Index: doc/theses/aaron_moss_PhD/phd/background.tex =================================================================== --- doc/theses/aaron_moss_PhD/phd/background.tex (revision 4cdfcbd5e5ed67a044350b5df6f4174e1090c2cb) +++ doc/theses/aaron_moss_PhD/phd/background.tex (revision 4eaefd1e4dcaf1eeec31e51364a92eaa199ba66b) @@ -115,5 +115,5 @@ \subsection{Type Assertions} -Since bare polymorphic types do not provide a great range of available operations, \CFA{} provides a \emph{type assertion} mechanism to provide further information about a type\footnote{Subscript not included in source code}: +Since bare polymorphic types do not provide a great range of available operations, \CFA{} provides a \emph{type assertion} mechanism to provide further information about a type\footnote{Subscript not included in source code.\label{sub-foot}}: \begin{cfa} @@ -129,5 +129,5 @@ Monomorphic specializations of polymorphic functions can themselves be used to satisfy type assertions. -For instance, !twice! could have been defined like this\footnotemark[5]: +For instance, !twice! could have been defined like this\footref{sub-foot}: \begin{cfa} Index: doc/theses/aaron_moss_PhD/phd/generic-types.tex =================================================================== --- doc/theses/aaron_moss_PhD/phd/generic-types.tex (revision 4cdfcbd5e5ed67a044350b5df6f4174e1090c2cb) +++ doc/theses/aaron_moss_PhD/phd/generic-types.tex (revision 4eaefd1e4dcaf1eeec31e51364a92eaa199ba66b) @@ -7,8 +7,8 @@ While this approach is flexible and supports integration with the C type checker and tooling, it is also tedious and error prone, especially for more complex data structures. A second approach is to use !void*!-based polymorphism, \eg{} the C standard library functions !bsearch! and !qsort!, which allow for the reuse of common functionality. -However, basing all polymorphism on !void*! eliminates the type checker's ability to ensure that argument types are properly matched, often requiring a number of extra function parameters, pointer indirection, and dynamic allocation that is otherwise not needed. +However, basing all polymorphism on !void*! eliminates the type checker's ability to ensure that argument types are properly matched, often requiring a number of extra function parameters, pointer indirection, and dynamic allocation that is otherwise unnecessary. A third approach to generic code is to use preprocessor macros, which does allow the generated code to be both generic and type checked, but errors in such code may be difficult to locate and debug. Furthermore, writing and using preprocessor macros is unnatural and inflexible. -Figure~\ref{bespoke-generic-fig} demonstrates the bespoke approach for a simple linked list with !insert! and !head! operations, while Figure~\ref{void-generic-fig} and Figure~\ref{macro-generic-fig} show the same example using !void*!- and !#define!-based polymorphism, respectively. +Figure~\ref{bespoke-generic-fig} demonstrates the bespoke approach for a simple linked list with !insert! and !head! operations, while Figure~\ref{void-generic-fig} and Figure~\ref{macro-generic-fig} show the same example using !void*! and !#define!-based polymorphism, respectively. \begin{figure} @@ -185,7 +185,7 @@ \section{Design} -Though a number of languages have some implementation of generic types, backward compatibility with both C and existing \CFA{} polymorphism presented some unique design constraints for this project. -The guiding principle was to maintain an unsurprising language model for C programmers without compromising runtime efficiency. -A key insight for this design was that C already possesses a handful of built-in generic types (\emph{derived types} in the language of the standard \cite[\S{}6.2.5]{C11}), notably pointer (!T*!) and array (!T[]!), and that user-definable generics should act similarly. +Though a number of languages have some implementation of generic types, backward compatibility with both C and existing \CFA{} polymorphism present some unique design constraints for \CFA{} generics. +The guiding principle is to maintain an unsurprising language model for C programmers without compromising runtime efficiency. +A key insight for this design is that C already possesses a handful of built-in generic types (\emph{derived types} in the language of the standard \cite[\S{}6.2.5]{C11}), notably pointer (!T*!) and array (!T[]!), and that user-definable generics should act similarly. \subsection{Related Work} @@ -194,9 +194,9 @@ The template approach is closely related to the macro-expansion approach to C polymorphism demonstrated in Figure~\ref{macro-generic-fig}, but where the macro-expansion syntax has been given first-class language support. Template expansion has the benefit of generating code with near-optimal runtime efficiency, as distinct optimizations can be applied for each instantiation of the template. -On the other hand, template expansion can also lead to significant code bloat, exponential in the worst case \cite{Haberman16}, and the