Hi All
Is there somewhere you can point me to a discussion about the choice for a
register VM rather than a stack VM? If not, let's have it now - I'll
volunteer to tidy the end result into a postable form.
The FAQ briefly mentions:
we're already running with a faster opcode dispatch
than [Perl, Python, and Ruby] are, and having registers just
decreases the amount of stack thrash we get.
Can I for one ask for some more detail?
The FAQ also points to the 68k emulator as a successful example. But the 68k
emulator *had* to be register based. This example shows it can be done, but
gives no evidence that it *should* be done for a script VM.
Note that I have *absolutely* no opinion on this (I lack the knowledge).
It's just that with Perl, Python, Ruby, the JVM and the CLR all stack based,
Parrot seems out on a limb. That's fine by me -- innovation is not about
following the crowd, but I feel it does warrant stronger justification.
Tom.
p.s. (and at the risk of being controversial :) Why did Miguel de Icaza say
Parrot was "based on religion"? Was it realted to this issue? Why is he
wrong?
