Re: Language/Compiler for 8/16 bit processor?

The old Z80 implementation of the EUMEL operating system (developed by the
Gesellschaft fuer Mathematik und Datenverarbeitung (GMD) in Germany)
included a compiler for ELAN, a procedural language somewhat similar to
Modula-2.


This implementation used a P-code apprach (called Bit-A coding) which made
the compiler more efficient (in both compile time and run time) than other
compilers available for Z80 machines at the time.


I remember that I once tried three small benchmark programs for which I
had found measurements of a Fortran, a Pascal, a Basic, and a Cobol
compiler producing Z80 code. The problems were (1) Sieve of Eratosthenes,
(2) some trigonometric stuff, (3) some string manipulation stuff.


Eleven of these twelve benchmark programs reported in that microcomputer
journal were slower than the respective ELAN implementations (the
exception was program (2) in Fortran). Most of the differences were factor
2 to 4.


The EUMEL implementation of ELAN on 8086 machines (still using Bit-A code)
lost this advantage, though, after mature compilers for these machines
were available,


Today, the successor of the EUMEL operating system, called L-3, uses
native code, too. But in the Z80 days, the interpreted pseudocode
approach was fantastic: it allowed to build an operating system with real
multiuser capability, efficient virtual memory, and memory protection on
an 8-bit machine. The whole operating system, complete with kernel,
compiler, libraries, and utilities was only a few hundred kilobytes.


Summing up: For small processors, there is no need to restrict the
language, only a special compiler approach is needed.


    Lutz
--
Lutz Prechelt (email: prechelt@ira.uka.de)
Institut fuer Programmstrukturen und Datenorganisation
Universitaet Karlsruhe; 76128 Karlsruhe; Germany
(Voice: ++49/721/608-4068, FAX: ++49/721/694092)
--

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