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About Iceberg

by Sven Van Caekenberghe

Hi, This is a thank you note about Iceberg. I have been moving all my external and internal Pharo code to git/tonel/7 and on multiple occasions I have been pleasantly surprised about the functionality and performance of Iceberg. Basically, it just works. Finally, Pharo code lives in standard open source and commercial repositories (git, GitHub, Bitbucket, ...), without losing anything. I know that it took years to get here and that lots of code and community battles had to be fought. So thank you, to the whole team, you did a great job ! Sven -- Sven Van Caekenberghe Proudly supporting Pharo http://pharo.org http://association.pharo.org http://consortium.pharo.org

Feb. 19, 2019

Re: [Pharo-dev] VMMaker in Pharo [Was: Squeak and Tonel]

by Tudor Girba

Hi Eliot, Please, let me clarify the current direction: I am not trying to get you to Pharo at this point. I only want to reach a point where the VMMaker code runs in Pharo. This will allow us to bootstrap an environment that can later be evaluated. Having the sources in Git is secondary at this point. With the current infrastructure, we get those sources in Git while preserving the history from the Squeaksource repo automatically. The code will be loadable from either Git or Squeaksource, but the commit repository is still the Squeaksource one. So, nothing would change from the workflow of the current committers. What we gain with the Git repository is a test ground and an easier ability to load the code in Pharo, all at no extra cost and without affecting your flow. Let me emphasize this again: the Git support should not be the main issue at this point. Now we would only need to get the code to run in Pharo. For this, we would need to introduce a few support methods. One key method that Andrei and I would like to propose, and that we used before in other porting projects, is: Object>>vmMakerForSqueak: aBlockToBeExecutedOnlyInSqueak forPharo: aBlockToBeExecutedOnlyInPharo Andrei will propose a commit in VMMaker Inbox this week. What do you say? Cheers, Doru > On Feb 18, 2019, at 7:55 PM, Eliot Miranda <eliot.miranda(a)gmail.com> wrote: > > Doru, > > On Sun, Feb 17, 2019 at 10:33 PM Tudor Girba <tudor(a)tudorgirba.com> wrote: > Hi Eliot, > > You raise a few technical concerns related to VMMaker that seem addressable: > > 1. Rendering technology: Both in Pharo and in GT, there exist in-image canvases, Athens and Sparta respectively, that are backend independent. This allows us to have image-based drawing logic, like BitBlt or even better, the drawing capabilities that Juan Vuletich built in Morphic 3, transparently. In fact, we even started to look at the code from Morphic 3 and we think itâs not much effort to make it work behind Sparta. This would provide a complete solution that would not rely on any external libraries. > > 2. Git history. We used to have the author and timestamp in the metadata of Tonel but because it generated unwanted conflicts it was decided to remove it. I think this is a good decision and one based on the experience of using it. But, why do you think the algorithm of retrieving Git could not be made to work in Squeak? Is there a specific technical reason, or is it more that you do not see the effort being spent in this direction? I am asking to understand what could a possible solution be. > > > But, letâs take a step back. George and Andrei did move the VMMaker code, including all its history, into Git using (and enhancing) https://github.com/peteruhnak/git-migration. > > The code is here: > https://github.com/feenkcom/opensmalltalk-vm/tree/pullrequest5/vmmaker > > Our goal was to make the code loadable and runnable in Pharo through Git. We have a reproducible process to produce this history, and this means that we can also synchronize all changes from the Monticello VMMaker repository and produce a history-preserving Git repository. > > The current code comes with a BaselineOfVMMaker that loads in Pharo, and the code generation seems to work to a good extent without much effort. There is still work that needs to be done especially on the simulation part, but we think most of it can be addressed through a Pharo-specific package that provides compatibility logic. > > I see two benefits for doing this: > 1. It allows people in Pharo to play with the VM within the Pharo context and consequently contribute. > 2. It allows us to build an environment dedicated for VM development without affecting the current contribution process. We can judge later whether this is useful. > > All this is great work. But I cannot use it until I can also function in Squeak. I know you want me to move to Pharo, but I am not convinced that it is a safe place for me to land. I have voiced my concerns before (stability, moving away from support I need (e.g. Pharo dropping read./write file streams is the latest example). Let me simply restate that "t6he devil you know is better than the devil you don't", and that I know I am productive with VMMaker in Squeak, but I *do not* know that I can be productive in Pharo (in fact, I have lots of experience of the contrary). So I will not move to Pharo any time soon and so, until there is a solution to git/tonel/squeak integration I cannot join the unified repository, must as I would like to. > > I'm sorry for the frustration this causes other. I am radical in some things, but deeply conservative in others. And my ability to be productive is obviously foundational. > > > Cheers, > Doru > > > > On Feb 17, 2019, at 9:27 PM, Eliot Miranda <eliot.miranda(a)gmail.com> wrote: > > > > Hi All, Hi Torsten, Hi Jakob, > > > > On Thu, Feb 14, 2019 at 6:17 AM Torsten Bergmann <astares(a)gmx.de> wrote: > > Hi, > > > > as some of you might already know "Tonel" is a file-per-class format for monticello repositories [1]. > > > > In Pharo land many projects are already converted to it - as regular "file tree" solution faces issues > > with git handling due to very long file names / deep file hierarchy (often leading to trouble on Windows). > > > > Dales's Rowan (a new project/package manager for Smalltalk) supports FileTree and also Tonel > > repositories [2]. There is also a tool to convert from STORE (VisualWorks Source-Code Versioning System) > > to Tonel format [3]. > > > > So I wonder about adoption of Tonel in Squeak land. > > > > Any status/comments? > > > > Last year I was given contract employment by Tudor Girba's feenk which in part was to involve me porting VMMaker.oscog to Pharo in order to reap the productivity benefits of the Glamorous Toolkit when applied to VMMaker. The major direction was to unify the opensmalltalk-vm repository with a Toned-Format repository holding the Smalltalk code. > > > > This project, though no fault of feenk's did not go well. A big part of it was my own emotional attachment to Squeak, my "muscle memory" with Squeak and my long experience with Smalltalk-80 derived meta programming which I make extensive use of in VMMaker.oscog. But a key issue was that I was not prepared to *move* VMMaker.oscog to Pharo; for me it is key that it can live in both places. In particular I will not risk VMMaker.oscog being stranded on Pharo as it moves away from the "image-based rendering model". This is not because I don't believe in pixel-independent rendering models, but because productivity in VMMaker depends much more than on GToolkit inspection on the key architectural feature of being completely, safely simulateable (not a real English word; but meaning capable of being simulated). As Pharo moves towards external libraries to implement its UI so the degree to which VMMaker is simulated is reduced. Thus crashes in external code cannot be handled with the same power as with errors presented within the Smalltalk environment itself, and this (as harsh experience over thirty five years has taught me) is far more important for overall productivity than having powerful tailorable inspectors. > > > > I therefore wanted a Tonel that could both function for Squeak's Monticello and for Pharo's Iceberg. I had modified the Tonel serialization a little to provide well-formatted support for method timestamps, which are still a key and extremely useful part of Squeak Monticello's "blame" equivalent. Until git author attribution can be imported into Squeak's Monticello (something I don't see happening) I wanted merely to be able to have a variant of Tonel, enabled for example by a class variable, and hence /not/ present in Pharo, that would allow VMMaker.oscog to use Tonel but still be functional inside Squeak. I asked Esteban and was met by a flat no. Not "OK, but this is an option only you will use", but a flat "not under any circumstance". > > > > So here I am joining in this thread reluctantly. I'm extremely frustrated by the state of Tonel in Squeak and between the two dialects. ClÃ©ment had moved his Scorch optimizer to Tonel/git and I tried to use Metacello and Jakob's Tonel code to at least allow me to load that code and try and push forward on Sista/Scorch. The port *does not work*. Metacello fails to load Scorch. Neither Jakob nor Fabio, after putting in some effort, were able to fix the problem, and it is well beyond me. So I have accepted the fact that I will have to use the Monticello repository for Scorch/Sista. > > > > I had deep concerns that the pursuit of git integration would end up splitting the Pharo and Squeak communities and indeed this is now in progress. I am utterly unmotivated by the lack of cooperation, the sheer arrogance and bullying of those that say "you will move to git/tonel or else", and considering leaving VMMaker altogether. The only things that are keeping me interested are Ron Teitelbaum's Terf and me pursuing a PhD on register allocation in the context of Sista/Scorch with Robert Hirshfeld's group at HPI. > > > > Here's the kind of crap people like Ducasse throw at me: > > > > "Eliot > > > > At the end of the day I will probably ask the two phds that should work on language design to use truffle or pypy > > because let us face it we cannot work with the Pharo VM. Else we will simply have to fork it (because we do not want to have > > to jump over cuis, newspeak, squeak code constraints and I do not what) and it will be another drama is in the pico world > > of the âopenâ smalltalk VM. " > > > > I am so over this crap. > > _,,,^..^,,,_ > > best, Eliot > > -- > www.feenk.com > > âSoftware has no shape. Actually, it has no one shape. It has many." > > > > -- > _,,,^..^,,,_ > best, Eliot -- www.feenk.com "Sometimes the best solution is not the best solution."

