/ 
parrot-0.8.0
/ docs/glossary.pod

NAME

docs/glossary.pod - Parrot Glossary

SUMMARY

Short descriptions of words and acronyms found in Parrot development.

GLOSSARY

AST

Abstract Syntax Tree: a data structure typically generated by a language parser.

bcg

Byte Code Generation: bcg will be part of the Parrot Compiler tools. It will aid in coverting POST to byte code.

Continuations

Think of continuations as an execution "context". This context includes everything local to that execution path, not just the stack. It is a snapshot in time (minus global variables). While it is similar to C's setjmp (taking the continuation)/longjmp (invoking the continuation), longjmp'ing only works "down" the stack; jumping "up" the stack (ie, back to a frame that has returned) is bad. Continuations can work either way.

We can do two important things with continuations:

  1. Create and pass a continuation object to a subroutine, which may recursively pass that object up the call chain until, at some point, the continuation can be called/executed to handle the final computation or return value. This is pretty much tail recursion.

  2. Continuations can be taken at an arbitrary call depth, freezing the call chain (context) at that point in time. If we save that continuation object into a variable, we can later reinstate the complete context by its "handle". This allows neat things like backtracking that aren't easily done in conventional stacked languages, such as C. Since continuations represent "branches" in context, it requires an environment that uses some combination of heap-based stacks, stack trees and/or stack copying.

It is common in a system that supports continuations to implement co-routines on top of them.

A continuation is a sort of super-closure. When you take a continuation, it makes a note of the current call stack and lexical scratchpads, along with the current location in the code. When you invoke a continuation, the system drops what it's doing, puts the call stack and scratchpads back, and jumps to the execution point you were at when the continuation was taken. It is, in effect, like you never left that point in your code.

Note that, like with closures, it only puts the scratchpads back in scope - it doesn't do anything with the values in the variables that are in those scratchpads.

Co-Routines

Co-routines are virtually identical to normal subroutines, except while subroutines always execute from their starting instruction to where they return, co-routines may suspend themselves (or be suspended asynchronously if the language permits) and resume at that point later. We can implement things like "factories" with co-routines. If the co-routine never returns, every time we call it, we "resume" the routine.

A co-routine is a subroutine that can stop in the middle, and start back up later at the point you stopped. For example:

sub sample : coroutine {
   print "A\n";
   yield;
   print "B\n";
   return;
}

sample();
print "Foo!\n";
sample();

will print

A
Foo!
B

Basically, the yield keyword says, "Stop here, but the next time we're called, pick up at the next statement." If you return from a co-routine, the next invocation starts back at the beginning. Co-routines remember all their state, local variables, and suchlike things.

COW

Copy On Write: a technique that copies strings lazily.

If you have a string A, and make a copy of it to get string B, the two strings should be identical, at least to start. With COW, they are, because string A and string B aren't actually two separate strings - they're the same string, marked COW. If either string A or string B are changed, the system notes it and only at that point does it make a copy of the string data and change it.

If the program never actually changes the string - something that's fairly common - the program need never make a copy, saving both memory and time.

destruction

Destruction is low level memory clean up, such as calling free on malloced memory. This happens after "finalization", and if resources are adequate, may only happen as a side effect of program exit.

DOD

Dead Object Detection: the process of sweeping through all the objects, variables, and whatnot inside of Parrot, and deciding which ones are in use and which ones aren't. The ones that aren't in use are then freed up for later reuse. (After they're destroyed, if active destruction is warranted.)

See also: "GC"

finalization

Finalization is high-level, user visible cleanup of objects, such as closing an associated DB handle. Finalization reduces active objects down to passive blocks of memory, but does not actually reclaim that memory. Memory is reclaimed by the related "destruction" operation, as and when necessary.

GC

Garbage Collection: the process of sweeping through all the active objects, variables, and structures, marking the memory they're using as in use, and all other memory is freed up for later reuse.

Garbage Collection and Dead Object Detection are separate in Parrot, since we generally chew through memory segments faster than we chew through objects. (This is a characteristic peculiar to Perl and other languages that do string processing. Other languages chew through objects faster than memory)

See also: "DOD"

HLL

High-Level Language; Any of the languages that target the parrot virtual machine.

ICU

International Components for Unicode

ICU is a C and C++ library that provides support for Unicode on a variety of platforms. It was distributed with parrot at one time, but current releases require you to get your own copy.

http://oss.software.ibm.com/icu/index.html

IMCC

Intermediate Code Compiler: the component of parrot that compiles PASM and PIR into bytecode.

See also "PIR".

JAPH

Just another Parrot Hacker: or, a small script that generates that text.

MRO

Method resolution order

NCI

Native Call Interface: parrot's interface to native "C" libraries, without a C-compiler.

