Re: alignment of data-types

"Mark McIntyre" <markmcintyre@spamcop.net> wrote in message
> On 6 Feb 2003 00:16:31 -0500, in comp.lang.c , "Glen Herrmannsfeldt"
> <gah@ugcs.caltech.edu> wrote:
>
> >"Mark McIntyre" <markmcintyre@spamcop.net> wrote in message
> >> You have little or no chance of being better at it than the guys who
> >> wrote it, at least not till you're a guru programmer, by which stage
> >> you won't need to ask us for advice....
> >
> >Should, but not always true.
> >
> >It is common for x86 compilers to allocate double variables on 4 byte
> >boundaries. This was optimal on the 386 and 486, but not on pentium
> >and later processors. The difference can be large.
>
> Indeed. But by the time hte OP truly understands why that is so, he
> for sure won't need to ask questions in CLC. Hence the 2nd part of my
> remark.


True, but even worse is doing profiling and having the alignment change
accidentally.


The one I was originally writing about is the pointer returned by malloc().
Structure alignment is a different question. malloc() alignment could
easily change with only a small change in a program, or even no change at
all.


-- glen

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