Preprocessor arithmetic

[Zack Weinberg]

On Wed, Nov 15, 2000 at 07:43:06AM +0000, Neil Booth wrote:
> Zack Weinberg wrote:-
> 
> > Either.  Think about cross-compiling from a 32-bit machine to a brand
> > new shiny 128-bit chip.  Okay, this is less likely than cross-
> > compiling from a 32-bit machine to an embedded 16- or 8-bit chip, but
> > no less wrong.
> 
> Right.  In other words, we require arbitrary precision integer
> arithmetic.  My understanding is that not even the compiler proper
> does this.

The compiler proper has support for up to 2*HOST_WIDE_INT integer
arithmetic (actually operating on tree nodes).  I think.

> What's the long term goal in this area?  To write a library to handle
> such arithmetic, and use it in cpp and the front ends?

Hm, g95 presently uses libgmp for integer and floating point
arithmetic simulation.  It might not be a bad idea to scrap what we
have and use libgmp everywhere - particularly the floating point
emulator.

zw