Why Bytecode?

[Eric W. Biederman]

>>>>> "MY" == Maneesh Yadav <97yadavm@scar.utoronto.ca> writes:

MY> Eric W. Biederman wrote:

>> >>>>> "MY" == Maneesh Yadav <97yadavm@scar.utoronto.ca> writes:
>> 
>> Efficiency, and portability.  A byte code is a no brainer to
>> interpret, just do a switch on the byte code, and go to the right
>> place to interpret that.
>> 

MY> I find it hard to believe that writing an java interpeter is as easy as writing
MY> a big switch statement in a loop.

It is, but the dispatch code for each byte code is that simple.
No parsing, or anything hard to figure out what you are supposed to do.

>> Also basic optimizations can be done ahead of time.
>> 

MY> Certain optimizations that work on one processers may not optimize well on
MY> another, past the algorithm level, (take branch prediction for instance on a 486
MY> pentium and ppro)

It's more like constant propogation and removal of some redundancies,
a la peephole optimization.
It's bytecode not machine specific.
If you want to see an example see the emacs lisp compiler.

>> Besides I haven't seen a `universal' bytecode.
>> 
MY> Why not concentrate on a VM with a readable language with a JIT and save
MY> space by leaving it up to a compression algo.?
>> 
MY> In order to prevent the code stealing, mangled sources could be used...
>> 
>> Code's copyrighted so why do you need to worry about code stealing?
>> 

MY> Oh yeah, I forgot it's a perfect world with perfect programmers :-)....

Well actually I think the whole issue of people worry about their code
is a little silly.  I'm more in the software as a service camp.


MY> I realize that a bytecode is good since it resembles a processers
MY> instruction set nad is small.  But why restrict a language to only work
MY> with today's processing paradigms (who knows what's next).  Surely a
MY> good HLL leaves more room for the future.
>> 
>> It's expedient, simple, and well tested.  When that future comes you
>> upgrade your virtual machine.
>> 

MY> That's what I'm saying we could possibly prevent by not using a bytecode, no one
MY> likes to upgrade unless they have to....

You can also use a compiler that will translate one bytecode into
another, and with version numbers you can support both.  Bytecode
simply optimizes the common case.

MY> Doesn't bytcode just put an unessecary step in between
MY> idea-> language->program?
>> 
>> No.  It just specifies the form.
>> 

MY> Couldn't that be done more elegantly in an HLL?

It is much easier to agree what basic primitives a computer
instruction set needs versus, what a universal high level language
needs.

In tunes we keep wanting to program in the HLL you would need but we
haven't written it yet :)

Eric