NQP

Not Quite Perl (6): designed to be a very small compiler for quickly generating PIR routines to create transformers for Parrot (especially HLL compilers).

See also "PCT".

Packfile

Another name for a PBC file, due to the names used for data structures in one of the early implementations in Perl 5.

PAST

Acronym for Parrot Abstract Syntax Tree, a set of classes that represent an abstract syntax tree.

See also "PCT".

PBC

Parrot Byte Code. The name for the "executable" files that can be passed to the Parrot interpreter for immediate execution (although PASM and IMC files can be executed directly, too).

See also "Packfile".

PCT

Parrot Compiler Toolkit: a complete set of tools and libraries that are designed to create compilers targeting Parrot. The principal components of PCT are PGE, PCT::HLLCompiler (a compiler driver), PAST classes, POST classes, PCT::Grammar (a base class for PGE grammars).

In the ideal case, a language can be implemented by providing its parser (using Perl 6 rules) which is generated by PGE, and providing a module written in NQP that contains the actions that are to be invoked during the parse. These actions can then create the appropriate PAST nodes. A PAST to PIR transformation already exists. Depending on the language, other phases can be added, or overridden (for instance, the PAST to PIR transformation).

PIRC

Acronym for PIR Compiler, a PIR compiler currently still in experimental phase. The purpose is to reimplement the PIR language, which is currently implemented by IMCC. There are two versions of PIRC: a handwritten, recursive- descent top-down compiler, written in C, and a version using a Bison and Flex grammar specification.

Some day, either PIRC should be completed, or IMCC should be cleaned up.

PDD

Parrot Design Document: documents that describe the features parrot must implement.

See also "pdd00_pdd" in pdds.

PGE

Parrot Grammar Engine.

See also "PCT".

PIL

Pugs' Intermediate Language.

PIR

Parrot Intermediate Representation: A medium-level assembly language for Parrot that hides messy details like register allocation so language compiler writers who target Parrot don't have to roll their own. Files have the extension .pir.

PMC

Parrot Magic Cookie: these classes are the primitives that HLLs use to represent their fundamental types, such as Perl's scalar values.

POD

(Perl's) Plain Old Documentation: the preferred form for all kinds of documentation in Parrot. See perlpod for details.

POST

Parrot Opcode Syntax Tree: A set of classes that represent opcodes.

See also "PCT".

Predereferencing

A bytecode transformation technique which reduces the amount of pointer dereferencing done in the inner loop of the interpreter by pre-converting opcode numbers into pointers to their opfuncs, and also converting the register numbers and constant numbers in the arguments to the ops into pointers.

The original implementation by Gregor Purdy was posted on 2001-12-11. On one test system, it resulted in a 22% speed increase on a test program with a tight inner loop.

http://archive.develooper.com/perl6-internals@perl.org/msg06941.html

On 2001-12-18, predereferencing got a speed boost (to about 47% faster than the regular DO_OP inner loop -- without compiler optimizations turned on). This was due to an off-list (actually over lunch) suggestion by John Kennedy that instead of pre-initializing the new copy of the bytecode with NULL pointers, we pre-initialize it with pointers to a pseudo-opfunc that does the predereferencing whenever it is encountered.

On 2002-04-11, Jason Gloudon suggested combining aspects of the Computed Goto Core and the Prederef[erencing] Core.

http://archive.develooper.com/perl6-internals@perl.org/msg07064.html

The week of 2003-02-09, Leopold Toetsch combined Computed Goto and Predereferencing to produce the CGP core.

http://dev.perl.org/perl6/list-summaries/2003/p6summary.2003-02-09.html#Week_of_the_alternative_runloops

Later, on 2003-02-14, Leopold Totsch and Nicholas Clark combined the JIT and the Computed Goto Prederef cores to great effect.

http://www.perl.com/pub/a/2003/02/p6pdigest/20030216.html

run core

aka run loop, aka runcore. The way Parrot executes PBCs. See running.pod for a list of available runcores, and how to tell parrot which one to use.

SMOP

Simple Meta Object Protocol: A prototype object model written in PIR.

TGE

Tree Grammar Engine: a tool that can be used to generate tree transformers.

vtable

A table of operations attached to some data types, such as PMCs and strings. Vtables are used to avoid using switches or long if chains to handle different data types. They're similar to method calls, except that their names are pre-selected, and there is no direct way to invoke them from PIR.

Warnock's Dilemma

The dilemma you face when posting a message to a public forum about something and not even getting an acknowledgment of its existence. This leaves you wondering if your problem is unimportant or previously addressed, if everyone's waiting on someone else to answer you, or if maybe your mail never actually made it to anyone else in the forum.