3 ms·
In old-school Pascal, type alfa is packed array [1..10] of char On the CDC 6600, word-size was 60 bits, and a character size of 6 bits -- so 10 characters in a
by ratboy666 4y ago
In old-school Pascal, type alfa is packed array [1..10] of char
On the CDC 6600, word-size was 60 bits, and a character size of 6 bits -- so 10 characters in a 60 bit word. Then, compares become simple. The PDP-10 used 36 bit words and 6 bit encoding (ASCII space to underscore subtract 32, so space is 0, A is 33, _ is 63). Not so nice: "set of char" takes 64 bits -- and only 60 bits are available (using DEC SIXBIT encoding, or CDC DISPLAYCODE https://en-academic.com/dic.nsf/enwiki/11602432 https://en-academic.com/dic.nsf/enwiki/11602432). I guess we put that down to -- can't win them all. These days, I would consider 7 bit, 18 characters in 128 bits, and "set of char" in 128 bits. Back then, 36 bits would hold 6 characters... and that could be a filename. Compare in one instruction on the DEC-10. Thus 6.3 names (filename, extension, and 18 more bits in 2 words).