AMD Athlon64 Systems

[Mike A. Harris]

On Thu, 16 Oct 2003, Robert L Cochran wrote:

>I have a new question: would it be worthwhile investing in the
>Athlon64 from a programming perspective? E.g. write 64 bit
>programs while the rest of the world is still living on 32 bits?

Hmmm...  What exactly is a 64bit program?  I've never written 
one.  ;o)

Seriously...  One writes "computer software" - it's neither 32bit 
nor 64bit, not if it's done correctly.  Recompile your 
application on a 32bit CPU, and it's a 32bit application, compile 
it on a 64bit CPU and it's a 64bit application.  If you've coded 
it properly and not made 32bit tunnel vision assumptions in your 
code, it should run without source modifications on 64bit 
systems.

That said, beware of making assumptions about the sizes of the 
standard C types in code, and things go rather smoothly.  ;o)

-- 
Mike A. Harris     ftp://people.redhat.com/mharris
OS Systems Engineer - XFree86 maintainer - Red Hat