🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <36507a30.14282068@news.alterdial.uu.net>,
  russmay@ditmco.com (Russell May) wrote:
>> I do agree that byte memory dumps for structures larger than
> bytes (especially for bit fields which span between bytes)
> are generally less intelligible with Little-Endian types, but
> that appears to be the only disadvantage of Little-Endian types.

And they are only less intelligible because
they are generally laid out backwards,
i.e., the programmers who write monitors and such
don't bother to order the dump:
F E D C B A 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 0
instead of:
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 A B C D E F

I got a chuckle out of an IBM document (part of some
RS/6000 tech refs) trying to justify
big-endianess, on the basis of crossover
muxes being need to store and retrieve different
size data types coherently from memory, when
the muxes wouldn't be needed if their register
naming/ordering conventions were reversed instead.

> >  yves@px.uk.com (Yves Tchapda) wrote:
> >>
> >> Hi Shail,
> >> Technically speaking, there is no  advantage of Big-Endianness over
> >> Little-Endianness. Intel processors are predominantly Little-Endian,
> >> while Motorola processors are Big-Endian. Choosing one over the other
> >> depends primarily on the overall system.
> >
> >I'm not totally convinced. Why do Intel designers choose an Endianness that
> >is, well, counter-intutive? Take a look at an x86 memory dump to know what I
> >mean...

See above. Personally I find little-endianness to be more 'intuitive'.
It corresponds to the way I add, subtract, and live: start at the small
end and work your way up.

  Are you sure there's no difference in the gate counts required to
> >make a system Small or Big Endian? Maybe one of them requires much fewer
> >gates to implement...

Can you give an example? A down counter requires the same number
of gates as an up counter, an adder has same gate count as a subtractor ...

> >
> >--Shail Bains
> >Silicon Automation Systems Ltd.
> >
> >-----------== Posted via Deja News, The Discussion Network ==----------
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>

- John

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