Feb. 19, 2019

Re: [Pharo-dev] The HiDPI Issue

by Eliot Miranda

Hi Eric, On Fri, Feb 15, 2019 at 8:53 AM Eric Gade <eric.gade(a)gmail.com> wrote: > Hello, > > I know that others have posted about this before but I wanted to get the > current status. > > I've recently had to buy a new laptop that came with a HiDPI display. > Generally (especially on Linux systems) this makes Pharo unusable. Though > there are font size increase and scaling options in the Pharo system > settings, these do not work as a solution -- buttons are still tiny, there > is inconsistent scaling behavior across morphic, etc. The overall problem > can be described as: in Pharo, one pixel equals one "point," and so the > interface is incredibly small on these HiDPI screens (3k etc). > > These HiDPI screens are becoming more common, both as laptop and as > external displays. Their main advantage is that they can render text very > crisply. In the HN post announcing the release of P7, there were one or two > complaints about this issue. It does make it hard to demonstrate to others > (as I do often) the power of developing in Pharo. > > Here are some questions I have about this issue: > 1) What is the current state of affairs in dealing with this issue, if any? > 2) Would this require VM changes (I assume it would)? If so, what might > those entail? > 3) If this does require VM changes, I assume the Squeak people would want > in on it? > 4) Is the current plan to wait for Bloc to resolve these issues and/or > would switching to Bloc resolve these issues at all anyway? > 5) Related -- where can one start to learn about current VM architecture > and development practices? > In the CONTRIBUTING.md and README.md and the HowToBuild files in each build.??? directory in the repository ( https://github.com/OpenSmalltalk/opensmalltalk-vm.git) On the opensmalltalk-vm mailing list ( http://lists.squeakfoundation.org/mailman/listinfo/vm-dev) In several blog posts and papers on the VM. > > That said I'm not here to just bellyache. While I don't have any VM > experience, I'm willing to jump in and try to work on it if someone can > point me in the right direction. Or perhaps this is too specialized a > task... > No it is not :-). It is a learning task, but VM development is performed by humans for humans ;-) > > Thanks > > -- > Eric > -- _,,,^..^,,,_ best, Eliot

