[MUD-Dev] Re: DevMUD considerations and the Halloween article

[Marc Hernandez]

On Tue, 3 Nov 1998, Chris Gray wrote:

}[Jon Leonard:]
}
} >There are a few design decisions I'm aware of that have far-reaching impact
} >on the VM design.  Some undecided ones that I'm aware of:
}
}Yep. Others might be issues with string handling (copy v.s. refcount or
}GC or something). Locking/unlocking of DB entries (automatic? manual?
}none?) Error reporting capabilities, traceback production, what level
}of run-time checking is done before byte-code is executed?
}
} >There's nothing keeping us from having alternate VMs, and these are possible
} >things that they might differ in.  We should definitely decide on one model
} >to start with, though.
}
}Makes sense, unless we magically end up with a couple of alternates fairly
}early in the game. I'm not being entirely altruistic in wanting to get
}my stuff available early!

	There are 2 versions of 'free' JVMs around (Kaffe and Japhar).
Just looking at Japhar (http://www.japhar.org) it is LGPL'd, which is
quite attractive.  
	Just because it is called the Java virtual machine doesnt mean
just java can compile to it.  Soon I will have a 'Tiger' (little toy
language to teach comiler writing ML/Pascalish looking) compiler compiling
to it. There is an Ada compiler for the JVM.  Although as a 'ground up'
alternative its not the best.  

}Chris Gray     cg at ami-cg.GraySage.Edmonton.AB.CA

Marc Hernandez		marc at eisoftware.com
Programmer		www.eisoftware.com