." Martin) writes:
>I read in last weeks PC week that Microsoft is coming out with Quick C and
>MSC 5.0 and 5.0 will come with Quick C.  Looks like Microsoft is afraid
>Borland will take over their compiler business (what's next Quick Pascal,
>can you imagine Microsoft advertising it as compatible with Turbo).

FYI: I moved a couple of programs written in Microsoft C 4.0 that had
a lot of interrupt calls [int86() & intdos()].  They compiled fine
with no changes using Turbo C 1.0 and ran ok too.  I've also been writing
programs using Turbo C and then compiling them on a VAX 8650 running
Ultrix ok too.  Needless to say, I'm very pleased with the portability
of code written using Turbo C so far.  A real time saver.

I saw Bill Gates on "The Computer Show" the other night demoing Quick C.
It looks like it has a number of advantages over Turbo C.  Will
hold off making a judgement until I get my Microsoft C 5.0/Quick C
upgrade though...todd

-- 
Todd Ogasawara, U. of Hawaii Computing Center
UUCP:		{ihnp4,seismo,ucbvax,dcdwest}!sdcsvax!nosc!uhccux!todd
ARPA:		uhccux!todd@nosc.MIL
INTERNET:	todd@uhccux.UHCC.HAWAII.EDU

frisk@askja.UUCP (Fridrik Skulason) (08/04/87)

I have heard that Borland does not change the version number of the
Turbo C compiler when fixing bugs. 

Now - the good thing about this is that you don't have to wait for months
for the fixes, but unfortunately it's hard to know just which bugs have
been fixed in "your" version. 

Since I have never seen a list of the various versions, I am going to
create one.

So - those of you using Turbo C, and having a few spare minutes how
about mailing the following information to me:

     TC creation date  [on the original disk please, not your HD copy]
     TC size
     Known fixes in this version

The resulting list will probably appear a few days after the replies stop
arriving......
-- 
Fridrik Skulason  Univ. of Iceland, Computing Center
       UUCP  ...mcvax!hafro!askja!frisk                BIX  frisk

                     "This line intentionally left blank"

dalegass@dalcsug.UUCP (09/17/87)

Maybe I've just been incredibly spoiled by Aztec C, but I find Turbo C to
generate relatively larger and slower code (except for stdio, which Aztec C
kinda flops on).  I don't know why everybody is so crazy about it, except
possibly for the nice environment.

I've found very many cases of redundant instructions in the code that a very
minimal peephole optimizer would pick up, such as  MOV var,AX   MOV AX,var.

And where a simple MUL or DIV would suffice, there always seems to be a bunch
of pushes and calls.

I won't even mention the stack screwups it's generated, which caused major
crashes...

Overall, I'm not very impressed, although I do like the environment.
Hopefully Turbo C ver 2.0, or QuickC will offer good optimization with this
type of environment...


-dalegass@dalcsug.uucp

glazer@osupyr.UUCP (09/20/87)

Could one of you Turbo C hackers out there please e-mail me the phone number
for Borland's technical help.  I would like to order the latest release.  The
version I have is 1.0000000 and not bugless.
 
Thanks
Jon

*******************************************************************************
*                        *                        * At                        *
*       Jon Glazer       * The |\/|     |  |      *     Ohio State University *
* Sysop of MGS (IBM BBS) *     |  |     |  |      *        Columbus, Ohio     *
*     (614)-848-5971     *     |  |ICRO |/\|IZARD *         Via PYRAMID       *
*                        *                        *     [glazer@osupyr.UUCP]  *
*                        *                        *    [glazer%osupyr@cbosgd] *
*******************************************************************************

Aron_Fingers_Nelson@cup.portal.com (09/21/87)

Borland (408) 438-8400 Ask for costumer support.