Re: [Psyco-devel] Non x86 version?

[Jesus C. A. <jc...@ar...>]

> Now I plan to rewrite Psyco again according to the ideas tested in the
> current version, in a much more flexible way. This will let Psyco be
> easily extended in various directions, including support for several
> very different "back-end" architectures.

You should checkout virtual machines compiled "just in time" for the
native platform. Example: OpenJIT, VCODE and GNU Lightning. So, your
backend could be "abstract" without losing almost no efficiency.

Google is your friend :-). Some random links:

http://www.openjit.org/
http://www.pdos.lcs.mit.edu/~engler/pldi96-abstract.html
http://www.gnu.org/software/lightning/

In my modest opinion, the virtual machine (basic, without JIT) should
come back, anyway, to cover any device where python runs, including MIPS
and ARM, for example :-(.

> So adding basic support for new processors should be relatively easy
> for people familiar to the instruction set.

Currently assembler coding is almost a lost art :-(

I had a look to current Psyco code, and to develop a new CPU backend
seems a lot of work, since details about x86 instruction set seems to
percolate the generic python core. I spend about 2-3 hours studying your
current code and the task seems not trivial.

[About Pyrex]
> Wouldn't it be nicer (and so much more flexible) to use Python as a
> language to specify the types as well?

I was thinking along the line, too. Some like:

import Pyrex
...
a=Pyrex.Integer()
b=Pyrex.Float()
c=Pyrex.list(b)
...

So, the code remains 100% Python but when Pyrex compiles it, the
compiler could recognize the constructors.

> Actually defining such a type system, and moreover giving the user
> control over the actual representation of the data, is exactly what I
> will need for the next Psyco. Currently there is already some
> flexibility in the typing information (e.g. types like 'tuple of two
> elements whose first element is an int') but it is purely in C and not
> really extensible -- and certainly not extensible by Python code.

Nice. That's the king of things where Psyco shines. If I only could run
pysco on my machines... };-)

-- 
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