Mini-Quiz: What is the Byte length of a boolean variable?

[(X)]

Can you guess what the Debug Output is going to be?

Dim t As Boolean = True
Dim f As Boolean = False

Trace Len(t)
Trace Len(f)

Test Boolean Var Length.G32 (172 B)

[Roger Cabo]

I assume byte?

but i never use byte or boolean.. always use int for byte and boolean..
From what I think its faster by assembler to get the adresss in 32bits than 8 bits and mask.
An perhaps a bit-test should is also slower than memory compare against 4 bytes with test register and branch..

I could be completely wrong!

[(X)]

Check this out:

Dim t As Boolean = True
Dim f As Boolean = False

Trace Len(t)
Trace Len(f)

Type T_Bool
 tf As Bool
EndType

Trace Len(T_Bool)

Dim tf As T_Bool
Trace SizeOf(tf)

[(X)]

And further:
$Library "gfawinx"
$Library "UpdateRT"
UpdateRuntime      ' Patches GfaWin23.Ocx

Dim t As Boolean = True
Dim f As Boolean = False

Trace Len(t)
Trace Len(f)

Type T_Bool
 B0 As Bool
 B1 As Bool
 B2 As Bool
 B3 As Bool
 B4 As Bool
 B5 As Bool
 B6 As Bool
 B7 As Bool
 C0 As Bool
 C1 As Bool
 C2 As Bool
 C3 As Bool
 C4 As Bool
 C5 As Bool
 C6 As Bool
 C7 As Bool
EndType

Trace Len(T_Bool)

Dim tf As T_Bool
tf.B0 = True
tf.B1 = True
tf.B2 = True
tf.B3 = True
tf.B4 = True
tf.B5 = True
tf.B6 = True
tf.B7 = True
tf.C0 = True
tf.C1 = True
tf.C2 = True
tf.C3 = True
tf.C4 = True
tf.C5 = True
tf.C6 = True
tf.C7 = True
Trace tf.B0
Trace tf.B1
Trace tf.B2
Trace tf.B3
Trace tf.B4
Trace tf.B5
Trace tf.B6
Trace tf.B7
Debug HexDump(V:tf)
tf.B0 = False
tf.B1 = False
tf.B2 = False
tf.B3 = False
tf.B4 = False
tf.B5 = False
tf.B6 = False
tf.B7 = False
tf.C0 = False
tf.C1 = False
tf.C2 = False
tf.C3 = False
tf.C4 = False
tf.C5 = False
tf.C6 = False
tf.C7 = False
Debug HexDump(V:tf)
Trace SizeOf(tf)
Trace tf.B0
Trace tf.B1
Trace tf.B2
Trace tf.B3
Trace tf.B4
Trace tf.B5
Trace tf.B6
Trace tf.B7


Debug Output...

TRACE:(1):Len(t) = 5
TRACE:(2):Len(f) = 6
TRACE:(3):Len(T_Bool) = 2
TRACE:(4):tf.B0 = True
TRACE:(5):tf.B1 = True
TRACE:(6):tf.B2 = True
TRACE:(7):tf.B3 = True
TRACE:(8):tf.B4 = True
TRACE:(9):tf.B5 = True
TRACE:(10):tf.B6 = True
TRACE:(11):tf.B7 = True
062F3DF0: FF FF 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 ÿÿ...... ........

062F3DF0: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 ........ ........

TRACE:(12):SizeOf(tf) = 2
TRACE:(13):tf.B0 = False
TRACE:(14):tf.B1 = False
TRACE:(15):tf.B2 = False
TRACE:(16):tf.B3 = False
TRACE:(17):tf.B4 = False
TRACE:(18):tf.B5 = False
TRACE:(19):tf.B6 = False
TRACE:(20):tf.B7 = False

[dragonjim]

Dec 6, 2023 17:05:40 GMT 1 (X) said:

Can you guess what the Debug Output is going to be?

