Re: C vs. Hyper C

[zcaa1122@rpool5.rus.uni-stuttgart.de (Wulf Hofbauer)]

In article <CE0EMq.7Eo@actrix.gen.nz>,
David Empson <dempson@swell.actrix.gen.nz> wrote:
>
>Another feature of ANSI C compilers is reasonable standardisation of
>the C library calls.  You can expect the same basic set of calls
>across all ANSI C compilers.  Non-ANSI C compilers usually implement
>most of them, but there may be differences.

The price to pay for this standardisation is inefficiency, a major concern on
the Apple //. And I've yet to see an ANSI C program that would compile on
several machines without some modifications.

>I haven't done any work in Hyper C, but from a quick scan of the
>documentation it looks like it is a K&R C compiler with several
>extensions (such as enumerated types and structure assignment, and
>several other non-standard ones).

The exception is that HyperC doesn't support floating point in a
standard way. The interpreted pseudo-code (native code is also possible)
is extremely compact und surprisingly fast. The other HyperC tools make
programming also fun!

>Pass - I've only read the first edition of K&R (see above).  Everything
>else I've picked up along the way or by reading manuals for various C
>compilers.
>
>The Hyper C documentation recommends reading K&R.  I can't offer an
>opinion on the second edition, but the first edition was good enough
>to get me started on C.  Note: I was already an accomplished Pascal
>and assembly language programmer at the time, which helped.

I like the first edition much better. It is more concise. You should
have however some programming experience in another language, I guess.
C may not be the ideal language to start with - there is not much
redundancy left in the source, and it is quite normal that a source
with some typos will compile flawlessly without warning.