[ruby-talk:22878] Re: Animorphic VM

Yo!

Did anybody check out this new cool VM that will created for the next
generation of Perl (and maybe for Python, too). It is called Parrot
and you can find anything about it under www.parrotcode.org. The VM
was built with dynamic scripting languages like Perl, Python, Tcl and
Ruby in mind and its architecture is very interesting in my opinion,
because it is not stack-oriented, but works as a hardware CPU does.

Cheers,

  <maik/>

Robert Feldt <[e-mail]> wrote in message news:<[e-mail]>...
> Hi,
> 
> (This is a bit long)
> 
> Below are some info I've assembled about the Animorhpic VM (AVM). 
> Sorry for the redundancies (and line wrap!). IMO, the reply from Gilad
> Bracha at Sun (one of its developers) is the most interesting.
> 
> My conclusions so far (might change!) are:
> * AVM is very relevant to Ruby VM development. It combines a fast
>   interpreter with dynamic compilation based on runtime profiling info.
> * A release of AVM (now owned by SUN) is coming up but its unclear when.
> * Its unclear how much can be learned from it since the VM sources will
>   NOT be released (only binaries of the VM and the Smalltalk source for
>   libraries etc).
>     * This probably indicates that there are still techniques in there
>       that are still commercially important => AVM still technically
>       state-of-the-art!?
> * There might be some docs released with the AVM release but none is
>   available right now so it'll have to be written => I doubt new docs will be
>   written for such an old project?!
> * AVM probably machine-dependent since contains dynamic compiler that has
>   to (?) emit machine code. Probably Sparc's.
> * The academic papers from the people behind AVM (on Self, Strongtalk,
>   Cecil etc) is highly relevant to VM development.
> 
> so mainly:
> 
> the Ruby community might learn from this but the AVM itself cannot be the
> basis for a Ruby VM since there will be no sources available. I somewhat
> doubt the future of AVM even for Smalltalk if there are no sources; how
> would it evolve?
> 
> Regards,
> 
> Robert Feldt
> 
> Ps. Stephane: I CC:ed you since you've also expressed interest in
> AVM.
> 
> 
> 
> Info on AVM
> ***********
> 
> Response from Gilad Bracha
> --------------------------
> >Hi Gilad,
> >
> >I'm working on VM related issues for the OO programming language Ruby and
> >recently heard about the Animorphic VM. I haven't found much hard facts
>  on
> >the technology even though there seems to be a lot of interest and
>  rumours
> >goind around.
> >
> >I'd appreciate if you could point me to any papers of information on AVM
> >and the technology it used/uses.
>  
> Robert,
>  
> I'll try and summarize things quickly; much of what I'll say you probably 
> already know.
>  
> Animorphic Smalltalk was a Smalltalk system built around the mid-90s as 
> part of a startup that was informally known as Animorphic Systems. In
> early 
> 1997, Animorphic was acquired by Sun, and much of the underlying VM 
> technology was put to real use in the Hotspot JVM.
>  
> Animorphic Smalltalk included a high performance VM, a blue-book
> compatible 
> library, novel browsers and flyweight glyph-based GUI framework, optional 
> type system, mirror based reflection and mixins.
> 
> The VM was a mixed-mode system, with a fast interpreter as well as dynamic 
> compiler that was invoked based on dynamic profiling info. The VM did not 
> make use of the type system at all; typing was strictly optional. Method 
> dispatch was based on inline caches, including PICs. All code was 
> represented internally as mixins, and any class could be used as a mixin
> as 
> well. Benchmarks showed that we were 2.5-4 times faster than commercial 
> Smalltalks at that time (Digitalk, ParcPlace (now Cincom) and IBM). The 
> system could run well on PC with 16Mb of RAM; it could be made to run in 
> less. We used generational GC and in the latest versions used the train 
> algorithm as well.
>  
> I believe we were the first mixed mode VM. The use of mixed-mode 
> (interpreter and compiler) was crucial for the combination of performance 
> with small footprint; the only previous application of similar technology 
> was Self, which was entirely compiled and had a huge footprint. It's also 
> very important for good interactive response.
>  
> We are currently engaged in an effort to release Animorphic Smalltalk. 
> Unfortunately,
> the source is restricted to the Smalltalk code; the VM was written in C++, 
> and will be released as a binary only.
> The release will most likely be governed by a Berkeley style license
> (i.e., 
> very liberal). I hope we can get a release out soon, but cannot give a
> firm 
> time table.
>  
> When the release comes out, there may be some more documentation  which 
> might be very interesting to you. However, that documentation does not 
> exist at the moment - someone needs to write it. It isn't clear if some
> one 
> really will. At the moment, all the documentation that exists is on my web 
> page.  You've probably looked at it. It isn't much, and it may not be 
> entirely accurate.
>  
> Since your focus is on VM issues and not on Smalltalk, such a release may 
> not be that useful to you. That said, I think it will be of some interest. 
> Ruby's underlying model is very Smalltalk-like. The primary differences is 
> that Ruby has mixins and let's objects change their class on the fly. The 
> use of mixins  was well supported in our system with essentially no
> penalty 
> in either time or space. Changing the class of an object seems 
> straightforward. Consequently, you can probably regard the performance of 
> Animorphic as a good indication of what is possible. Ultimately, it also 
