Hello everybody!
I have some questions about the programming contest. I have already been
busy making an unsigned multiply routine as a start. But I encounter some
problems with the contest itself:
- The real routine needs to be signed. But how to do that? I mean do I have
to use 2-complement notation or can I just take whatever I like... For
instance I can use 15 out of 16 bits for keeping the number and use 1 bit
for deciding if this number is positive or negative.
- What is the time an instruction uses? I have a table with T-states, but I
have heard something about wait-states. Do I have to add one wait-state
for every instruction, for every byte of code or for every M-cycle?
- How is the time the routine uses calculated? There are some jumps in it
which make a worst case/best case situation possible. But simply take an
average of these isn't enough. When a routine is optimized for one
calculation (for instance 0*0) and it takes other calculations at normal
speed the best case gets much better and the worst case gets only little
worse. So the average will get better. Please give better regulations on
this subject.
- Are the multiply routine and the division routine part of separate
contests or are they together in one contest? I can imagine both routines
may result in different winners. So who will be the winner overall?
- All routines are said to be published at the mailinglist at november 1st.
This is after the end of the contest to get a fair competition. But in
his mail of september 4th Jos Hulzink writes nobody needs to send his
routines because he already has the fastest routines himself. But a real
fair competition excludes him from taking part in it! Except if everybody
sends his routines to him on october 31th at the end of the day...
I hope these questions result in some better defined regulations!
Jasper Lautenbag.
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