Aron_Fingers_Nelson@cup.portal.com.UUCP (09/02/87)
I was reading an ad by datalight challenging microsoft to a test, does anyone know or has heard anything of it? Is datalight a viable challenger to turbo c or microsoft 5.0? Is it any good period?
bright@dataio.UUCP (09/02/87)
In article <682@cup.portal.com> Aron_Fingers_Nelson@cup.portal.com writes:
#I was reading an ad by datalight challenging microsoft to a test, does
#anyone know or has heard anything of it? Is datalight a viable
#challenger to turbo c or microsoft 5.0? Is it any good period?
o Microsoft did not respond to the challenge. They purchased
a copy of Datalight C. Draw your own conclusions.
o Datalight is a viable challenger. We wouldn't have run the
ad if we would have lost the challenge. MSC 5.0 is not
available yet, so we don't know about that.
o We think it's pretty good. We just don't have a .5M dollar
advertising budget.
You can call Datalight at 1-800-221-6630 or 1-206-367-1803 if you have
specific questions. The Datalight bulletin board is 1-206-821-2123.
Disclaimer: I have no relationship with Datalight, other than the fact
that I wrote the compiler and receive money from sales of it.connery@bnrmtv.UUCP (Glenn Connery) (09/03/87)
In article <682@cup.portal.com>, Aron_Fingers_Nelson@cup.portal.com writes: > I was reading an ad by datalight challenging microsoft to a test, does > anyone know or has heard anything of it? Is datalight a viable > challenger to turbo c or microsoft 5.0? Is it any good period? Datalight is a perfectly good compiler, and definitely up for the current compiler wars. The basic compiler is very fast and produces very good code. The Optimizer is an optional step and unlike Microsoft, when you turn it off exacts no time penalty. But with the optimizer on, compile times are very similar to Microsoft C 4.0 (ick). However, this is a serious optimizer--loop invariants, common subexpressions, etc. The DataLight Optimizer and Microsoft C 5.0 are breaking a lot of the compiler benchmarks which do nothing, and therefore compile to nothing. All that said, I am using Microsoft C and Turbo these days. Microsoft largely because I'm used to it, like Codeview, think ANSI C is a godsend, may be working with OS/2 etc, and Turbo because its highly compatible with Microsoft, cost very little and compiles much much faster. Datalight started with Lattice C as a model but is evolving to the ANSI C stuff over time. Glenn -- Glenn Connery, Bell Northern Research, Mountain View, CA {hplabs,amdahl,3comvax}!bnrmtv!connery
scott@hpcvck.HP (Scott Linn) (09/04/87)
With regards to Datalight... I haven't used Microsoft or Turbo C, but have used Lattice extensively. I bought the Datalight compiler a while back, and I like it much better than Lattice. The global optimizer really pushes the speeds up on particular programs. Execution times are much faster than Lattice. I run off of a HP110 and HP150, and have had no problems (I can't say this with other compilers that require "true clones" to work). Also, I have grabbed many programs off of the net, written in Microsoft C, Lattice C, BDS C, some UNIX C compilers, MIX C, Ecosoft, etc...., and they all compiled fine. Scott Linn HP - Northwest IC Division I have no connection with Datalight except for being a happy customer.