Feb. 18, 2019

Re: [Pharo-dev] [squeak-dev] Squeak and Tonel

by Eliot Miranda

On Mon, Feb 18, 2019 at 11:02 AM Esteban Lorenzano <estebanlm(a)gmail.com> wrote: > Fair enough. > I should not have step in this discussion. > Again, your response is to withdraw and not to engage. I am trying too be honest about my feelings and about the issues. Why don't you try and do the same? Why do you always try and withdraw? Why do you top post emotionally and run away from a real problem that affects both of us? I do not understand this pattern Esteban. I am not trying to hurt you. > Esteban > > On 18 Feb 2019, at 19:48, Eliot Miranda <eliot.miranda(a)gmail.com> wrote: > > Esteban, > > On Mon, Feb 18, 2019 at 10:37 AM Esteban Lorenzano <estebanlm(a)gmail.com> > wrote: > >> Still thatâs not the point. >> Not having an agreement is very different that the behaviour you >> described about me (and that to justify your own actions). >> You presented my opposition as it would have been âjust becauseâ and I >> presented you my arguments. Even more, I *was* trying to find a solution. >> I can be right or wrong, but Iâm not an idiot trying to be more than I >> am. >> Honestly, discussing with you many times feels like it is âmy way or the >> highwayâ, and itâs hard to follow you :( >> > > I am not trying to force my way. I am trying to find a way that works for > me. I asked you to support an option in Tonel. I did not ask you8 to > change they way Pharo uses Tonel. You can choose to read my request as some > kind of threat, or you can choose to read it as a straightforward request. > I am not trying to get you to follow me. > > I am frustrated at being mistrusted. I have not asked you to follow me. > I have tried to work with you. But you don't trust me. > > I have done everything I can in the VM (let's ignore source code control > and building for now) to support Pharo. I have done *nothing* to interfere > with Pharo's use of the VM in the code base itself. have I? Point to > actions I have taken, code I have written to try and harm you. > > We now have a situation where we support differences in the code base > (FilePlugin API, command line argument parsing, version printing) that > extend *those I put in at the beginning to support differences* (such as > plugins.ext and plugins.int to allow builders to configure the VM as they > choose). Where have I tried to block Pharo? > > But you left vm-dev. You decided to stop communicating. And now you > continue to describe a straight-forward request to allow an optional > behavior in Tonel with a flat refusal, plus some BS about me trying to > insist that you follow me. > > I don't understand Esteban. You and I do not communicate. I feel that > you top not want to work with me, that you dislike and distrust me. I > cannot work with you. I have tried for years and we are still in > difference and disagreement. > > >> Esteban >> >> On 18 Feb 2019, at 18:34, Eliot Miranda <eliot.miranda(a)gmail.com> wrote: >> >> Esteban, >> >> On Mon, Feb 18, 2019 at 4:06 AM Esteban Lorenzano <estebanlm(a)gmail.com> >> wrote: >> >>> Hi, >>> >>> Iâm so not wanting to be part of this discussion, but here I am. >>> Just because it was mentioned my name in a way I consider inaccurate. >>> >>> On 17 Feb 2019, at 21:27, Eliot Miranda <eliot.miranda(a)gmail.com> wrote: >>> >>> Hi All, Hi Torsten, Hi Jakob, >>> >>> On Thu, Feb 14, 2019 at 6:17 AM Torsten Bergmann <astares(a)gmx.de> wrote: >>> >>>> Hi, >>>> >>>> as some of you might already know "Tonel" is a file-per-class format >>>> for monticello repositories [1]. >>>> >>>> In Pharo land many projects are already converted to it - as regular >>>> "file tree" solution faces issues >>>> with git handling due to very long file names / deep file hierarchy >>>> (often leading to trouble on Windows). >>>> >>>> Dales's Rowan (a new project/package manager for Smalltalk) supports >>>> FileTree and also Tonel >>>> repositories [2]. There is also a tool to convert from STORE >>>> (VisualWorks Source-Code Versioning System) >>>> to Tonel format [3]. >>>> >>>> So I wonder about adoption of Tonel in Squeak land. >>>> >>>> Any status/comments? >>>> >>> >>> Last year I was given contract employment by Tudor Girba's feenk which >>> in part was to involve me porting VMMaker.oscog to Pharo in order to reap >>> the productivity benefits of the Glamorous Toolkit when applied to >>> VMMaker. The major direction was to unify the opensmalltalk-vm repository >>> with a Toned-Format repository holding the Smalltalk code. >>> >>> This project, though no fault of feenk's did not go well. A big part of >>> it was my own emotional attachment to Squeak, my "muscle memory" with >>> Squeak and my long experience with Smalltalk-80 derived meta programming >>> which I make extensive use of in VMMaker.oscog. But a key issue was that I >>> was not prepared to *move* VMMaker.oscog to Pharo; for me it is key that it >>> can live in both places. In particular I will not risk VMMaker.oscog being >>> stranded on Pharo as it moves away from the "image-based rendering model". >>> This is not because I don't believe in pixel-independent rendering models, >>> but because productivity in VMMaker depends much more than on GToolkit >>> inspection on the key architectural feature of being completely, safely >>> simulateable (not a real English word; but meaning capable of being >>> simulated). As Pharo moves towards external libraries to implement its UI >>> so the degree to which VMMaker is simulated is reduced. Thus crashes in >>> external code cannot be handled with the same power as with errors >>> presented within the Smalltalk environment itself, and this (as harsh >>> experience over thirty five years has taught me) is far more important for >>> overall productivity than having powerful tailorable inspectors. >>> >>> I therefore wanted a Tonel that could both function for Squeak's >>> Monticello and for Pharo's Iceberg. I had modified the Tonel serialization >>> a little to provide well-formatted support for method timestamps, which are >>> still a key and extremely useful part of Squeak Monticello's "blame" >>> equivalent. Until git author attribution can be imported into Squeak's >>> Monticello (something I don't see happening) I wanted merely to be able to >>> have a variant of Tonel, enabled for example by a class variable, and hence >>> /not/ present in Pharo, that would allow VMMaker.oscog to use Tonel but >>> still be functional inside Squeak. I asked Esteban and was met by a flat >>> no. Not "OK, but this is an option only you will use", but a flat "not >>> under any circumstanceâ. >>> >>> >>> This is textually my answer (even with the English errors): >>> â¦ âAnyway the answer will be no :) >>> This was considered, and even the first implementation of tonel had it. >>> Now, this was discarded because it does not works with git (or other file >>> backends). It was not even me who complained first (as I said, I >>> implemented it). It was Dale and other people used to work on git. >>> >>> Thing is, putting timestamps it will generate conflicts massively when >>> there is no reason to it. >>> >> >> How can this be true? Since a method's time stamp changes only when it is >> modified it will only produce a change where a method is changed. I see no >> problem with this. >> >> I do see the possibility of a bug in Pharo when it was using Monticello >> and timestamps though. There was a time when you, Esteban, were >> contributing to VMMaker.oscog from Pharo and often there would be many >> changes where just the timestamp had changed. SO the problem seems to be >> not with timestamps but with mismanagement of them. >> >> >> So, we drop itâ¦ and we add support for the equivalent using the tool we >>> use (iceberg gives you not just the author that modified last the method >>> but all of them, along the history). >>> >> >> Who is we? I ask from a different perspective. I ask not too have Pharo >> use it but to allow Squeak to use it so that I can have timestamps for >> Squerask and still use Tonel. But still "âAnyway the answer will be no :)". >> >> So, your first statement is false. If things are correct there will >> *not* be massive generation of conflicts when there is no reason. Second, >> I am not asking you to change Tonel in Pharo. i am only asking you to >> allow Tonel to support timestamps in systems that want to use it. >> >> >>> I hope is an understandable reason?â >>> >>> And then in other mail of same thread I suggested an approach viable for >>> squeak: >>> >>> "Now, what Iâm sure is that if you are trying of using the 100% of >>> Monticello and to use git just as another repository backend, it will not >>> work (we already tried). It will consume far too much effort and you will >>> finish beating the purpose of use git and a file-based-format, and you will >>> be in the worst of two worlds :) >>> >>> We started like that, and we ended up implementing Iceberg to take >>> benefit of the tools we are using. >>> >>> In the middle, there was/is gitfiletree. >>> (I think I suggested you to look at it to adapt it for tonel and squeak). >>> >>> Gitfiletree uses OSProcess to call git as external tool and it makes all >>> the operations needed. â >>> >>> >>> Now, what I was suggesting was a way to use tonel backed with OSProcess >>> (which works in squeak) instead backing it with libgit2 as us. >>> Since they need the blame support, they could use OSProcess and external >>> git for it. >>> >>> Of course squeak (and any other dialect) are free to take tonel and >>> adapt it to their needs (in fact, Mariano extended Tonel for VA specific >>> things). >>> And Pharo can read that format but it will ignore all extensions. >>> Now, another problem is to WRITE: Pharo would write those packages in >>> âpharo formatâ and that information would be lost. And in the case of >>> VMMaker, if the idea is to be able to work on both sides, then Pharo needs >>> to âhonourâ that format, it cannot just read it and ignore it later. So >>> this creates an incompatibility that needs to be handled. >>> >>> Anyway, as you can see my answer was not ânot under any circumstancesâ. >>> Was âno, because is not convenientâ. >>> >> >> It was still no. And my request was clear. I asked if you would allow >> Tonel to support timestamps, not that Pharo would use timestamps. This >> avoids forking Tonel, which I see as essential (it is essential that Tonel >> *not* fork) for Tonel to be a format that can serve as an interchange >> between Squeak and Pharo. >> >> >>> Esteban >>> >>> >>> >>> So here I am joining in this thread reluctantly. I'm extremely >>> frustrated by the state of Tonel in Squeak and between the two dialects. >>> ClÃ©ment had moved his Scorch optimizer to Tonel/git and I tried to use >>> Metacello and Jakob's Tonel code to at least allow me to load that code and >>> try and push forward on Sista/Scorch. The port *does not work*. Metacello >>> fails to load Scorch. Neither Jakob nor Fabio, after putting in some >>> effort, were able to fix the problem, and it is well beyond me. So I have >>> accepted the fact that I will have to use the Monticello repository for >>> Scorch/Sista. >>> >>> I had deep concerns that the pursuit of git integration would end up >>> splitting the Pharo and Squeak communities and indeed this is now in >>> progress. I am utterly unmotivated by the lack of cooperation, the sheer >>> arrogance and bullying of those that say "you will move to git/tonel or >>> else", and considering leaving VMMaker altogether. The only things that >>> are keeping me interested are Ron Teitelbaum's Terf and me pursuing a PhD >>> on register allocation in the context of Sista/Scorch with Robert >>> Hirshfeld's group at HPI. >>> >>> Here's the kind of crap people like Ducasse throw at me: >>> >>> "Eliot >>> >>> At the end of the day I will probably ask the two phds that should work >>> on language design to use truffle or pypy >>> because let us face it we cannot work with the Pharo VM. Else we will >>> simply have to fork it (because we do not want to have >>> to jump over cuis, newspeak, squeak code constraints and I do not what) >>> and it will be another drama is in the pico world >>> of the âopenâ smalltalk VM. " >>> >>> I am so over this crap. >>> _,,,^..^,,,_ >>> best, Eliot >>> >>> >>> >> >> -- >> _,,,^..^,,,_ >> best, Eliot >> >> >> > > -- > _,,,^..^,,,_ > best, Eliot > > > -- _,,,^..^,,,_ best, Eliot

