Captain Jack wrote:
> That's true... I know the specification calls for packing the bytes as 
> tightly as possible, but there's no standard spec for alignment.

I also believe (but I am too lazy to look it up right now) that it's 
impossible to portably know whether

struct PackBits alpha = {0, 1, 0, 0};
struct PackBits beta = {0, 0, 0, 1};

alpha or beta will yield a larger number when cast to an int. I.e., I don't 
think the standard even says whether the fields are allocated MSB or LSB first.

> I also used to make use of its "asm" keyword which would let me insert x86 
> assembler code into the middle of my C code, and I'd often use that to 
> squeeze some extra bits out of my memory usage.

Yep. When you really need to talk to the machine directly, C falls down. 
That was the point of asking "why is C better?"  It was only better for 
portability compared to the other languages of the time.

-- 
   Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   I ordered stamps from Zazzle that read "Place Stamp Here".

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