[Mono-dev] Cilk for Mono

Fri Nov 5 07:08:07 EDT 2010

For Task and work-stealing schedulers we have System.Threading.Tasks already
(albeit with no language support). Plus Cilk is released under GPL (afaict)
which make it incompatible for us.

--
Jérémie Laval
jeremie.laval at gmail.com
http://neteril.org

On Fri, Nov 5, 2010 at 10:38 AM, Stifu <stifu at free.fr> wrote:

>
> What I meant by "runtime", is what you called "virtual machine".
> If it doesn't need to be changed, then yeah, .NET compatibility should not
> be an issue.
>
> I can't help further, gotta see if the Mono team thinks this is both
> desirable and doable. And whether they'd consider doing it themselves, or
> if
> they will only include it if community members do it...
> IMHO, though, implementing missing stuff (+ fixing, optimizing stuff) that
> .NET supports is more of a priority. I value stability and interoperability
> more than extras.
>
>
> kcleung wrote:
> >
> > What do you mean for the "runtime"?
> >
> > In the cilk-5.4.6 for C
> >
> > http://supertech.csail.mit.edu/cilk/
> >
> > .cilk and .cilkh files is first compiled to vanilla .c and .h files by
> > the cilk2c compiler.  The generated .c and .h files includes headers
> > of the runtime library (in C).  These generated .c and .h files are in
> > turn compiled by an ordinary C compiler such as gcc and linked to the
> > runtime library.
> >
> > As discussed in my previous posts, Cilk can have similar arrangement in
> > C#:
> >
> > The extended language (C# plus spawn and sync) is parsed by dmcs, then
> > the AST is expanded in-place within dmcs to conform to vanilla C#, and
> > finally dmcs emits CIL that calls the runtime library that is written
> > in vanilla C# and compiled into CIL.
> >
> > Therefore compatibility with .NET should not be affected, because:
> > - the virtual machine and the CIL language is not changed.
> > - any valid C# programs are also valid in the extended language
> >
> > So any program that can run on vanilla .NET should be run on mono.
> >
> > Finally, we can make the Cilk support to be off by default, and can be
> > turned on by supplying a flag to dmcs, such as "-fcilk".
> >
> > In the default mode, cilk keywords are not allowed and code generated
> > will *not* link to cilk runtime library
> > if "-fcilk" is addedm then dmcs will enter the cilk mode and produce
> > CIL that may call the cilk runtime library, and the resultant code
> > would run natively in mono, or if run on native .NET, the cilk runtime
> > library path must be made available to .NET
> >
> > Would this work?
> >
> > Qichang
> >
> >
> > On Fri, Nov 5, 2010 at 9:56 PM, Stifu <stifu at free.fr> wrote:
> >>
> >> Would this require a change in the runtime, or only in the compiler?
> >> If the runtime needs to be updated, that would break compatibility with
> >> .NET.
> >> I doubt this could work as an external library, right?
> >>
> >>
> >> kcleung wrote:
> >>>
> >>> I am surprised that the Cilk task-stealing mechanism, which is
> >>> algorithmically proven to be the most efficient, is not included in C#
> >>> 5.0 specification.
> >>>
> >>> However would it be feasible for us to implement Cilk in dmcs for Mono
> >>> 3.0?
> >>>
> >>> The resultant language will have the new keywords "spawn" and "sync"
> >>> (with support for atomic "+=", "-=" operators on spawn results) and
> >>> inlets.  The compiler should also forbid using results from spawn
> >>> before calling "sync"
> >>>
> >>> Beside performance advantages, the cilk model is really much simpler
> >>> than the async interface in C# 5.0
> >>>
> >>> Since Cilk (developed by MIT) is *not* patented, there should be no
> >>> legal obstacles preventing us from implementing the Cilk flow model
> >>> onto C#, or other mono / .NET languages.
> >>>
> >>> What do you think?
> >>>
> >>> Cheers,
> >>>
> >>> Qichang
> >>> _______________________________________________
> >>> Mono-devel-list mailing list
> >>> Mono-devel-list at lists.ximian.com
> >>> http://lists.ximian.com/mailman/listinfo/mono-devel-list
> >>>
> >>>
> >>
> >> --
> >> View this message in context:
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> >>
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> >
> >
>
> --
> View this message in context:
> http://mono.1490590.n4.nabble.com/Cilk-for-Mono-tp3028260p3028453.html
> Sent from the Mono - Dev mailing list archive at Nabble.com.
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