Feb. 18, 2019

Re: [Pharo-dev] [squeak-dev] Squeak and Tonel

by Esteban Lorenzano

Fair enough. I should not have step in this discussion. Esteban > On 18 Feb 2019, at 19:48, Eliot Miranda <eliot.miranda(a)gmail.com> wrote: > > Esteban, > > On Mon, Feb 18, 2019 at 10:37 AM Esteban Lorenzano <estebanlm(a)gmail.com <mailto:estebanlm@gmail.com>> wrote: > Still thatâs not the point. > Not having an agreement is very different that the behaviour you described about me (and that to justify your own actions). > You presented my opposition as it would have been âjust becauseâ and I presented you my arguments. Even more, I *was* trying to find a solution. > I can be right or wrong, but Iâm not an idiot trying to be more than I am. > Honestly, discussing with you many times feels like it is âmy way or the highwayâ, and itâs hard to follow you :( > > I am not trying to force my way. I am trying to find a way that works for me. I asked you to support an option in Tonel. I did not ask you8 to change they way Pharo uses Tonel. You can choose to read my request as some kind of threat, or you can choose to read it as a straightforward request. I am not trying to get you to follow me. > > I am frustrated at being mistrusted. I have not asked you to follow me. I have tried to work with you. But you don't trust me. > > I have done everything I can in the VM (let's ignore source code control and building for now) to support Pharo. I have done *nothing* to interfere with Pharo's use of the VM in the code base itself. have I? Point to actions I have taken, code I have written to try and harm you. > > We now have a situation where we support differences in the code base (FilePlugin API, command line argument parsing, version printing) that extend *those I put in at the beginning to support differences* (such as plugins.ext and plugins.int <http://plugins.int/> to allow builders to configure the VM as they choose). Where have I tried to block Pharo? > > But you left vm-dev. You decided to stop communicating. And now you continue to describe a straight-forward request to allow an optional behavior in Tonel with a flat refusal, plus some BS about me trying to insist that you follow me. > > I don't understand Esteban. You and I do not communicate. I feel that you top not want to work with me, that you dislike and distrust me. I cannot work with you. I have tried for years and we are still in difference and disagreement. > > > Esteban > >> On 18 Feb 2019, at 18:34, Eliot Miranda <eliot.miranda(a)gmail.com <mailto:eliot.miranda@gmail.com>> wrote: >> >> Esteban, >> >> On Mon, Feb 18, 2019 at 4:06 AM Esteban Lorenzano <estebanlm(a)gmail.com <mailto:estebanlm@gmail.com>> wrote: >> Hi, >> >> Iâm so not wanting to be part of this discussion, but here I am. >> Just because it was mentioned my name in a way I consider inaccurate. >> >>> On 17 Feb 2019, at 21:27, Eliot Miranda <eliot.miranda(a)gmail.com <mailto:eliot.miranda@gmail.com>> wrote: >>> >>> Hi All, Hi Torsten, Hi Jakob, >>> >>> On Thu, Feb 14, 2019 at 6:17 AM Torsten Bergmann <astares(a)gmx.de <mailto:astares@gmx.de>> wrote: >>> Hi, >>> >>> as some of you might already know "Tonel" is a file-per-class format for monticello repositories [1]. >>> >>> In Pharo land many projects are already converted to it - as regular "file tree" solution faces issues >>> with git handling due to very long file names / deep file hierarchy (often leading to trouble on Windows). >>> >>> Dales's Rowan (a new project/package manager for Smalltalk) supports FileTree and also Tonel >>> repositories [2]. There is also a tool to convert from STORE (VisualWorks Source-Code Versioning System) >>> to Tonel format [3]. >>> >>> So I wonder about adoption of Tonel in Squeak land. >>> >>> Any status/comments? >>> >>> Last year I was given contract employment by Tudor Girba's feenk which in part was to involve me porting VMMaker.oscog to Pharo in order to reap the productivity benefits of the Glamorous Toolkit when applied to VMMaker. The major direction was to unify the opensmalltalk-vm repository with a Toned-Format repository holding the Smalltalk code. >>> >>> This project, though no fault of feenk's did not go well. A big part of it was my own emotional attachment to Squeak, my "muscle memory" with Squeak and my long experience with Smalltalk-80 derived meta programming which I make extensive use of in VMMaker.oscog. But a key issue was that I was not prepared to *move* VMMaker.oscog to Pharo; for me it is key that it can live in both places. In particular I will not risk VMMaker.oscog being stranded on Pharo as it moves away from the "image-based rendering model". This is not because I don't believe in pixel-independent rendering models, but because productivity in VMMaker depends much more than on GToolkit inspection on the key architectural feature of being completely, safely simulateable (not a real English word; but meaning capable of being simulated). As Pharo moves towards external libraries to implement its UI so the degree to which VMMaker is simulated is reduced. Thus crashes in external code cannot be handled with the same power as with errors presented within the Smalltalk environment itself, and this (as harsh experience over thirty five years has taught me) is far more important for overall productivity than having powerful tailorable inspectors. >>> >>> I therefore wanted a Tonel that could both function for Squeak's Monticello and for Pharo's Iceberg. I had modified the Tonel serialization a little to provide well-formatted support for method timestamps, which are still a key and extremely useful part of Squeak Monticello's "blame" equivalent. Until git author attribution can be imported into Squeak's Monticello (something I don't see happening) I wanted merely to be able to have a variant of Tonel, enabled for example by a class variable, and hence /not/ present in Pharo, that would allow VMMaker.oscog to use Tonel but still be functional inside Squeak. I asked Esteban and was met by a flat no. Not "OK, but this is an option only you will use", but a flat "not under any circumstanceâ. >> >> This is textually my answer (even with the English errors): >> â¦ âAnyway the answer will be no :) >> This was considered, and even the first implementation of tonel had it. Now, this was discarded because it does not works with git (or other file backends). It was not even me who complained first (as I said, I implemented it). It was Dale and other people used to work on git. >> >> Thing is, putting timestamps it will generate conflicts massively when there is no reason to it. >> >> How can this be true? Since a method's time stamp changes only when it is modified it will only produce a change where a method is changed. I see no problem with this. >> >> I do see the possibility of a bug in Pharo when it was using Monticello and timestamps though. There was a time when you, Esteban, were contributing to VMMaker.oscog from Pharo and often there would be many changes where just the timestamp had changed. SO the problem seems to be not with timestamps but with mismanagement of them. >> >> >> So, we drop itâ¦ and we add support for the equivalent using the tool we use (iceberg gives you not just the author that modified last the method but all of them, along the history). >> >> Who is we? I ask from a different perspective. I ask not too have Pharo use it but to allow Squeak to use it so that I can have timestamps for Squerask and still use Tonel. But still "âAnyway the answer will be no :)". >> >> So, your first statement is false. If things are correct there will *not* be massive generation of conflicts when there is no reason. Second, I am not asking you to change Tonel in Pharo. i am only asking you to allow Tonel to support timestamps in systems that want to use it. >> >> >> I hope is an understandable reason?â >> >> And then in other mail of same thread I suggested an approach viable for squeak: >> >> "Now, what Iâm sure is that if you are trying of using the 100% of Monticello and to use git just as another repository backend, it will not work (we already tried). It will consume far too much effort and you will finish beating the purpose of use git and a file-based-format, and you will be in the worst of two worlds :) >> >> We started like that, and we ended up implementing Iceberg to take benefit of the tools we are using. >> >> In the middle, there was/is gitfiletree. >> (I think I suggested you to look at it to adapt it for tonel and squeak). >> >> Gitfiletree uses OSProcess to call git as external tool and it makes all the operations needed. â >> >> >> Now, what I was suggesting was a way to use tonel backed with OSProcess (which works in squeak) instead backing it with libgit2 as us. >> Since they need the blame support, they could use OSProcess and external git for it. >> >> Of course squeak (and any other dialect) are free to take tonel and adapt it to their needs (in fact, Mariano extended Tonel for VA specific things). >> And Pharo can read that format but it will ignore all extensions. >> Now, another problem is to WRITE: Pharo would write those packages in âpharo formatâ and that information would be lost. And in the case of VMMaker, if the idea is to be able to work on both sides, then Pharo needs to âhonourâ that format, it cannot just read it and ignore it later. So this creates an incompatibility that needs to be handled. >> >> Anyway, as you can see my answer was not ânot under any circumstancesâ. Was âno, because is not convenientâ. >> >> It was still no. And my request was clear. I asked if you would allow Tonel to support timestamps, not that Pharo would use timestamps. This avoids forking Tonel, which I see as essential (it is essential that Tonel *not* fork) for Tonel to be a format that can serve as an interchange between Squeak and Pharo. >> >> >> Esteban >> >> >>> >>> So here I am joining in this thread reluctantly. I'm extremely frustrated by the state of Tonel in Squeak and between the two dialects. ClÃ©ment had moved his Scorch optimizer to Tonel/git and I tried to use Metacello and Jakob's Tonel code to at least allow me to load that code and try and push forward on Sista/Scorch. The port *does not work*. Metacello fails to load Scorch. Neither Jakob nor Fabio, after putting in some effort, were able to fix the problem, and it is well beyond me. So I have accepted the fact that I will have to use the Monticello repository for Scorch/Sista. >>> >>> I had deep concerns that the pursuit of git integration would end up splitting the Pharo and Squeak communities and indeed this is now in progress. I am utterly unmotivated by the lack of cooperation, the sheer arrogance and bullying of those that say "you will move to git/tonel or else", and considering leaving VMMaker altogether. The only things that are keeping me interested are Ron Teitelbaum's Terf and me pursuing a PhD on register allocation in the context of Sista/Scorch with Robert Hirshfeld's group at HPI. >>> >>> Here's the kind of crap people like Ducasse throw at me: >>> >>> "Eliot >>> >>> At the end of the day I will probably ask the two phds that should work on language design to use truffle or pypy >>> because let us face it we cannot work with the Pharo VM. Else we will simply have to fork it (because we do not want to have >>> to jump over cuis, newspeak, squeak code constraints and I do not what) and it will be another drama is in the pico world >>> of the âopenâ smalltalk VM. " >>> >>> I am so over this crap. >>> _,,,^..^,,,_ >>> best, Eliot >> >> >> >> -- >> _,,,^..^,,,_ >> best, Eliot > > > > -- > _,,,^..^,,,_ > best, Eliot

