[Vm-dev] Re: [ANN] 7061 = Squeak 3.9 final

Bert Freudenberg bert at freudenbergs.de
Tue Sep 26 10:24:16 UTC 2006


Am 26.09.2006 um 00:28 schrieb Alan Grimes:

> 1. Linux on my system currently has a major major bug that causes my
> machine to be unusable for all but the most trivial tasks. linux blows
> donkies.

We know by now, and we could not care less. Please stop bitching  
about operating systems on Squeak lists. There are better places for  
that.

> 2. The current Slang > C compiler is very hackish and behaves in very
> counterintuitive ways, especially with regards to the VM.

Actually, the translation is quite straight-forward, in particular  
compared to similar translation projects in other languages. If there  
is something specific you want to know, just ask.

> 3. It is very difficult to understand how the Slang compiler interacts
> with the system compiler so it would be very very difficult for anyone
> except the most elite Squeak programmer to work on it. -- One gripe I
> have with the current (recient?) system compiler is that it doesn't
> provide information about the scope of a variable (method context  
> versus
> block context)

What do you mean by "system compiler"? The (old) Squeak compiler? It  
indeed does handle block-local variables as method temps. Why is this  
a problem for Slang?

> 4. Because of how the current compiler works, it is impossible to  
> get a
> working VM that isn't inlined and therefore doing normal code
> coverage/profiling becomes many times more difficult.

That would be a bug, I think, but it would not be high on the  
priority list. Would be a nice little project to clean that up I guess.

> 5. Mere mortals don't have access to the current version. Any hacker
> trying to get the "development" version can't (or at least couldn't  
> last
> time I checked). You COULD develop based off of what's on the  
> website or
> try to get the SVN source working (VERY HARD/IMPOSSIBLE -- used to be
> very reliable), but then you'd have to completely re-do your changes
> when you finally get a chance to sync with the mainline version. =(

Not true anymore, at least for the Unix VM. SVN head works perfectly  
for me.

- Bert -



More information about the Vm-dev mailing list