<br><br><div class="gmail_quote">On Fri, Mar 8, 2013 at 12:15 PM, Louis LaBrunda <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:Lou@keystone-software.com" target="_blank" class="vt-p">Lou@keystone-software.com</a>></span> wrote:<br>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex"><br>
Hi Casey,<br>
<br>
Since you are posting the to VM news group I will give you an idea I had a<br>
while ago that requires a little VM work. The goal is an object database<br>
that doesn't require serializing the objects.<br>
<br>
This would be done by replacing the normal memory pointers in objects with<br>
offsets from the beginning of the database. Persistent objects (those from<br>
the database) would have an indicator to distinguish them form<br>
non-persistent objects. When accessing persistent objects the VM would use<br>
the database offset pointer as a key into a virtual memory lookup table<br>
whose value would be the real memory address of the object. If not present<br>
in the table, the object would be read from the database. Remember,<br>
everything else about the object would look the same as it does now in<br>
memory. From time to time the VM would save all changed (DB) objects to<br>
the database. If this sounds familiar it should, it is the way most caches<br>
work.<br>
<br></blockquote><div><br></div><div>That sounds quite similar to what Gemstone does. It tags persistent objects with a bit in the object reference. I think</div><div>Gemstone 32 used the combination 10 for the last bits (because of 4 alignment all object pointers ended up with 00 and SmallIntegers with 01 or 11, so 10 was free).</div>
<div>Gemstone 64 uses several bits for tagging (6 or 8 or something like that). Besides tagging persisten objects they can also embed immediate objects like characters, small flotas, nil, and stuff like that. </div><div><br>
</div><div>Best, </div><div> </div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex">
I have no experience with the VM (and not very much experience with Squeak)<br>
but I think this would be a cool project and it could be useful. I'm not<br>
is much better shape than you are but I could contribute some time and<br>
ideas.<br>
<br>
Lou<br>
<div><div class="h5"><br>
<br>
>Hello Squeakers!<br>
><br>
>My job search is turning up dead ends, hurry up and wait, and unfathomably boring prospects.<br>
><br>
>Screw all that! I want to do something cool.<br>
><br>
>I'm thinking about doing a KickStarter, but almost all of my ideas are either a) stuff no one else wants which only I could possibly think would be cool, or b) overly ambitious. The words Andreas used to describe my last idea: "a bit grandiose." Gift for understatement at times.<br>
><br>
>So I'm looking for something which could be completed by one or two geeks in six months to a year, which people actually want, to be implemented (at least in part) using Squeak, and to be released at the end under the MIT license.<br>
><br>
>I've floored my expenses, so I can make my own labor (relatively, for a guy living in Seattle) very cheap. By floored, I mean the room I sleep in isn't even tall enough to stand up in -- I do not presently meet the definition of a free-range chicken -- and I've disconnected my cellular service. I want to be an efficient engine for getting things that matter to me and other people done, rather than go on being some tool used to ship lucrative enterprise crapware.<br>
><br>
>So here's the $x question: what do you want me to do? I have a Raspberry Pi on order, so bonus points if you can work that in somehow.<br>
><br>
>The person with the best (realistic) idea will be credited for it.<br>
><br>
>Inspire me! And thanks for reading all the way down to the bottom of this message.<br>
><br>
>Casey<br>
</div></div>-----------------------------------------------------------<br>
Louis LaBrunda<br>
Keystone Software Corp.<br>
SkypeMe callto://PhotonDemon<br>
mailto:<a href="mailto:Lou@Keystone-Software.com" class="vt-p">Lou@Keystone-Software.com</a> <a href="http://www.Keystone-Software.com" target="_blank" class="vt-p">http://www.Keystone-Software.com</a><br>
<br>
</blockquote></div><br><br clear="all"><div><br></div>-- <br>Mariano<br><a href="http://marianopeck.wordpress.com" target="_blank" class="vt-p">http://marianopeck.wordpress.com</a><br>