[tz] [PROPOSED] Do not assume bytes have 8 bits

[Brian Inglis]

On 2021-04-23 13:27, Paul Eggert via tz wrote:
> * zic.c (convert, convert64): Mask bytes with 0xff before storing
> them, for portability to machines where bytes have more than 8 bits.
> Although this is surely only of theoretical interest, we might as
> well be portable.

Not uncommon on DSPs which are now being used not only for graphics but also for 
machine learning and neural network processing for audio speech recognition, 
video object recognition and classification, and natural language recognition e.g.

https://www.embecosm.com/2017/04/18/non-8-bit-char-support-in-clang-and-llvm/

The models are so large with billions or trillions of parameters that they hit 
limits on systems with 4 GPUs each having 12GB local memory, 64-128GB system 
memory, even with usual optimizations to use 16 bit floats.

-- 
Take care. Thanks, Brian Inglis, Calgary, Alberta, Canada

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