>John,
>
>This is not a good example, in .NET ultimately it all gets compiled either in a single step or by the JIT technology.
>
>The other big difference between p-code and the .NET IL is that you can actually write and compile a program using IL instructions whereas p-code is usually a proprietry representation of the symbol tables and tokens in a manner optimised for the back-end executor.

Many years ago, when I first came across p-code Pascal, one of the tools we had was a p-code assembler, so we were able to write small routines directly in p-code (more often used for patching/optimising p-code generated from Pascal). We also had a p-code compiler, that produced native code for the specific machine we were running on.

Isn't IL "a proprietry representation of the symbol tables and tokens in a manner optimised for the back-end executor ?

IMO, the only real difference between p-code & IL is the name, otherwise the principle is the same.

Similarly, this is just my 2p worth.