[Cuis-dev] VectorEnginePlugin (was Re: UK Smalltalk User Group meeting - Wednesday March 31st)

[Juan Vuletich]

Hello Dave,

Thanks for testing! (inline)

On 3/23/2021 4:53 PM, David T. Lewis via Cuis-dev wrote:
> ...
> Hi Juan,
>
> I loaded VectorEnginePlugin.pck.st into the Squeak VMMaker image that I
> use for generating classic interpreter VMs. The package loaded without
> modification to the code, and I was able to easily generate new sources,
> including VectorEnginePlugin.c.

This is great!

> The VM with new plugin compiled without problems on the first try, and there
> are no compiler warnings.

Nice.

> I used this VM with a Cuis5.0-4526-v3.image, and followed your instructions
> up through A - 9). It all worked without issue, and performance when rotating
> or scaling M3Exp01Morph seems very impressive. This is running on an old
> but still fast Intel 64-bit laptop with Ubuntu Linux.

This is great to know.

> I did find problems at step 15), with errors to the console and a hung image.
> I don't have time to look at it further right now, but my guess is that
> it may be something related to running the V3 image, which handles integers
> and floats differently than Spur.

This plugin does nothing special. If other plugins using SmallInteger, 
Float, Bitmap, WordArray and IntegerArray parameters work correctly, I 
wouldn't expect any dependence on V3 vs. Spur. In any case, when 
possible, please post the errors you get on the console.

> I am really impressed with how well the plugin worked on the very first
> try, with no effort or changes from me whatsoever.
>
> Congratulations and great work!
>
> Dave

Please note that I included a change set for VMMaker to declare 
WordArray and Bitmap as uint32_t* (and not unsigned*), and IntegerArray 
as int32_t* (and not int*). I know that Windows / MacOS / Linux treat 
int and unsigned as 32 bit, but I think it is good practice to adopt 
explicit stdint.h types. After all, they have been part of the C 
standard for over 20 years!

Thanks,

-- 
Juan Vuletich
www.cuis-smalltalk.org
https://github.com/Cuis-Smalltalk/Cuis-Smalltalk-Dev
https://github.com/jvuletich
https://www.linkedin.com/in/juan-vuletich-75611b3
@JuanVuletich