costs of increased instruction cache pressure at runtime and wasted developer time when compiling cannot be discounted. +On the other hand, template expansion can also lead to significant code bloat, exponential in the worst case \cite{Haberman16}, and the costs of increased compilation time and instruction cache pressure cannot be ignored. The most significant restriction of the \CC{} template model is that it breaks separate compilation and C's translation-unit-based encapsulation mechanisms. -Because a \CC{} template is not actually code, but rather a sort of ``recipe'' to generate code, template code must be visible at its call site to be used. +Because a \CC{} template is not actually code, but rather a ``recipe'' to generate code, template code must be visible at its call site to be used. Furthermore, \CC{} template code cannot be type-checked without instantiating it, a time consuming process with no hope of improvement until \CC{} concepts \cite{C++Concepts} are standardized in \CCtwenty{}. -C code, by contrast, only needs a !struct! or function declaration to call that function or use (by-pointer) values of that type, a desirable property to maintain for \CFA{}. +C code, by contrast, only needs a function declaration to call that function or a !struct! declaration to use (by-pointer) values of that type, desirable properties to maintain in \CFA{}. Java \cite{Java8} has another prominent implementation for generic types, introduced in Java~5 and based on a significantly different approach than \CC{}. @@ -205,5 +205,5 @@ To use this model, a more C-like language such as \CFA{} would be required to dynamically allocate internal storage for variables, track their lifetime, and properly clean them up afterward. -Cyclone \cite{Grossman06} is another language extending C, and also provides capabilities for polymorphic functions and existential types, similar to \CFA{}'s !forall! functions and generic types. +Cyclone \cite{Grossman06} extends C and also provides capabilities for polymorphic functions and existential types which are similar to \CFA{}'s !forall! functions and generic types. Cyclone existential types can include function pointers in a construct similar to a virtual function table, but these pointers must be explicitly initialized at some point in the code, which is tedious and error-prone compared to \CFA{}'s implicit assertion satisfaction. Furthermore, Cyclone's polymorphic functions and types are restricted to abstraction over types with the same layout and calling convention as !void*!, \ie{} only pointer types and !int!. @@ -215,5 +215,5 @@ Haskell \cite{Haskell10} combines ML-style polymorphism with the notion of type classes, similar to \CFA{} traits, but requiring an explicit association with their implementing types, unlike \CFA{}. Objective-C \cite{obj-c-book} is an extension to C which has had some industrial success; however, it did not support type-checked generics until recently \cite{xcode7}, and its garbage-collected, message-passing object-oriented model is a radical departure from C. -Go \cite{Go}, and Rust \cite{Rust} are modern compiled languages with abstraction features similar to \CFA{} traits, \emph{interfaces} in Go and \emph{traits} in Rust. +Go \cite{Go}, and Rust \cite{Rust} are modern compiled languages with abstraction features similar to \CFA{} traits: \emph{interfaces} in Go and \emph{traits} in Rust. Go has implicit interface implementation and uses a ``fat pointer'' construct to pass polymorphic objects to functions, similar in principle to \CFA{}'s implicit forall parameters. Go does not, however, allow user code to define generic types, restricting Go programmers to the small set of generic types defined by the compiler. @@ -223,6 +223,6 @@ \subsection{\CFA{} Generics} -The generic types design in \CFA{} draws inspiration from both \CC{} and Java generics, capturing the better aspects of each. -Like \CC{} template types, generic !struct!s and !union!s in \CFA{} have macro-expanded storage layouts, but, like Java generics, \CFA{} generic types can be used with separately-compiled polymorphic functions without requiring either the type or function definition to be visible to the other. +The generic types design in \CFA{} draws inspiration from both \CC{} and Java generics, capturing useful aspects of each. +Like \CC{} template types, generic !struct! and !union! types in \CFA{} have macro-expanded storage layouts, but, like Java generics, \CFA{} generic types can be used with separately-compiled polymorphic functions without requiring either the type or function definition to be visible to the other. The fact that the storage layout of any instantiation of a \CFA{} generic type is identical to that of the monomorphic type produced by simple macro replacement of the generic type parameters is important to provide consistent and predictable runtime performance, and to not impose any undue abstraction penalty on generic code. As an example, consider the following generic type and function: @@ -238,9 +238,9 @@ In this example, !with_len! is defined at the same scope as !pair!, but it could be called from any context that can see the definition of !pair! and a declaration of !with_len!. -If its return type was !pair(const char*, int)*!, callers of !with_len! would only need the declaration !forall(otype R, otype S) struct pair! to call it, in accordance with the usual C rules for opaque types. - -!with_len! is itself a monomorphic function, returning a type that is structurally identical to !struct { const char* first; int second; }!, and as such could be called from C given an appropriate re-declaration and demangling flags. +If its return type were !pair(const char*, int)*!, callers of !with_len! would only need the declaration !forall(otype R, otype S) struct pair! to call it, in accordance with the usual C rules for opaque types. + +!with_len! is itself a monomorphic function, returning a type that is structurally identical to !struct { const char* first; int second; }!, and as such could be called from C given appropriate re-declarations and demangling flags. However, the definition of !with_len! depends on a polymorphic function call to the !pair! constructor, which only needs to be written once (in this case, implicitly by the compiler according to the usual \CFA{} constructor generation \cite{Schluntz17}) and can be re-used for a wide variety of !pair! instantiations. -Since the parameters to this polymorphic constructor call are all statically known, compiler inlining can eliminate any runtime overhead of this polymorphic call. +Since the parameters to this polymorphic constructor call are all statically known, compiler inlining can in principle eliminate any runtime overhead of this polymorphic call. \CFA{} deliberately does not support \CC{}-style partial specializations of generic types. @@ -251,5 +251,5 @@ Since \CFA{} polymorphic functions can operate over polymorphic generic types, functions over such types can be partially or completely specialized using the usual overload selection rules. -As an example, the !with_len! function above could be an optimization of the following more general function: +As an example, the following generalization of !with_len! is a semantically-equivalent function which works for any type that has a !len! function declared, making use of both the ad-hoc (overloading) and parametric (!forall!) polymorphism features of \CFA{}: \begin{cfa} @@ -260,5 +260,5 @@ \end{cfa} -\CFA{} generic types also support the type constraints from !forall! functions. +\CFA{} generic types also support type constraints, as in !forall! functions. For example, the following declaration of a sorted set type ensures that the set key implements equality and relational comparison: @@ -267,11 +267,12 @@ \end{cfa} -These constraints are implemented by applying equivalent constraints to the compiler-generated constructors for this type. +These constraints are enforced by applying equivalent constraints to the compiler-generated constructors for this type. \section{Implementation} \label{generic-impl-sec} -The ability to use generic types in polymorphic contexts means that the \CFA{} implementation in \CFACC{} must support a mechanism for accessing fields of generic types dynamically at runtime. -While \CFACC{} could in principle use this same mechanism for accessing fields of all generic types, such an approach would throw away compiler knowledge of static types and impose an unnecessary runtime cost, limiting the utility of the generic type design. -Instead, my design for generic type support in \CFACC{} distinguishes between \emph{concrete} generic types that have a fixed memory layout regardless of type parameters and \emph{dynamic} generic types that may vary in memory layout depending on their type parameters. +The ability to use generic types in polymorphic contexts means that the \CFA{} implementation must support a mechanism for accessing fields of generic types dynamically. +While \CFACC{} could in principle use this same mechanism for accessing fields of generic types in monomorphic contexts as well, such an approach would throw away compiler knowledge of static types and impose an unnecessary runtime cost. +Instead, my design for generic types in \CFACC{} distinguishes between \emph{concrete} generic types that have a fixed memory layout regardless of type parameters and \emph{dynamic} generic types that may vary in memory layout depending on their type parameters. + A \emph{dtype-static} type has polymorphic parameters but is still concrete. Polymorphic pointers are an example of dtype-static types; given some type variable !T!, !T! is a polymorphic type, but !T*! has a fixed size and can therefore be represented by a !void*! in code generation. @@ -283,12 +284,12 @@ \begin{cfa} //dynamic, layout varies based on T -forall(otype T) T value( pair(const char*, T) p ) { return p.second; } +forall(otype T) T value$\(_1\)$( pair(const char*, T) p ) { return p.second; } // dtype-static, F* and T* are concrete but recursively