mic@lapis.berkeley.edu.UUCP (04/22/87)
In reply to my previous question, I am convinced of the vertues of C for getting a closeness to the system without having to mess-up with the assembler. But my original question was not well formulated (I forgot I was talking to system programmers here). NOW: In an environment where 95% of the work to be done by a program is number-crunching, (talking about structural analysis for civil engineerings), most people as using.. well..FORTRAN (That's it I said the dreaded word, FORTRAN the archaic!). Anyhow, as of today, I am not convinced that something like C will help me do the job faster (key word), although I realise all af of the nice tricks C will allow me to do. C would maybe help me to get some nice friendly features implemented, but not all: For example, engineers like standards (why would you think they stuck to Fortran for all those years). So when come time to add graphics to a structural analysis program, it would appear logical to use G.K.S. (another clanky standard). Unfortunately, I have not heard of a single C compiler that will link with the GKS librairy (but 3 fortrans do). Further, graphics are frill, speed is the essence of those application (i.e. number-crunching speed). Not everybody wants to buy a CRAY, but one is entitled to the best performance on a given machine. THEREFORE, as anybody seen number crunching benchmarks for pure calculation (no I/O) comparing C and FORTRAN???? I am still ignorant, so please let me know....
cbenda@unccvax.UUCP (carl m benda) (04/23/87)
In article <3254@jade.BERKELEY.EDU>, mic@lapis.berkeley.edu (Michel Bruneau) writes: > for pure calculation (no I/O) comparing C and FORTRAN???? > > I am still ignorant, so please let me know.... Compiler.... It depends on the compiler version and what it can do. It is known that most professional C compilers have switches that will allow the compiler to produce optimized code for the particular machine the program is running on. This object code may allow performance increases as much as 35%. Why doesn't one use these switches all the time? For the simple reason that to optimize the object code the compiler does alot of extra work which of course increases compile time.... not something one wants to put up with while developing a program. /Carl