> pcc also generates fast code. faster than gcc on vax at any rate.. i 
> should do a more involved comparison than the little shootout between gcc 
> and pcc and ultrix/vax cc that ragge and i did.. though we had machines 
> of somewhat different characteristics, but pcc2's code was at least as 
> fast as gcc's best optimization. 
> 
Well, I think you have a bad memory :-)
Here's the test again:

! Running the command:
! % echo "2 9999 ^ 3 6308 ^ / p" | /usr/bin/time ./dc
! 
! gave the following results:
! 
! cc:
!        44.7 real        44.4 user         0.0 sys
! 
! vcc:
!        51.0 real        50.8 user         0.0 sys  
! 
! gcc:
!        31.3 real        31.1 user         0.0 sys  
! 


This shows that pcc's code is almost 50% _slower_ than the gcc code, 
and the DEC C compiler is even worse...

Gcc takes quite a while to compile, but generates rather good code.

There are other problems making the VAXen slow, though.

-- Ragge