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{\huge 
Yes, thank you, that part was obvious already. The question pertained
to the fact that nobody outside compiler-visible code was being handed
an address for b, and so the compiler could (if it wanted to) prove
under pretty broad assumptions that nobody could *find* b to make the
change in the first place. \par

Now other people assure me that the Standard explicitly rules this out,
and I'm willing to believe that--although naturally I'd still feel more 
comfortable if I'd actually seen the relevant text. Just so long as
we're not making another wild-guess stab at solving the problem. \par}


{\huge As it turns out, the discussion is now moot since volatile does indeed
imply here what I dared not assume it would, and so it might even solve
the RELOC problem. }

Jeroen  jtv <jtv@xs4all.nl>

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