[LLVMdev] 9 Ideas To Better Support Source Language Developers

[Valery A.Khamenya]

Hello Chris,

Wednesday, January 7, 2004, 9:37:19 PM, you wrote:

CL> Typically distributed computing like this is performed at a much higher
CL> level than things like LLVM.

almost right, if you mean "distributed computing is usually
implemented as some compiled libs". But if it is a part of the
language then it is not as you say :)

Well, Chris, let's forget about traditions (finally LLVM is
tradition-breaking thing!). At which level the optimization like i've
meant *should* be implemented?..

If a priori optimization is restricted to a one host, then nothing to
discuss. But just imagine that you say: "OK, let's make a basic
support for code eval distributed to multiple hosts" :)

CL> Mechanisms like RPC (remote procedure calls)
CL> are used to do things like this, which makes the low-level code look a lot
CL> different than a standard call.

RPC call has nothing to do with optimization. The code should be
_ready_ before applying RPC.

CL> LLVM should support distributed computing as well as, say, C does... not
CL> that C supports is particularly well... :)

you are right, but you didn't get my point completely. I'd say:

  1. LLVM is OK for distributed computing, because ...it has nothing
     to do with this directly, e.g. like C :)

  2. LLVM could bring a *lot* to distributed computing, if distributed
     computing will be a *part* of LLVM concept.

OK, Chris, let's put it in another way. Just think of those guys, who
implement nice languages for distributed computing
(e.g. http://www.mozart-oz.org/) and ask yourself, why
<b>exactly this</b> audience should be excited with LLVM?
Why should they find some nice LLVM optimization specific for the
applications, where _part_ of the code might be EITHER executed at
current host OR outsourced to some other host, because, say,
current host is just quite busy? -- Maybe you'll find answer more
suitable for you, then I try to formulate in Idea 10 :)

-- 
Best regards,
Valery A.Khamenya                       mailto:khamenya at mail.ru
Local Time: 22:08