Feb. 18, 2019

Re: [Pharo-dev] VMMaker in Pharo [Was: Squeak and Tonel]

by Eliot Miranda

Doru, On Sun, Feb 17, 2019 at 10:33 PM Tudor Girba <tudor(a)tudorgirba.com> wrote: > Hi Eliot, > > You raise a few technical concerns related to VMMaker that seem > addressable: > > 1. Rendering technology: Both in Pharo and in GT, there exist in-image > canvases, Athens and Sparta respectively, that are backend independent. > This allows us to have image-based drawing logic, like BitBlt or even > better, the drawing capabilities that Juan Vuletich built in Morphic 3, > transparently. In fact, we even started to look at the code from Morphic 3 > and we think itâs not much effort to make it work behind Sparta. This would > provide a complete solution that would not rely on any external libraries. > > 2. Git history. We used to have the author and timestamp in the metadata > of Tonel but because it generated unwanted conflicts it was decided to > remove it. I think this is a good decision and one based on the experience > of using it. But, why do you think the algorithm of retrieving Git could > not be made to work in Squeak? Is there a specific technical reason, or is > it more that you do not see the effort being spent in this direction? I am > asking to understand what could a possible solution be. > > > But, letâs take a step back. George and Andrei did move the VMMaker code, > including all its history, into Git using (and enhancing) > https://github.com/peteruhnak/git-migration. > > The code is here: > https://github.com/feenkcom/opensmalltalk-vm/tree/pullrequest5/vmmaker > > Our goal was to make the code loadable and runnable in Pharo through Git. > We have a reproducible process to produce this history, and this means that > we can also synchronize all changes from the Monticello VMMaker repository > and produce a history-preserving Git repository. > > The current code comes with a BaselineOfVMMaker that loads in Pharo, and > the code generation seems to work to a good extent without much effort. > There is still work that needs to be done especially on the simulation > part, but we think most of it can be addressed through a Pharo-specific > package that provides compatibility logic. > > I see two benefits for doing this: > 1. It allows people in Pharo to play with the VM within the Pharo context > and consequently contribute. > 2. It allows us to build an environment dedicated for VM development > without affecting the current contribution process. We can judge later > whether this is useful. > All this is great work. But I cannot use it until I can also function in Squeak. I know you want me to move to Pharo, but I am not convinced that it is a safe place for me to land. I have voiced my concerns before (stability, moving away from support I need (e.g. Pharo dropping read./write file streams is the latest example). Let me simply restate that "t6he devil you know is better than the devil you don't", and that I know I am productive with VMMaker in Squeak, but I *do not* know that I can be productive in Pharo (in fact, I have lots of experience of the contrary). So I will not move to Pharo any time soon and so, until there is a solution to git/tonel/squeak integration I cannot join the unified repository, must as I would like to. I'm sorry for the frustration this causes other. I am radical in some things, but deeply conservative in others. And my ability to be productive is obviously foundational. > Cheers, > Doru > > > > On Feb 17, 2019, at 9:27 PM, Eliot Miranda <eliot.miranda(a)gmail.com> > wrote: > > > > Hi All, Hi Torsten, Hi Jakob, > > > > On Thu, Feb 14, 2019 at 6:17 AM Torsten Bergmann <astares(a)gmx.de> wrote: > > Hi, > > > > as some of you might already know "Tonel" is a file-per-class format for > monticello repositories [1]. > > > > In Pharo land many projects are already converted to it - as regular > "file tree" solution faces issues > > with git handling due to very long file names / deep file hierarchy > (often leading to trouble on Windows). > > > > Dales's Rowan (a new project/package manager for Smalltalk) supports > FileTree and also Tonel > > repositories [2]. There is also a tool to convert from STORE > (VisualWorks Source-Code Versioning System) > > to Tonel format [3]. > > > > So I wonder about adoption of Tonel in Squeak land. > > > > Any status/comments? > > > > Last year I was given contract employment by Tudor Girba's feenk which > in part was to involve me porting VMMaker.oscog to Pharo in order to reap > the productivity benefits of the Glamorous Toolkit when applied to > VMMaker. The major direction was to unify the opensmalltalk-vm repository > with a Toned-Format repository holding the Smalltalk code. > > > > This project, though no fault of feenk's did not go well. A big part of > it was my own emotional attachment to Squeak, my "muscle memory" with > Squeak and my long experience with Smalltalk-80 derived meta programming > which I make extensive use of in VMMaker.oscog. But a key issue was that I > was not prepared to *move* VMMaker.oscog to Pharo; for me it is key that it > can live in both places. In particular I will not risk VMMaker.oscog being > stranded on Pharo as it moves away from the "image-based rendering model". > This is not because I don't believe in pixel-independent rendering models, > but because productivity in VMMaker depends much more than on GToolkit > inspection on the key architectural feature of being completely, safely > simulateable (not a real English word; but meaning capable of being > simulated). As Pharo moves towards external libraries to implement its UI > so the degree to which VMMaker is simulated is reduced. Thus crashes in > external code cannot be handled with the same power as with errors > presented within the Smalltalk environment itself, and this (as harsh > experience over thirty five years has taught me) is far more important for > overall productivity than having powerful tailorable inspectors. > > > > I therefore wanted a Tonel that could both function for Squeak's > Monticello and for Pharo's Iceberg. I had modified the Tonel serialization > a little to provide well-formatted support for method timestamps, which are > still a key and extremely useful part of Squeak Monticello's "blame" > equivalent. Until git author attribution can be imported into Squeak's > Monticello (something I don't see happening) I wanted merely to be able to > have a variant of Tonel, enabled for example by a class variable, and hence > /not/ present in Pharo, that would allow VMMaker.oscog to use Tonel but > still be functional inside Squeak. I asked Esteban and was met by a flat > no. Not "OK, but this is an option only you will use", but a flat "not > under any circumstance". > > > > So here I am joining in this thread reluctantly. I'm extremely > frustrated by the state of Tonel in Squeak and between the two dialects. > ClÃ©ment had moved his Scorch optimizer to Tonel/git and I tried to use > Metacello and Jakob's Tonel code to at least allow me to load that code and > try and push forward on Sista/Scorch. The port *does not work*. Metacello > fails to load Scorch. Neither Jakob nor Fabio, after putting in some > effort, were able to fix the problem, and it is well beyond me. So I have > accepted the fact that I will have to use the Monticello repository for > Scorch/Sista. > > > > I had deep concerns that the pursuit of git integration would end up > splitting the Pharo and Squeak communities and indeed this is now in > progress. I am utterly unmotivated by the lack of cooperation, the sheer > arrogance and bullying of those that say "you will move to git/tonel or > else", and considering leaving VMMaker altogether. The only things that > are keeping me interested are Ron Teitelbaum's Terf and me pursuing a PhD > on register allocation in the context of Sista/Scorch with Robert > Hirshfeld's group at HPI. > > > > Here's the kind of crap people like Ducasse throw at me: > > > > "Eliot > > > > At the end of the day I will probably ask the two phds that should work > on language design to use truffle or pypy > > because let us face it we cannot work with the Pharo VM. Else we will > simply have to fork it (because we do not want to have > > to jump over cuis, newspeak, squeak code constraints and I do not what) > and it will be another drama is in the pico world > > of the âopenâ smalltalk VM. " > > > > I am so over this crap. > > _,,,^..^,,,_ > > best, Eliot > > -- > www.feenk.com > > âSoftware has no shape. Actually, it has no one shape. It has many." > > -- _,,,^..^,,,_ best, Eliot

