Re: Optimizers

[Dick Gabriel <RPG at SU-AI>]

I think that this conversation is a little misguided. First, the
optimizers are only for the compiler, not the interpreter. Second, there
is a concept (source-to-source transformations) plus a control structure
(re-application until quiescence). In the first case, people should not
mind that compile cpu-time is sacrificed for runtime cpu-time.  In the
second case, the ordered list of optimizers is re-scanned until none
applies. Since one can optimize an expression to any value (in theory),
one needs a second value to report the success of the attempt. I do not 
see the completeness of this loss as clearly as some others do.
			-rpg