> depends on resources; we could have done a good deal more given more time.
>  
> I hope this is helpful to you.
>  
>  
> Cheers,  Gilad
>  
> *********************************************
> Gilad Bracha
> Computational Theologist
> Sun Java Software
> http://java.sun.com/people/gbracha/
> 
> 
> Some links to info on Animorphic VM
> -----------------------------------
> 
> Animorphic VM (AVM) was a VM (and dynamic compiler!) 
> supporting both Smalltalk and Java that was 
> developed mid-1990's by a group of researchers previously working on Self. 
> They were bought by SUN in 1996 and their Java tech made it into the
> Hotspot 
> Java Jitter/dynamic optimizer. There has been rumours that SUN plan to
> make 
> its source code open. This is interesting since such a VM might include 
> techniques that can be used to implement Ruby VM's.
> 
> There is a lot of rumours on the great performance of the Animorphic VM
> but
> very little has been published and its hard to get by facts. Here's
> a list of interesting links with summaries (some from Conrad Schneiker):
> 
> http://brain.cs.uiuc.edu/StWritersCoop/Topics+having+found+authors
> "Animorphic Smalltalk: The animorphic Smalltalk is still today (more than
> 5
> years after its baught by SUN and the end of the project) one of the most
> interesting Smalltalk. Besides having the fastest VM, it is based on
> Mixins,
> incorporate a type system, new thought about Smalltalk GUI, recomposition
> of
> reflective Smalltalk aspects. Gilad Bracha [e-mail]
> promised
> to write a chapter on this amazing Smalltalk."
> 
> http://cow.physics.wisc.edu/~craigm/idl/archive/msg00077.html
> "The Self group started out at Stanford.  They later
>      moved to Sun.  Then, they formed a company
>      Animorphic, to commercialize the technology.
>      (Apparently, they got the memory consumption back
>      down to a reasonable level.)  But, before they
>      could, they were bought by Sun.  Sun's HotSpot
>      compiler for Java is supposed to be based on
>      this technology."
> 
> http://lampwww.epfl.ch/events.html
> "A High Performance Mixin Implementation (Gilad Bracha, Sun Microsystems)"
>  
> "We describe the use and implementation of mixins in the Animorphic
> Smalltalk system, a high performance Smalltalk virtual machine and
> programming environment. Mixins are the basic unit of implementation, and
> are directly supported by the VM. At the language level, code can be
> defined
> either in mixins or in classes, but classes are merely sugar for mixin
> definition and application. The Strongtalk type system supports the
> optional
> static typechecking of mixins in an encapsulated manner. Mixins are used
> at
> key points in the library. The system is the fastest Smalltalk
> implementation to date, typically three times faster than other Smalltalk
> implementations. Gilad Bracha received his Ph.D. 1992 from the University
> of
> Utah. He is now with Sun Microsystems where he worked on the
> specifications
> of the Java Programming Language and the Java Virtual Machine. He is
> currently the specification lead for an effort to extend the language to
> support generic types."
> 
> Papers
> ******
> "Extending Smalltalk with Mixins" Gilad Bracha and David Griswold,
> OOPSLA96 Workshop on Extending the Smalltalk Language,
> http://java.sun.com/people/gbracha/mwp.html
> 
> Similarities to Ruby's Mixin concept:
>  * A mixin can be composed with another mixin, to produce a composite
> mixin, in a manner completely analogous to function composition. (I think
> the same effect is accomplished in Ruby by including both modules in a
> class)
> 
> Differences:
>  * A mixin is not a class; it must be invoked on an actual superclass 
>    parameter to PRODUCE A CLASS.
>  
> Facts on the company Animorphic Systems
> ***************************************
> Also known as Longview Technologies
> (http://developer.java.sun.com/developer/onlineTraining/webcasts/javaone01/rhutcherson.html)
> 
> Founded in 1994
> 
> Sun aquired them in early 1997
> http://java.sun.com/pr/1997/feb/pr970218-01.html
> http://www.wired.com/news/topstories/0,1287,6557,00.html
> 
> (Technical) People
> ******************
> Urs Hzle, Co-founder of Animorphic systems,
> http://www.cs.ucsb.edu/~urs/
> http://buffy.eecs.berkeley.edu/Seminars/Old.98/Apr/980413.hoelzle.html
> Probably the professor behind most of this (Self, Animorphic and Hotspot)
> Principal designer of Java Hotspot
> Currently works at google
> 
> Gilad Bracha, http://java.sun.com/people/gbracha/
> Now at SUN.
> I mailed him on the 17/10 2001 and asked him for pointers.
> 
> Lars Bak, Lecturer at Aarhus University,
> Has course on OO VM implementation
> http://www.daimi.au.dk/doc152.html: "...worked on Animorphic systems"
> Also worked on Self.
> 
> Robert Griesemer, Senior Staff Engineer, HotSpot Client Compiler Group,
> Sun Microsystems
> "He joined Longview Technologies (aka Animorphic Systems), a newly founded
> startup company in Palo Alto, California, in 1994. At Longview, he was
> instrumental in designing and implementing Smalltalk and Java virtual
> machines. Since 1997 Robert has been with Sun Microsystems where he
> continued to work on the Java HotSpot Virtual Machine technology
> originally developed at Longview. In particular, he has been responsible
> for the design and implementation of the interpreter and much of the
> runtime architecture as well as the Client Compiler. He has been the
> Technical Lead of the Java HotSpot Virtual Machine team for the last
> year."
> 
> David Griswold, was President of LongView Technologies
> Co-authored some related papers with Bracha and was main author on Sun's
> Java Hotspot paper.
> 
> David Ungar
> Unclear if he was involved but probable.