Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!husc6!rutgers!nysernic!itsgw!leah!uwmcsd1!ig!jade!ucbvax!sdcsvax!ucsdhub!jack!wolf!drew From: drew@wolf.UUCP (Drew Dean) Newsgroups: comp.arch Subject: Re: C machine Message-ID: <592@wolf.UUCP> Date: Sun, 6-Dec-87 20:56:10 EST Article-I.D.: wolf.592 Posted: Sun Dec 6 20:56:10 1987 Date-Received: Sat, 12-Dec-87 06:04:54 EST References: <759@auscso.UUCP> Distribution: na Organization: Systems'n'Software San Diego, CA Lines: 32 Keywords: C, Lilith (sp?), In Progress? Summary: I think it exists I apologize, as a non - vi hacker, I can't get this message to contain a copy of the one it refers to, if someone could send me a little description of vi I'd be very grateful ..... Anyways, the Lilith (you did spell it correctly) was / is a machine built by Dr. Nicklaus Wirth to run Modula-2 as its SOLE language. That is the OS, compiler, debugger, and everything else are written in Modula. The machine has a 16 bit architecture, and has 4 AMD 2900 series bit slice chips. (That is 2900, NOT 29000, work on the Lilith started in the late 1970's.) The 4 board proccesor has 256 instructions, all chosen to help in the writing of the Modula-2 compiler. For example, building a stack frame on procedure entry is ONE instruction. Due to the need to support a (at that time) hi-res display (768 by 594, mono. and interlaced), the system uses a 64 bit wide read data bus, and a 16 bit write data bus. With the average instruction length ~ 10 bits, each instruction fetch got about 6 instructions. The Lilith was a very CISCy design (process switching is also < 5 instructions), and was completely stack based. All math operations received operands on top of the stack, and pushed the result back on. If anyone wants further detail, send me email .... At any rate, the Lilith was a 1979 technology 16 bit machine running at 6 Mhz. It was blindingly fast, the 5 (yes 5) pass modula compiler was quicker that a lot of recent things, like Microsoft C 4.0. It had a barrel shifter for fast graphics, and the OS had several interesting features, and came in SOURCE code. I remember hearing a few years ago about something called the BBN C machine, which did essentially the same thing for C. Can someone supply further details about it ? Also, the Novix NC4000 and upcoming Buffalo processors do the same thing for Forth. The buffalo is is supposed to run @ 100 Mhz, and require .8 clock cycles/instruction. That's only rumor, but if it's anything close to that it will be FAST.... Drew Dean FROM Disclaimers IMPORT StandardDisclamier; UUCP: {ihnp4, sdcsvax}!jack!wolf!drew