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From: dewar@merv.cs.nyu.edu (Robert Dewar)
Subject: Re: Shared Generic Instance Code
Date: 1997/04/07
Message-ID: <dewar.860424457@merv>#1/1
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References: <5hrkhkINN9ip@snoopy.cis.ohio-state.edu>
  <1997Apr1.201631.28634@ocsystems.com> <dewar.859987468@merv>
  <sO6r4AADiBRzEwoj@marnhull.demon.co.uk> <dewar.860114590@merv>
  <5i23k6$hkq@mulga.cs.mu.OZ.AU> <dewar.860160858@merv>
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Organization: New York University
Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada
Date: 1997-04-07T00:00:00+00:00
List-Id: <comp.lang.ada>


<<Though I haven't done a lot of timing studies, I have the distinct
impression that big generics can *drastically* slow down compilation
(Gnat 3.04a NT/95).  I presume the macro is essentially expanded and
recompiled each time it's instantiated?>>

Compiling a macro expanded generic is indeed like compiling the source,
it should be no slower or no faster. Big generics are best avoided if
you are working with a compiler without shared generics and you plan
to do many instantiations, as I mentioned before, have a look at the
GNAT implementation of Integer_IO or Float_IO to see what I mean by
this.

But in any case I was talking about runtime efficiency, not compile
time speed, when I said that macro instantiated generics will generally
be significantly more efficient.