MSVC the "most advanced" compiler, despite: 1. Doesn't support C99. 2. Can't correctly align its stack, making SSE optimizations of any sort a complete nigh

MSVC the "most advanced" compiler, despite: 1. Doesn't support C99. 2. Can't correctly align its stack, making SSE optimizations of any sort a complete nightmare and forcing us to disable a number of optimizations when compiling under MSVC. 3. Has the worst 32-bit libc I have ever seen in my life, with a memcpy that goes at less than 1 byte per clock cycle for small copies, a massive performance killer for large apps. 4. Completely incompatible with almost all features of the more widely used C compilers, e.g. AT&T-syntax inline assembly. ICC, on the other hand, supports nearly everything. 5. Loves to mangle its entire project file every time you change one small thing, resulting in enormous numbers of false deltas in version control. Now, I'm not big on GCC either and can come up with dozens of regressions and miscompilation problems with GCC, along with who-knows-how-many cases of suboptimal compilation. But at least it works and doesn't force us to mangle our entire codebase just to get it to compile! If you want to make an argument about compilers superior to GCC, pick one that is actually good, like ICC, rather a relic like MSVC. Merely what I have to do to keep supporting this late-80s-technology beast makes me want to gouge my eyes out. I mean, seriously, a compiler that doesn't even support variable declarations in the middle of a code block? It's 2008, folks.