Feb. 18, 2019

Re: [Pharo-dev] [squeak-dev] Squeak and Tonel

by Eliot Miranda

Esteban, On Mon, Feb 18, 2019 at 10:37 AM Esteban Lorenzano <estebanlm(a)gmail.com> wrote: > Still thatâs not the point. > Not having an agreement is very different that the behaviour you described > about me (and that to justify your own actions). > You presented my opposition as it would have been âjust becauseâ and I > presented you my arguments. Even more, I *was* trying to find a solution. > I can be right or wrong, but Iâm not an idiot trying to be more than I am. > Honestly, discussing with you many times feels like it is âmy way or the > highwayâ, and itâs hard to follow you :( > I am not trying to force my way. I am trying to find a way that works for me. I asked you to support an option in Tonel. I did not ask you8 to change they way Pharo uses Tonel. You can choose to read my request as some kind of threat, or you can choose to read it as a straightforward request. I am not trying to get you to follow me. I am frustrated at being mistrusted. I have not asked you to follow me. I have tried to work with you. But you don't trust me. I have done everything I can in the VM (let's ignore source code control and building for now) to support Pharo. I have done *nothing* to interfere with Pharo's use of the VM in the code base itself. have I? Point to actions I have taken, code I have written to try and harm you. We now have a situation where we support differences in the code base (FilePlugin API, command line argument parsing, version printing) that extend *those I put in at the beginning to support differences* (such as plugins.ext and plugins.int to allow builders to configure the VM as they choose). Where have I tried to block Pharo? But you left vm-dev. You decided to stop communicating. And now you continue to describe a straight-forward request to allow an optional behavior in Tonel with a flat refusal, plus some BS about me trying to insist that you follow me. I don't understand Esteban. You and I do not communicate. I feel that you top not want to work with me, that you dislike and distrust me. I cannot work with you. I have tried for years and we are still in difference and disagreement. > Esteban > > On 18 Feb 2019, at 18:34, Eliot Miranda <eliot.miranda(a)gmail.com> wrote: > > Esteban, > > On Mon, Feb 18, 2019 at 4:06 AM Esteban Lorenzano <estebanlm(a)gmail.com> > wrote: > >> Hi, >> >> Iâm so not wanting to be part of this discussion, but here I am. >> Just because it was mentioned my name in a way I consider inaccurate. >> >> On 17 Feb 2019, at 21:27, Eliot Miranda <eliot.miranda(a)gmail.com> wrote: >> >> Hi All, Hi Torsten, Hi Jakob, >> >> On Thu, Feb 14, 2019 at 6:17 AM Torsten Bergmann <astares(a)gmx.de> wrote: >> >>> Hi, >>> >>> as some of you might already know "Tonel" is a file-per-class format for >>> monticello repositories [1]. >>> >>> In Pharo land many projects are already converted to it - as regular >>> "file tree" solution faces issues >>> with git handling due to very long file names / deep file hierarchy >>> (often leading to trouble on Windows). >>> >>> Dales's Rowan (a new project/package manager for Smalltalk) supports >>> FileTree and also Tonel >>> repositories [2]. There is also a tool to convert from STORE >>> (VisualWorks Source-Code Versioning System) >>> to Tonel format [3]. >>> >>> So I wonder about adoption of Tonel in Squeak land. >>> >>> Any status/comments? >>> >> >> Last year I was given contract employment by Tudor Girba's feenk which in >> part was to involve me porting VMMaker.oscog to Pharo in order to reap the >> productivity benefits of the Glamorous Toolkit when applied to VMMaker. >> The major direction was to unify the opensmalltalk-vm repository with a >> Toned-Format repository holding the Smalltalk code. >> >> This project, though no fault of feenk's did not go well. A big part of >> it was my own emotional attachment to Squeak, my "muscle memory" with >> Squeak and my long experience with Smalltalk-80 derived meta programming >> which I make extensive use of in VMMaker.oscog. But a key issue was that I >> was not prepared to *move* VMMaker.oscog to Pharo; for me it is key that it >> can live in both places. In particular I will not risk VMMaker.oscog being >> stranded on Pharo as it moves away from the "image-based rendering model". >> This is not because I don't believe in pixel-independent rendering models, >> but because productivity in VMMaker depends much more than on GToolkit >> inspection on the key architectural feature of being completely, safely >> simulateable (not a real English word; but meaning capable of being >> simulated). As Pharo moves towards external libraries to implement its UI >> so the degree to which VMMaker is simulated is reduced. Thus crashes in >> external code cannot be handled with the same power as with errors >> presented within the Smalltalk environment itself, and this (as harsh >> experience over thirty five years has taught me) is far more important for >> overall productivity than having powerful tailorable inspectors. >> >> I therefore wanted a Tonel that could both function for Squeak's >> Monticello and for Pharo's Iceberg. I had modified the Tonel serialization >> a little to provide well-formatted support for method timestamps, which are >> still a key and extremely useful part of Squeak Monticello's "blame" >> equivalent. Until git author attribution can be imported into Squeak's >> Monticello (something I don't see happening) I wanted merely to be able to >> have a variant of Tonel, enabled for example by a class variable, and hence >> /not/ present in Pharo, that would allow VMMaker.oscog to use Tonel but >> still be functional inside Squeak. I asked Esteban and was met by a flat >> no. Not "OK, but this is an option only you will use", but a flat "not >> under any circumstanceâ. >> >> >> This is textually my answer (even with the English errors): >> â¦ âAnyway the answer will be no :) >> This was considered, and even the first implementation of tonel had it. >> Now, this was discarded because it does not works with git (or other file >> backends). It was not even me who complained first (as I said, I >> implemented it). It was Dale and other people used to work on git. >> >> Thing is, putting timestamps it will generate conflicts massively when >> there is no reason to it. >> > > How can this be true? Since a method's time stamp changes only when it is > modified it will only produce a change where a method is changed. I see no > problem with this. > > I do see the possibility of a bug in Pharo when it was using Monticello > and timestamps though. There was a time when you, Esteban, were > contributing to VMMaker.oscog from Pharo and often there would be many > changes where just the timestamp had changed. SO the problem seems to be > not with timestamps but with mismanagement of them. > > > So, we drop itâ¦ and we add support for the equivalent using the tool we >> use (iceberg gives you not just the author that modified last the method >> but all of them, along the history). >> > > Who is we? I ask from a different perspective. I ask not too have Pharo > use it but to allow Squeak to use it so that I can have timestamps for > Squerask and still use Tonel. But still "âAnyway the answer will be no :)". > > So, your first statement is false. If things are correct there will *not* > be massive generation of conflicts when there is no reason. Second, I am > not asking you to change Tonel in Pharo. i am only asking you to allow > Tonel to support timestamps in systems that want to use it. > > >> I hope is an understandable reason?â >> >> And then in other mail of same thread I suggested an approach viable for >> squeak: >> >> "Now, what Iâm sure is that if you are trying of using the 100% of >> Monticello and to use git just as another repository backend, it will not >> work (we already tried). It will consume far too much effort and you will >> finish beating the purpose of use git and a file-based-format, and you will >> be in the worst of two worlds :) >> >> We started like that, and we ended up implementing Iceberg to take >> benefit of the tools we are using. >> >> In the middle, there was/is gitfiletree. >> (I think I suggested you to look at it to adapt it for tonel and squeak). >> >> Gitfiletree uses OSProcess to call git as external tool and it makes all >> the operations needed. â >> >> >> Now, what I was suggesting was a way to use tonel backed with OSProcess >> (which works in squeak) instead backing it with libgit2 as us. >> Since they need the blame support, they could use OSProcess and external >> git for it. >> >> Of course squeak (and any other dialect) are free to take tonel and adapt >> it to their needs (in fact, Mariano extended Tonel for VA specific things). >> And Pharo can read that format but it will ignore all extensions. >> Now, another problem is to WRITE: Pharo would write those packages in >> âpharo formatâ and that information would be lost. And in the case of >> VMMaker, if the idea is to be able to work on both sides, then Pharo needs >> to âhonourâ that format, it cannot just read it and ignore it later. So >> this creates an incompatibility that needs to be handled. >> >> Anyway, as you can see my answer was not ânot under any circumstancesâ. >> Was âno, because is not convenientâ. >> > > It was still no. And my request was clear. I asked if you would allow > Tonel to support timestamps, not that Pharo would use timestamps. This > avoids forking Tonel, which I see as essential (it is essential that Tonel > *not* fork) for Tonel to be a format that can serve as an interchange > between Squeak and Pharo. > > >> Esteban >> >> >> >> So here I am joining in this thread reluctantly. I'm extremely >> frustrated by the state of Tonel in Squeak and between the two dialects. >> ClÃ©ment had moved his Scorch optimizer to Tonel/git and I tried to use >> Metacello and Jakob's Tonel code to at least allow me to load that code and >> try and push forward on Sista/Scorch. The port *does not work*. Metacello >> fails to load Scorch. Neither Jakob nor Fabio, after putting in some >> effort, were able to fix the problem, and it is well beyond me. So I have >> accepted the fact that I will have to use the Monticello repository for >> Scorch/Sista. >> >> I had deep concerns that the pursuit of git integration would end up >> splitting the Pharo and Squeak communities and indeed this is now in >> progress. I am utterly unmotivated by the lack of cooperation, the sheer >> arrogance and bullying of those that say "you will move to git/tonel or >> else", and considering leaving VMMaker altogether. The only things that >> are keeping me interested are Ron Teitelbaum's Terf and me pursuing a PhD >> on register allocation in the context of Sista/Scorch with Robert >> Hirshfeld's group at HPI. >> >> Here's the kind of crap people like Ducasse throw at me: >> >> "Eliot >> >> At the end of the day I will probably ask the two phds that should work >> on language design to use truffle or pypy >> because let us face it we cannot work with the Pharo VM. Else we will >> simply have to fork it (because we do not want to have >> to jump over cuis, newspeak, squeak code constraints and I do not what) >> and it will be another drama is in the pico world >> of the âopenâ smalltalk VM. " >> >> I am so over this crap. >> _,,,^..^,,,_ >> best, Eliot >> >> >> > > -- > _,,,^..^,,,_ > best, Eliot > > > -- _,,,^..^,,,_ best, Eliot

