Assembly language programming in unix environment

[freeburn]

> Freeburn,
> 
> Where did you get the idea that AMD processors were somehow more
> difficult to program than Intel processors? They both use the Intel
> instruction set.  With the exception of short periods of time when one
> vendor is catching up with the other (and has yet to implement new
> instruction set extensions) they are, for all practical purposes,
> identical.  AMD has built its business on being code compatible with
> Intel.  When one installs Ubuntu, one decides whether to install the
> 32-bit versus the 64-bit version, not whether to install Intel or AMD.
> 
> As a developer, with 30+ years in the business, I have worked with
> RISC processors such as the IBM PowerPC --- and yes assembly language
> coding is more tedious.  Funny thing, C compilers eliminated the
> difference.  Another reason that assembly language lost its economic
> appeal.  For 99.99% of commercial programming, it is more cost
> effective to minimize the need to deal with hardware differences.
> I've had to fire more than one programmer who refused to learn that
> lesson and chose to waste time and money squeezing the last bit of
> performance from an already fast processor.
> 
> Regards,
> Dick Dowdell


see i don't know much about AMD specifically. i knew that risc assembly
is more tedious. and i thought that amd falls into that category also.
and i've understood that "coding" is not necessarily harder. although my
argument was for assembly language not for "c". and still i think
assembly should be known in order to understand the microprocessor. i
have not studied compilers yet, but from my understanding a compiler
should require some sort asm codes(correct me if i wrong). and what
about the kernel or device drivers? they also should require some asm to
interface with the hardware. if they were made entirely in c ,
efficiency should be a question there. this should be true for embedded
systems also.