polymorphic -forall(dtype F, otype T) T value( pair(F*, T*) ) { return *p.second; } +forall(dtype F, otype T) T value$\(_2\)$( pair(F*, T*) ) { return *p.second; } pair(const char*, int) p = {"magic", 42}; $\C[2.5in]{// concrete}$ int i = value(p); -pair(void*, int*) q = {0, &p.second}; $\C[2.5in]{// concrete}$ +pair(void*, int*) q = {0, &i}; $\C[2.5in]{// concrete}$ i = value(q); double d = 1.0; @@ -299,9 +300,9 @@ \subsection{Concrete Generic Types} -The \CFACC{} translator template expands concrete generic types into new structure types, affording maximal inlining. +The \CFACC{} translator template-expands concrete generic types into new structure types, affording maximal inlining. To enable interoperation among equivalent instantiations of a generic type, \CFACC{} saves the set of instantiations currently in scope and reuses the generated structure declarations where appropriate. In particular, tuple types are implemented as a single compiler-generated generic type definition per tuple arity, and can be instantiated and reused according to the usual rules for generic types. A function declaration that accepts or returns a concrete generic type produces a declaration for the instantiated structure in the same scope, which all callers may reuse. -As an example, the concrete instantiation for !pair(const char*, int)! is\footnote{This omits the field name mangling performed by \CFACC{} for overloading purposes.\label{mangle-foot}} +As an example, the concrete instantiation for !pair(const char*, int)! is\footnote{Field name mangling for overloading purposes is omitted.\label{mangle-foot}}: \begin{cfa} @@ -310,5 +311,5 @@ A concrete generic type with dtype-static parameters is also expanded to a structure type, but this type is used for all matching instantiations. -In the example above, the !pair(F*, T*)! parameter to !value! is such a type; its expansion is below\footref{mangle-foot}, and it is used as the type of the variables !q! and !r! as well, with casts for member access where appropriate. +In the example above, the !pair(F*, T*)! parameter to !value! is such a type; its expansion is below\footref{mangle-foot}, and it is used as the type of the variables !q! and !r! as well, with casts for member access where appropriate: \begin{cfa} @@ -322,9 +323,9 @@ The design for generic types presented here adds an \emph{offset array} containing structure-member offsets for dynamic generic !struct! types. A dynamic generic !union! needs no such offset array, as all members are at offset 0, but size and alignment are still necessary. -Access to members of a dynamic structure is provided at runtime via base displacement addressing the structure pointer and the member offset (similar to the !offsetof! macro), moving a compile-time offset calculation to runtime. +Access to members of a dynamic structure is provided at runtime via base-displacement addressing of the structure pointer and the member offset (similar to the !offsetof! macro), moving a compile-time offset calculation to runtime. The offset arrays are statically generated where possible. If a dynamic generic type is passed or returned by value from a polymorphic function, \CFACC{} can safely assume that the generic type is complete (\ie{} has a known layout) at any call site, and the offset array is passed from the caller; if the generic type is concrete at the call site, the elements of this offset array can even be statically generated using the C !offsetof! macro. -As an example, the body of the second !value! function above is implemented as +As an example, the body of !value!$_2$ above is implemented as: \begin{cfa} @@ -333,5 +334,5 @@ Here, !_assign_T! is passed in as an implicit parameter from !otype T! and takes two !T*! (!void*! in the generated code), a destination and a source, and !_retval! is the pointer to a caller-allocated buffer for the return value, the usual \CFA{} method to handle dynamically-sized return types. -!_offsetof_pair! is the offset array passed into !value!; this array is statically generated at the call site as +!_offsetof_pair! is the offset array passed into !value!; this array is statically generated at the call site as: \begin{cfa} @@ -347,5 +348,5 @@ These layout functions take as arguments pointers to size and alignment variables and a caller-allocated array of member offsets, as well as the size and alignment of all !sized! parameters to the generic structure. Un-!sized! parameters are not passed because they are forbidden from being used in a context that affects layout by C's usual rules about incomplete types. -Similarly, the layout function can only safely be called from a context where the generic type definition is visible, because otherwise the caller will not know how large to allocate the array of member offsets. +Similarly, the layout function can only safely be called from a context where the generic type definition is visible, because otherwise the caller does not know how large to allocate the array of member offsets. The C standard does not specify