[Python-3000] C API for ints and strings

["Martin v. Löwis"]

> 3.0: 10 loops, best of 3: 6.76 sec per loop
> 2.6: 10 loops, best of 3: 2.61 sec per loop

I can't quite reproduce these results. On a 3.2GHz Pentium 4,
running Linux 2.6.21, gcc 4.1.3, I get

3.0: 10 loops, best of 3: 728 msec per loop
2.6: 10 loops, best of 3: 558 msec per loop

So it's only 30% slower, not 260%.

What puzzles me more is that on comparable machines, it
runs 5 to 10 times as fast on Linux as it does on Windows.
Have you turned off optimization by any chance in the
compiler (what compiler did you use, anyway)?

Regards,
Martin