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Intel's Open Runtime Platform Specs

Posted by timothy on from the ac-dc dept.

prostoalex writes "The new issue of Intel Technology Journal has a lengthy article on a new platform, developed in Intel labs. The Open Runtime Platform: A Flexible High-Performance Managed Runtime Environment describes the platform that is capable of running both Java VM and Microsoft's CLI, on both Windows and Linux platforms. Full PDF version is also available."

4 of 26 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Is this... by XBL · · Score: 5, Informative

    No, this article just shows how interfaces creating abstraction can be implemented between the virtual machine, the just-in-time compiler, and the garbage collector without a performance hit.

    This level of separation then allows a better implementation of each of these components to be more easily created. For example, a JIT that supports both Java and CLI is more easy to design and implement. No knowledge of the VM (besides the interface) is needed to do this with ORP.

    Overall, a very impressive article.

  2. Article Distilled: by Ayanami+Rei · · Score: 5, Interesting

    We managed to create a virtual machine that is the superset of the .NET CLR and the JVM. This super-vm can compile straight into machine code for IA-32 and Itanium, and it can do it dynamically in realtime through profiling. It also has a bunch of different optimizers and garbage collectors it can pick from.

    All this is implemented in C++. They use opensource class libraries to provide the classpaths.

    What I would find really cool is if they can release a microcode-based CPU that runs the superset bytecode. It may simply be a microcode patch to the Itanium. That would be truely wicked.

    --
    THIS THING CAN TURN ON A DIME, MACROSSZERO STYLE ALSO FUCK BETA, ~NYORON
  3. Re:Is this... by cbiffle · · Score: 5, Informative

    Nope, not like Parrot, because the JVM and CLI are not like Parrot. There are a lot of differences, but the two main ones are:
    -Static typing.
    -Stack-based (vs. register-based)

    The JVM and CLI are both designed for static-typed languages, like Java, C, C++, C#. Parrot's main deviation from previous VMs is its design around dynamically-typed languages like Perl and Ruby, with the corresponding techniques to make this fast.

    Furthermore, the JVM and CLI are both stack-based, while Parrot is register-based. These involve different optimization techniques and a different underlying virtualization.

    The framework described in the Intel paper is most definitely static-type oriented (they discuss the difference in casting-exceptions in C# and Java, and how they handle it), and most probably stack-oriented (though that doesn't seem specified).

  4. One thing is always constant by hayriye · · Score: 5, Funny

    Java: Language is constant, others can vary.
    .NET: OS is constant, others can vary.
    Portable Runtime: Processor is constant, others can vary.