Feb. 18, 2019

Re: [Pharo-dev] [squeak-dev] Squeak and Tonel

by Esteban Lorenzano

Still thatâs not the point. Not having an agreement is very different that the behaviour you described about me (and that to justify your own actions). You presented my opposition as it would have been âjust becauseâ and I presented you my arguments. Even more, I *was* trying to find a solution. I can be right or wrong, but Iâm not an idiot trying to be more than I am. Honestly, discussing with you many times feels like it is âmy way or the highwayâ, and itâs hard to follow you :( Esteban > On 18 Feb 2019, at 18:34, Eliot Miranda <eliot.miranda(a)gmail.com> wrote: > > Esteban, > > On Mon, Feb 18, 2019 at 4:06 AM Esteban Lorenzano <estebanlm(a)gmail.com <mailto:estebanlm@gmail.com>> wrote: > Hi, > > Iâm so not wanting to be part of this discussion, but here I am. > Just because it was mentioned my name in a way I consider inaccurate. > >> On 17 Feb 2019, at 21:27, Eliot Miranda <eliot.miranda(a)gmail.com <mailto:eliot.miranda@gmail.com>> wrote: >> >> Hi All, Hi Torsten, Hi Jakob, >> >> On Thu, Feb 14, 2019 at 6:17 AM Torsten Bergmann <astares(a)gmx.de <mailto:astares@gmx.de>> wrote: >> Hi, >> >> as some of you might already know "Tonel" is a file-per-class format for monticello repositories [1]. >> >> In Pharo land many projects are already converted to it - as regular "file tree" solution faces issues >> with git handling due to very long file names / deep file hierarchy (often leading to trouble on Windows). >> >> Dales's Rowan (a new project/package manager for Smalltalk) supports FileTree and also Tonel >> repositories [2]. There is also a tool to convert from STORE (VisualWorks Source-Code Versioning System) >> to Tonel format [3]. >> >> So I wonder about adoption of Tonel in Squeak land. >> >> Any status/comments? >> >> Last year I was given contract employment by Tudor Girba's feenk which in part was to involve me porting VMMaker.oscog to Pharo in order to reap the productivity benefits of the Glamorous Toolkit when applied to VMMaker. The major direction was to unify the opensmalltalk-vm repository with a Toned-Format repository holding the Smalltalk code. >> >> This project, though no fault of feenk's did not go well. A big part of it was my own emotional attachment to Squeak, my "muscle memory" with Squeak and my long experience with Smalltalk-80 derived meta programming which I make extensive use of in VMMaker.oscog. But a key issue was that I was not prepared to *move* VMMaker.oscog to Pharo; for me it is key that it can live in both places. In particular I will not risk VMMaker.oscog being stranded on Pharo as it moves away from the "image-based rendering model". This is not because I don't believe in pixel-independent rendering models, but because productivity in VMMaker depends much more than on GToolkit inspection on the key architectural feature of being completely, safely simulateable (not a real English word; but meaning capable of being simulated). As Pharo moves towards external libraries to implement its UI so the degree to which VMMaker is simulated is reduced. Thus crashes in external code cannot be handled with the same power as with errors presented within the Smalltalk environment itself, and this (as harsh experience over thirty five years has taught me) is far more important for overall productivity than having powerful tailorable inspectors. >> >> I therefore wanted a Tonel that could both function for Squeak's Monticello and for Pharo's Iceberg. I had modified the Tonel serialization a little to provide well-formatted support for method timestamps, which are still a key and extremely useful part of Squeak Monticello's "blame" equivalent. Until git author attribution can be imported into Squeak's Monticello (something I don't see happening) I wanted merely to be able to have a variant of Tonel, enabled for example by a class variable, and hence /not/ present in Pharo, that would allow VMMaker.oscog to use Tonel but still be functional inside Squeak. I asked Esteban and was met by a flat no. Not "OK, but this is an option only you will use", but a flat "not under any circumstanceâ. > > This is textually my answer (even with the English errors): > â¦ âAnyway the answer will be no :) > This was considered, and even the first implementation of tonel had it. Now, this was discarded because it does not works with git (or other file backends). It was not even me who complained first (as I said, I implemented it). It was Dale and other people used to work on git. > > Thing is, putting timestamps it will generate conflicts massively when there is no reason to it. > > How can this be true? Since a method's time stamp changes only when it is modified it will only produce a change where a method is changed. I see no problem with this. > > I do see the possibility of a bug in Pharo when it was using Monticello and timestamps though. There was a time when you, Esteban, were contributing to VMMaker.oscog from Pharo and often there would be many changes where just the timestamp had changed. SO the problem seems to be not with timestamps but with mismanagement of them. > > > So, we drop itâ¦ and we add support for the equivalent using the tool we use (iceberg gives you not just the author that modified last the method but all of them, along the history). > > Who is we? I ask from a different perspective. I ask not too have Pharo use it but to allow Squeak to use it so that I can have timestamps for Squerask and still use Tonel. But still "âAnyway the answer will be no :)". > > So, your first statement is false. If things are correct there will *not* be massive generation of conflicts when there is no reason. Second, I am not asking you to change Tonel in Pharo. i am only asking you to allow Tonel to support timestamps in systems that want to use it. > > > I hope is an understandable reason?â > > And then in other mail of same thread I suggested an approach viable for squeak: > > "Now, what Iâm sure is that if you are trying of using the 100% of Monticello and to use git just as another repository backend, it will not work (we already tried). It will consume far too much effort and you will finish beating the purpose of use git and a file-based-format, and you will be in the worst of two worlds :) > > We started like that, and we ended up implementing Iceberg to take benefit of the tools we are using. > > In the middle, there was/is gitfiletree. > (I think I suggested you to look at it to adapt it for tonel and squeak). > > Gitfiletree uses OSProcess to call git as external tool and it makes all the operations needed. â > > > Now, what I was suggesting was a way to use tonel backed with OSProcess (which works in squeak) instead backing it with libgit2 as us. > Since they need the blame support, they could use OSProcess and external git for it. > > Of course squeak (and any other dialect) are free to take tonel and adapt it to their needs (in fact, Mariano extended Tonel for VA specific things). > And Pharo can read that format but it will ignore all extensions. > Now, another problem is to WRITE: Pharo would write those packages in âpharo formatâ and that information would be lost. And in the case of VMMaker, if the idea is to be able to work on both sides, then Pharo needs to âhonourâ that format, it cannot just read it and ignore it later. So this creates an incompatibility that needs to be handled. > > Anyway, as you can see my answer was not ânot under any circumstancesâ. Was âno, because is not convenientâ. > > It was still no. And my request was clear. I asked if you would allow Tonel to support timestamps, not that Pharo would use timestamps. This avoids forking Tonel, which I see as essential (it is essential that Tonel *not* fork) for Tonel to be a format that can serve as an interchange between Squeak and Pharo. > > > Esteban > > >> >> So here I am joining in this thread reluctantly. I'm extremely frustrated by the state of Tonel in Squeak and between the two dialects. ClÃ©ment had moved his Scorch optimizer to Tonel/git and I tried to use Metacello and Jakob's Tonel code to at least allow me to load that code and try and push forward on Sista/Scorch. The port *does not work*. Metacello fails to load Scorch. Neither Jakob nor Fabio, after putting in some effort, were able to fix the problem, and it is well beyond me. So I have accepted the fact that I will have to use the Monticello repository for Scorch/Sista. >> >> I had deep concerns that the pursuit of git integration would end up splitting the Pharo and Squeak communities and indeed this is now in progress. I am utterly unmotivated by the lack of cooperation, the sheer arrogance and bullying of those that say "you will move to git/tonel or else", and considering leaving VMMaker altogether. The only things that are keeping me interested are Ron Teitelbaum's Terf and me pursuing a PhD on register allocation in the context of Sista/Scorch with Robert Hirshfeld's group at HPI. >> >> Here's the kind of crap people like Ducasse throw at me: >> >> "Eliot >> >> At the end of the day I will probably ask the two phds that should work on language design to use truffle or pypy >> because let us face it we cannot work with the Pharo VM. Else we will simply have to fork it (because we do not want to have >> to jump over cuis, newspeak, squeak code constraints and I do not what) and it will be another drama is in the pico world >> of the âopenâ smalltalk VM. " >> >> I am so over this crap. >> _,,,^..^,,,_ >> best, Eliot > > > > -- > _,,,^..^,,,_ > best, Eliot

