Noalias trivia question

[Karl Heuer]

In article <7832 at brl-smoke.ARPA> gwyn at brl.arpa (Doug Gwyn (VLD/VMB) <gwyn>) writes:
>[If you need noalias-style optimizations for vectorization]
>You should discuss this with your compiler vendor.  First ask for good
>global data access analysis (although it's unlikely that you'll get it),
>then ask for a compiler flag for special treatment of [] parameters, then
>ask for a __keyword.

Please, let's not have "int a[]" mean "int * noalias a" in formal parameters,
even as a non-conforming extension.  Logically, what that declaration should
mean is "array of int", with the whole array passed by value%.  Ask your
vendor for a magic keyword, a pragma, a new flavor of assert(), or whatever,
but let's reserve array notation for what it should have meant in the first
place.

Karl W. Z. Heuer (ima!haddock!karl or karl at haddock.isc.com), The Walking Lint
Followups to comp.std.c.
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% Although to be meaningful, it would need an explicit size.