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“c is portable assembly” hasn't been true since optimising compilers appeared for it. it's an accurate description for those really simple (usually old) c compilers on the other hand… where for (;;) and while (1) are different and local variables aren't free. old c is so cute
i think sizeof(short) == sizeof(int) is cute
it's a portable macro assembler, even. macros are faster than functions, just like in assembly, and c has really powerful macros by assembler standards
so much of c was a good idea, or at least good enough, for its time, but we've been using this poor old language for far too long and i think making optimising compilers for it was really mean to it. society if rust had existed in 1992…
@hikari it's 2087. the last line of linux is rewritten in rust. the tsukumogami spirit of the c programming language is finally set free and retires in comfortable pdp-10 pastures.
@hikari I think I'd still be waiting for the cargo build I started in 1992 in that case though.