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- Path: sparky!uunet!cs.utexas.edu!uwm.edu!ogicse!news.u.washington.edu!milton.u.washington.edu!dong
- From: dong@milton.u.washington.edu (Dong-Lok Kim)
- Newsgroups: comp.arch
- Subject: Re: Computer Architecture Rationale
- Message-ID: <1992Aug29.044900.19852@u.washington.edu>
- Date: 29 Aug 92 04:49:00 GMT
- Article-I.D.: u.1992Aug29.044900.19852
- References: <GLEW.92Aug28171114@pdx007.intel.com>
- Sender: news@u.washington.edu (USENET News System)
- Organization: University of Washington, Seattle
- Lines: 33
-
- >>I once made the mistake of giving my manager a copy of the
- >>architecture description with the rationale visible as struck out
- >>text, clearly indicated as such. The rationale described some of the
- >>rejected alternatives, and the reasoning --- but it also clearly
- >>stated what was planned, in the form of a specification. Status report
- >>said "Architecture description more a collection of alternatives than
- >>a plan". Right away I gave him a copy of the same spec, with the
- >>rationale conditional text turned off (invisible). Next status report
- >>said "Architecture description much improved."
-
- >>Moral: no matter how clearly you try to separate rationale from
- >>decision, some people will get confused.
- --
-
- >>Andy Glew, glew@ichips.intel.com
-
- I agree on Andy. The rationale gives more confusion..
-
- Sometimes we get involved in a project where some specification or
- methodology is alredy given by political reasons. For example, you need to use
- i860 because your company or school is funded by Intel. We usually have
- to include some white lies (?) in the rationale even though we clearly see
- some critical limits of i860(for example) for your target appliation. Or you
- don't have much time to look around other processors to give another rationale
- to replace i860. It is painful in either case.
-
- Dong-Lok Kim
-
- --
- ICSL (Image Computing System Lab)
- Dept. of Electrical Eng., FT-10
- University of Washington
- Seattle, WA 98195
-