64 bit architectures and C/C++

[Stephen Clamage]

dhoward at ready.eng.ready.com (David Howard) writes:

>C compilers for the 80x86 abortchitecture have long=32 and pointer=32,
>neither of which is easily supported or natural on that chip. 

Type long is required to be at least 32 bits.  This is reasonable on
386/486.  If it is not convenient on 8086/286, that is irrelevant,
since the type cannot be smaller.  No one would implement long as, say,
36 bits on these machines, since that would in fact be unnatural.

Pointers on 8086/286 (or 386 in "real" mode) are either 16 or 32 bits,
depending on whether they are "near" or "far", and consequently are easily
supported and natural.
-- 

Steve Clamage, TauMetric Corp, steve at taumet.com