Dim t As Boolean = True
Dim f As Boolean = False

Trace Len(t)
Trace Len(f)

View Attachment

The Len function converts the output into a string, with a leading space if it is numeric - interesting that it converts it to " True" and " False" rather than " -1" and " 0".

Another interesting thing I noticed when playing around with this is that using Mode StrSpace 0 does not shorten the output as you would expect, although it does for other numeric values:

Dim t As Boolean = True
Dim f As Boolean = False
Dim g As Int32 = 34

Mode StrSpace 1
Trace Len(t) : Trace "*" & t & "*"
Trace Len(f) : Trace "*" & f & "*"
Trace Len(g) : Trace "*" & g & "*"

Mode StrSpace 0
Trace Len(t) : Trace "*" & t & "*"
Trace Len(f) : Trace "*" & f & "*"
Trace Len(g) : Trace "*" & g & "*"
...produces...

TRACE:(1):Len(t) =  5
TRACE:(2):"*" & t & "*" = * True*
TRACE:(3):Len(f) =  6
TRACE:(4):"*" & f & "*" = * False*
TRACE:(5):Len(g) =  3
TRACE:(6):"*" & g & "*" = * 34*
TRACE:(7):Len(t) =  5
TRACE:(8):"*" & t & "*" = * True*
TRACE:(9):Len(f) =  6
TRACE:(10):"*" & f & "*" = * False*
TRACE:(11):Len(g) =  2
TRACE:(12):"*" & g & "*" = *34*

[dragonjim]

The functions better suited to variable length are SizeOf and BitSizeOf as can be seen from the updated example from the help page:

OpenW 1
Type atest
   Boolean a
 - Int b
 - Double c
 - Byte d
EndType

Dim a As atest
a.a = 1 : a.b = 2 : a.c = 3 : a.d = 4

Print " Size of the element in bit"
Print "BitSizeOf of a: ", BitSizeOf(a.a)
Print "BitSizeOf of b: ", BitSizeOf(a.b)
Print "BitSizeOf of c: ", BitSizeOf(a.c)
Print "BitSizeOf of d: ", BitSizeOf(a.d)
Print
Print " Size of the element's in byte"
Print "SizeOf of a: ", SizeOf(a.a)
Print "SizeOf of b: ", SizeOf(a.b)
Print "SizeOf of c: ", SizeOf(a.c)
Print "SizeOf of d: ", SizeOf(a.d)

When dealing with user-defined types, Len does work as SizeOf but, as shown in the posts above, when dealing with other types of variables, it converts them into strings first and then outputs the length of the string.

It is similar with Trim: if you use Trim(3), it will automatically convert the number into a string first (with a leading space) then trim it, then output the string version which is "3".  So Trim(3) is really Trim(Str(3)), and Len(3) is really Len(Str(3)).

[Roger Cabo]

There are also interesting stuff to know about cpus and math.

In the past I have tried to optimize sqrt() by a LUT.. or Unity Vector3 trigonometric functions as well.

docs.unity3d.com/ScriptReference/Vector3.html

All of the functions that use system.math.sqrt() are FASTER than a LUT table. :-)

When you tried to optimize the sqrt() function in Unity's Vector3 class using a Lookup Table, you found it slower because accessing memory (to read the LUT) is often slower than calculating the square root directly using SIMD Single Instruction, Multiple Data instructions. Modern CPUs are highly optimized for these calculations, making direct computation faster than memory access in this case.

--------

anyway, a setup of the Vector2 functions and methods in gb32 for D2D would be great as lib.. inside of D2D. would be a simple copy and paste.
docs.unity3d.com/ScriptReference/Vector2.html (with the source code). Constructors any types as well. it's not much.

Types in Double and Single.. (Not sure of someone require single these days, make all the stuff so jerky and unusable in some conditions.)

Vector2
Vector2Int
Vector4
Quaternion // rotation that would not stuck at 0°
Rotation // euler
Transform