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No one in their right mind would design a general purpose computer system from scratch with an 8-bit word size unless they were forced to. Neither Zuse nor Ecke

No one in their right mind would design a general purpose computer system from scratch with an 8-bit word size unless they were forced to. Neither Zuse nor Eckert and Mauchly ever did. > Plenty of older microcomputers got by just fine with only 8 bits in a word. They got by fine on your kid’s desk. Those processors were better suited for implementing smart terminals that people would use to interface with the computer that would actually solve your problem. > That's enough room to fit two binary-coded decimal digits and thus perform all the common arithmetic operations one or two digits at a time. Why perform them one digit at a time when you can perform them 10 digits at a time? Why force your users to adopt a programming model where you have to implement arbitrary precision arithmetic anytime you want to use a number larger than 255? Or have to implement a useful floating point in software? Or be forced to pull in libraries or use some environment were that stuff is pre-implemented in order to do basic operations that previously could be done in a single line in assembly? >...albeit at speeds far below the billions of operations per second expected of modern computers. They performed at speeds below what was expected of computers from the 50s and 60s. > The advantage of 32-bit word size is more for interoperability with modern systems and familiarity to modern programmers and programming languages. No it is not about modern computing or modern programmers. 32-bit or similar word sizes were the standard for electronic computing since the earliest times because there are intrinsic advantages. Nobody did 8-bit computing before micro-processors from the 70s because it would have been stupid to limit yourself that way if you didn’t need to.

kbolino 2y ago
But the designers of early micros did need to limit themselves, and they proved that those limits were not insurmountable. The luxuries afforded by kilowatts of electricity and cubic meters of space were beyond the reach of early micros. You may sneer at the fruits of their labors, but for a large number of people across an entire generation, these devices were accessible to them when room-sized computers weren't. Taking such a hostile tone over what is obviously already settled seems strange to me. Of course you don't design modern systems with 8-bit words. There are many advantages to larger words besides those I mentioned or implied. But calling the elements which were good enough for the second wave of the computer revolution completely impractical is also absurd to me.
- Mr_Minderbinder 2y ago
  > Of course you don't design modern systems with 8-bit words. Again this is not about contemporary computing or computer technology level in general, as I have already made clear. What is good or bad design for general computing is independent of those things, it is timeless. Why do you keep referring to some arbitrary “modern computing” as if that is somehow relevant when word-size in particular is a design decision that is not really dictated by technology level? It is often possible to compromise on other aspects of the design in order to have the width you want. What you mean to say is “you don't design any general purpose system with 8-bit words.” but you won’t because it would undermine your whole argument. > But the designers of early micros did need to limit themselves, It would have been more difficult but not impossible to create an IC with a larger word-size in the early 70s. The 8-bit word size was not entirely chosen for technical reasons but also because they were targeting a specific market, one that did not have to meet all the demands of general computing and one for which the general computers were ill suited so this made the most sense. Would you really not say they were designed for and are better suited for the subset of computing applications that is called “embedded” computing? Don’t forget that most of them were designed before the desktop computer market existed and were never intended to be used that way. You can force them to be more than what they are (and people did) and pretend that they are but it doesn’t mean you should. > But calling the elements which were good enough for the second wave of the computer revolution completely impractical is also absurd to me. Design concessions which are intrinsically bad, awkward or inappropriate do not become good because it “still worked” or succeeded in a particular market. Not that it counts for much since those computers were not marketed in the same way or purchased for the same reasons. You say it was “good enough” but a lot of people didn’t think so but I guess most of them are dead now (like Wirth). The word-size was not a selling point, and only not enough of a hindrance to upset the novelty of the overall product. What it takes to introduce people to electronic computing is not the measure of general computing. What is absurd is people like yourself insisting those particular machines, out of all machines, should be used to inform us as to what is reasonable for general computing when, considering the context of their creation, it is completely unwarranted.
  - kbolino 2y ago

kbolino 2y ago

But the designers of early micros did need to limit themselves, and they proved that those limits were not insurmountable. The luxuries afforded by kilowatts of electricity and cubic meters of space were beyond the reach of early micros. You may sneer at the fruits of their labors, but for a large number of people across an entire generation, these devices were accessible to them when room-sized computers weren't. Taking such a hostile tone over what is obviously already settled seems strange to me. Of course you don't design modern systems with 8-bit words. There are many advantages to larger words besides those I mentioned or implied. But calling the elements which were good enough for the second wave of the computer revolution completely impractical is also absurd to me.

Mr_Minderbinder 2y ago
> Of course you don't design modern systems with 8-bit words. Again this is not about contemporary computing or computer technology level in general, as I have already made clear. What is good or bad design for general computing is independent of those things, it is timeless. Why do you keep referring to some arbitrary “modern computing” as if that is somehow relevant when word-size in particular is a design decision that is not really dictated by technology level? It is often possible to compromise on other aspects of the design in order to have the width you want. What you mean to say is “you don't design any general purpose system with 8-bit words.” but you won’t because it would undermine your whole argument. > But the designers of early micros did need to limit themselves, It would have been more difficult but not impossible to create an IC with a larger word-size in the early 70s. The 8-bit word size was not entirely chosen for technical reasons but also because they were targeting a specific market, one that did not have to meet all the demands of general computing and one for which the general computers were ill suited so this made the most sense. Would you really not say they were designed for and are better suited for the subset of computing applications that is called “embedded” computing? Don’t forget that most of them were designed before the desktop computer market existed and were never intended to be used that way. You can force them to be more than what they are (and people did) and pretend that they are but it doesn’t mean you should. > But calling the elements which were good enough for the second wave of the computer revolution completely impractical is also absurd to me. Design concessions which are intrinsically bad, awkward or inappropriate do not become good because it “still worked” or succeeded in a particular market. Not that it counts for much since those computers were not marketed in the same way or purchased for the same reasons. You say it was “good enough” but a lot of people didn’t think so but I guess most of them are dead now (like Wirth). The word-size was not a selling point, and only not enough of a hindrance to upset the novelty of the overall product. What it takes to introduce people to electronic computing is not the measure of general computing. What is absurd is people like yourself insisting those particular machines, out of all machines, should be used to inform us as to what is reasonable for general computing when, considering the context of their creation, it is completely unwarranted.
- kbolino 2y ago