Re: Driver optimization.

Henning Schmiedehausen (barnard@forge.franken.de)
1 Jul 1996 14:47:01 +0200


khan@pacificrim.net (Khan M. Klatt) writes:

>On a similar note, I was speaking to a friend who is fairly familiar with
>NT. He states that you can install NT 3.5/4.0 on computer A, a 586, and
>also on computer B, a DEC alpha, and also computer C, a PowerPC RS/6000.

>Then you can go to a store and buy Word or Office for NT, and install the
>same software on computer A and on computer B and on computer C.

Most likely he has Versions for all NT platforms on one CD.

Or he confused NT with NextStep. There you can have 'fat' binaries (right
word, hehe. ;-) ) which contain actually the executeable for some or all
NS platforms (m68k, Intel, HP, Sparc). But they're the same amount bigger.

>It appears to me that NT has a technical advantage if what my friend says
>is true?

I think he confused this. ;-) There is no 'interpreted layer' in the OS as
you get with Java or the ancient UCSD p-code system.

There is, however, in many Microsoft products a similar layer to p-Code,
called microcode and support in some compilers to compile your C(++) Code
to this microcode which is then 'on-the-fly' compiled or interpreted. Most
parts of Word for Windows is written in this intermediate code (which may
be an explanation for its 'speed' ;-) )

Microsoft does this not for transport between platforms but for memory
usage; this compiler-produced Microcode tends to be more space-efficient
than real machine code.

Ciao
Henning

-- 
Henning Schmiedehausen       ...side by side in orbit... around a fairer SUN.
barnard@forge.franken.de     http://www.franken.de/users/forge/henning

Der Mann hat nicht schlecht, sondern ueberhaupt nicht gepfiffen. Das ist schon ein Unterschied. Benachteiligt wurde niemand, nur das Spiel selbst. -- Lutz Frommberger ueber das EM Viertelfinale Deutschland - Kroatien