low level optimization

[Henry Spencer]

In article <21848 at lanl.gov> jlg at lanl.gov (Jim Giles) writes:
>If you want now to recommend this implementation as opposed to the
>non-conforming method of dependent compilation you were previously
>recommending, then i have no quarrel with you.

Either method is fully, 100% conforming.  There is nothing non-conforming
about a compiler that does certain optimizations only in favorable situations,
e.g. when it is compiling all source modules involved.  It has to be able to
cope with separately-translated files, but that does not require that it
translate each and every file independently.  It is perfectly entitled to
notice that it is being asked to process more than one file, and to do its
optimizations on all of them together rather than each one separately.  The
only constraint is that certain aspects of the external behavior of the
resulting program must not vary with such optimizations.
-- 
And the bean-counter replied,           | Henry Spencer @ U of Toronto Zoology
"beans are more important".             |  henry at zoo.toronto.edu  utzoo!henry