Re:Writing a RISC-V Emulator in Rust
by hajile on Monday October 27, 2025 @01:43PM
(#45724058)
The fact that essentially every major ISA except x86 has support for big-endian including the two latest big-name entries (ARMv8 and RISC-V) contradicts this assertion.
Most importantly, big-endian numbers have overwhelmingly won the human factor. If I write 4567, you don't interpret it as 7 thousand 6 hundred and fifty-four. Even an "inverted big-endian" (writing the entire sequence backward rather than partially forward and partially backward like little endian) makes more sense and would be much more at home with right-to-left readers more than little endian too.
Most importantly, big-endian numbers have overwhelmingly won the human factor. If I write 4567, you don't interpret it as 7 thousand 6 hundred and fifty-four. Even an "inverted big-endian" (writing the entire sequence backward rather than partially forward and partially backward like little endian) makes more sense and would be much more at home with right-to-left readers more than little endian too.