forcing tail/sibling call optimization

[Jeffrey A Law]

  In message < oupn1el760c.fsf@pigdrop.muc.suse.de >you write:
  > Problem I see with that is diagnostics again: e.g. someone depends on a 
  > particular call being a tail call and not allocating new storage.
Therein lies the first problem -- programmer dependence on specific 
optimizations in the compiler.  That's a fundamental mistake.

If you _must_ have tail calls optimized to gotos, then write them that way
or use a language which guarantees tail calls will turn into gotos.  If
tail call optimizations are merely convenience, then write them as calls :-)

  >  With a 
  > "tail call statement" gcc could easily give a warning or even an error
  > when the compiler is not able to satisfy that requirement.
True.

  >  With the functio
  > wide attribute it would be much harder to enforce it. Every call could
  > possible be a tail call depending on rather complex, machine dependent rule
True.

  > How would you generate the "not a tail call" warning without getting lots
  > of false positives? With an explicit statement it is clear what to do. 
I don't think there really is a way.  Nor do I think we should spend a lot
of time worrying about it :-)

jeff