a memory layout for structs, but the POSIX ABI for x86 \cite{POSIX08} does; this memory layout is common for C implementations, but is a platform-specific issue for porting \CFA{}. @@ -356,5 +357,4 @@ forall(dtype T1, dtype T2, ... | sized(T1) | sized(T2) | ...) void layout(size_t* size, size_t* align, size_t* offsets) { - // initialize values *size = 0; *align = 1; // set up members @@ -374,5 +374,5 @@ \end{cfa} -Results of layout function calls are cached so that they are only computed once per type per function. +Results of layout-function calls are cached so that they are only computed once per type per function. Layout functions also allow generic types to be used in a function definition without reflecting them in the function signature, an important implementation-hiding constraint of the design. For instance, a function that strips duplicate values from an unsorted !list(T)! likely has a reference to the list as its only explicit parameter, but uses some sort of !set(T)! internally to test for duplicate values. @@ -380,7 +380,7 @@ Whether a type is concrete, dtype-static, or dynamic is decided solely on the basis of the type arguments and !forall! clause type parameters. -This design allows opaque forward declarations of generic types, \eg{} !forall(otype T) struct Box;! like in C, all uses of !Box(T)! can be separately compiled, and callers from other translation units know the proper calling conventions to use. -In an alternate design where the definition of a structure type is included in deciding whether a generic type is dynamic or concrete, some further types may be recognized as dtype-static --- \eg{} !Box! could be defined with a body !{ T* p; }!, and would thus not depend on !T! for its layout. -However, the existence of an !otype! parameter !T! means that !Box! \emph{could} depend on !T! for its layout if this definition is not visible, and we judged preserving separate compilation (and the associated C compatibility) in the implemented design to be an acceptable trade-off. +This design allows opaque forward declarations of generic types, \eg{} !forall(otype T) struct Box;! like in C, all uses of !Box(T)! can be separately compiled, and callers from other translation units know the proper calling conventions. +In an alternate design, where the definition of a structure type is included in deciding whether a generic type is dynamic or concrete, some further types may be recognized as dtype-static --- \eg{} !Box! could be defined with a body !{ T* p; }!, and would thus not depend on !T! for its layout. +However, the existence of an !otype! parameter !T! means that !Box! \emph{could} depend on !T! for its layout if this definition is not visible, and preserving separate compilation (and the associated C compatibility) is a more important design metric. \subsection{Applications of Dtype-static Types} \label{dtype-static-sec} @@ -401,5 +401,5 @@ Another useful pattern enabled by reused dtype-static type instantiations is zero-cost \emph{tag structures}. Sometimes, information is only used for type checking and can be omitted at runtime. -In the example below, !scalar! is a dtype-static type; hence, all uses have a single structure definition containing !unsigned long! and can share the same implementations of common functions like !?+?!. +In the example below, !scalar! is a dtype-static type; hence, all uses have a single structure definition containing !unsigned long! and can share the same implementations of common functions, like !?+?!. These implementations may even be separately compiled, unlike \CC{} template functions. However, the \CFA{} type checker ensures matching types are used by all calls to !?+?!, preventing nonsensical computations like adding a length to a volume. @@ -422,6 +422,6 @@ \section{Performance Experiments} \label{generic-performance-sec} -To validate the practicality of this generic type design I have conducted microbenchmark-based tests against a number of comparable code designs in C and \CC{}, first published in \cite{Moss18}. -Since all these languages are compiled with the same compiler backend and share a subset essentially comprising standard C, maximal-performance benchmarks should show little runtime variance, differing only in length and clarity of source code. +To validate the practicality of this generic type design, microbenchmark-based tests were conducted against a number of comparable code designs in C and \CC{}, first published in \cite{Moss18}. +Since all these languages are all C-based and compiled with the same compiler backend, maximal-performance benchmarks should show little runtime variance, differing only in length and clarity of source code. A more illustrative comparison measures the costs of idiomatic usage of each language's features. The code below shows the \CFA{} benchmark tests for a generic stack based on a singly-linked list; the test suite is equivalent for the other other languages. @@ -429,4 +429,5 @@ \begin{cfa} +#define N 4000000 int main() { int max = 0, val = 42;