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List:       mumps-l
Subject:    Bitwise operators in M
From:       Floyd Dennis <fbdennis () MINDSPRING ! COM>
Date:       1998-01-24 8:49:52
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David Whitten <whitten@netcom.com> wrote:

<snip>
>PS. Is there a need in the M community to standardize bitwise operations?
>We have had several proposals in the MDC, and I would like to hear from
>those who might use this.

I would tend to reply in the affirmative.  Historically speaking, M
has always presented itself as an operating environment whose primary
strength was its strong support for manipulation of text data, with
some low-level arithmetical capabilities.  Conversely, this has also
meant that M was correspondingly weak in the areas of high-level
mathematical and (Boolean) logical data manipulation.  I feel one of
the prime issues the MDC should be considering is that of "shoring up"
some of M's inherent deficiencies to insure its capability as a viable
tool in the future.

Here's one example of this kind of "futurethink" I'm talking about -
communications.  IMHO one of the prime characteristics of the
information processing paradigm for the next decade or so (at least)
will be an ever-increasing requirement for access to data and/or
information - which necessarily implies ever-increasing communication
of the same.  I forsee vendors having to expend more of their
resources on supporting multiple layers of communication support (be
it serial I/O, fax, multiple network layers, cellular, etc., PLUS
whatever the future may hold) in both conventional and unconventional
ways.

Developers will have to write the "black boxes" that support these
communications, and they are going to require a much closer level of
interaction with various forms of hardware-based communications than
has previously been the norm.  I don't know how many of you have had
experience with developing low-level communications drivers - but I
have, and (depending upon the device/protocol in question) they can
involve Boolean operations out the wazoo.  Pardon my Latin, but if an
M developer were faced with doing this sort of job with the tools
available today, s/he'd be SOL.

That's just one example that immediately pops to mind.  In any case -
better to have the tools and not need them, than to need the tools and
not have them.  :>


Floyd Dennis
fbdennis@mindspring.com

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