Parallel embedded systems

[Tril]

On Fri, 18 Dec 1998, Maneesh Yadav wrote:

> Hi fellow Tuners,
> 
> Been ahwile since I posted last, largely due to the fact that I can't keep up
> with the theory, I can't seem to differentiate when it's somebody's opinion or
> hard and concerete theory...

Concrete theory?  Sounds oxymoronic.  Oh, well, everything is relative.

> I realizee now that this is a very important issue.  Although I really have no
> idea what TUNES is anymore, how will a system like address these issues?

TUNES is a general-purpose reflective system.  To create a system which
uses a subset of the available features (such as an embedded system
without interactivity), you spin off a specialized systems from the main
one, by choosing features to remove, and limitations to add.  Then you can
test the subsystem using emulation, while tweaking it.  At some point, you
create a virtual machine for the hardware that it will actually be running
on.  You should be able to do all development on the main box, including
generating machine code.  Then, transfer it over to the embedded system
and test some more.  If you had a connection between the boxes you could
use the full reflective system as a master for the embedded slave.  This
would be remarkably easy, because the embedded system would BE tunes, in a
sense.  Creating embedded subsets of tunes would just be the same as
removing features from your local system, only with a different target
arch.  At least, that's the goal we hope to achieve ;)

David Manifold <dem@tunes.org>
This message is placed in the public domain.