Feb. 18, 2019

Re: [Pharo-dev] [squeak-dev] Squeak and Tonel

by Ben Coman

On Tue, 19 Feb 2019 at 01:34, Eliot Miranda <eliot.miranda(a)gmail.com> wrote: > Esteban, > > On Mon, Feb 18, 2019 at 4:06 AM Esteban Lorenzano <estebanlm(a)gmail.com> > wrote: > >> Hi, >> >> Iâm so not wanting to be part of this discussion, but here I am. >> Just because it was mentioned my name in a way I consider inaccurate. >> >> On 17 Feb 2019, at 21:27, Eliot Miranda <eliot.miranda(a)gmail.com> wrote: >> >> Hi All, Hi Torsten, Hi Jakob, >> >> On Thu, Feb 14, 2019 at 6:17 AM Torsten Bergmann <astares(a)gmx.de> wrote: >> >>> Hi, >>> >>> as some of you might already know "Tonel" is a file-per-class format for >>> monticello repositories [1]. >>> >>> In Pharo land many projects are already converted to it - as regular >>> "file tree" solution faces issues >>> with git handling due to very long file names / deep file hierarchy >>> (often leading to trouble on Windows). >>> >>> Dales's Rowan (a new project/package manager for Smalltalk) supports >>> FileTree and also Tonel >>> repositories [2]. There is also a tool to convert from STORE >>> (VisualWorks Source-Code Versioning System) >>> to Tonel format [3]. >>> >>> So I wonder about adoption of Tonel in Squeak land. >>> >>> Any status/comments? >>> >> >> Last year I was given contract employment by Tudor Girba's feenk which in >> part was to involve me porting VMMaker.oscog to Pharo in order to reap the >> productivity benefits of the Glamorous Toolkit when applied to VMMaker. >> The major direction was to unify the opensmalltalk-vm repository with a >> Toned-Format repository holding the Smalltalk code. >> >> This project, though no fault of feenk's did not go well. A big part of >> it was my own emotional attachment to Squeak, my "muscle memory" with >> Squeak and my long experience with Smalltalk-80 derived meta programming >> which I make extensive use of in VMMaker.oscog. But a key issue was that I >> was not prepared to *move* VMMaker.oscog to Pharo; for me it is key that it >> can live in both places. In particular I will not risk VMMaker.oscog being >> stranded on Pharo as it moves away from the "image-based rendering model". >> This is not because I don't believe in pixel-independent rendering models, >> but because productivity in VMMaker depends much more than on GToolkit >> inspection on the key architectural feature of being completely, safely >> simulateable (not a real English word; but meaning capable of being >> simulated). As Pharo moves towards external libraries to implement its UI >> so the degree to which VMMaker is simulated is reduced. Thus crashes in >> external code cannot be handled with the same power as with errors >> presented within the Smalltalk environment itself, and this (as harsh >> experience over thirty five years has taught me) is far more important for >> overall productivity than having powerful tailorable inspectors. >> >> I therefore wanted a Tonel that could both function for Squeak's >> Monticello and for Pharo's Iceberg. I had modified the Tonel serialization >> a little to provide well-formatted support for method timestamps, which are >> still a key and extremely useful part of Squeak Monticello's "blame" >> equivalent. Until git author attribution can be imported into Squeak's >> Monticello (something I don't see happening) I wanted merely to be able to >> have a variant of Tonel, enabled for example by a class variable, and hence >> /not/ present in Pharo, that would allow VMMaker.oscog to use Tonel but >> still be functional inside Squeak. I asked Esteban and was met by a flat >> no. Not "OK, but this is an option only you will use", but a flat "not >> under any circumstanceâ. >> >> >> This is textually my answer (even with the English errors): >> â¦ âAnyway the answer will be no :) >> This was considered, and even the first implementation of tonel had it. >> Now, this was discarded because it does not works with git (or other file >> backends). It was not even me who complained first (as I said, I >> implemented it). It was Dale and other people used to work on git. >> >> Thing is, putting timestamps it will generate conflicts massively when >> there is no reason to it. >> > > How can this be true? Since a method's time stamp changes only when it is > modified it will only produce a change where a method is changed. I see no > problem with this. > This is a case of the difference between theory and practice :) > > I do see the possibility of a bug in Pharo when it was using Monticello > and timestamps though. > When I heard of this timestamp conflict problem I began with the same belief to do some digging (and you know how I dig deep into things) with git-only command line experiments and ended up finding its really true. I'll try to remember some examples. cheers -ben

Feb. 18, 2019

Re: [Pharo-dev] [squeak-dev] Squeak and Tonel

by Eliot Miranda

Esteban, On Mon, Feb 18, 2019 at 4:06 AM Esteban Lorenzano <estebanlm(a)gmail.com> wrote: > Hi, > > Iâm so not wanting to be part of this discussion, but here I am. > Just because it was mentioned my name in a way I consider inaccurate. > > On 17 Feb 2019, at 21:27, Eliot Miranda <eliot.miranda(a)gmail.com> wrote: > > Hi All, Hi Torsten, Hi Jakob, > > On Thu, Feb 14, 2019 at 6:17 AM Torsten Bergmann <astares(a)gmx.de> wrote: > >> Hi, >> >> as some of you might already know "Tonel" is a file-per-class format for >> monticello repositories [1]. >> >> In Pharo land many projects are already converted to it - as regular >> "file tree" solution faces issues >> with git handling due to very long file names / deep file hierarchy >> (often leading to trouble on Windows). >> >> Dales's Rowan (a new project/package manager for Smalltalk) supports >> FileTree and also Tonel >> repositories [2]. There is also a tool to convert from STORE (VisualWorks >> Source-Code Versioning System) >> to Tonel format [3]. >> >> So I wonder about adoption of Tonel in Squeak land. >> >> Any status/comments? >> > > Last year I was given contract employment by Tudor Girba's feenk which in > part was to involve me porting VMMaker.oscog to Pharo in order to reap the > productivity benefits of the Glamorous Toolkit when applied to VMMaker. > The major direction was to unify the opensmalltalk-vm repository with a > Toned-Format repository holding the Smalltalk code. > > This project, though no fault of feenk's did not go well. A big part of > it was my own emotional attachment to Squeak, my "muscle memory" with > Squeak and my long experience with Smalltalk-80 derived meta programming > which I make extensive use of in VMMaker.oscog. But a key issue was that I > was not prepared to *move* VMMaker.oscog to Pharo; for me it is key that it > can live in both places. In particular I will not risk VMMaker.oscog being > stranded on Pharo as it moves away from the "image-based rendering model". > This is not because I don't believe in pixel-independent rendering models, > but because productivity in VMMaker depends much more than on GToolkit > inspection on the key architectural feature of being completely, safely > simulateable (not a real English word; but meaning capable of being > simulated). As Pharo moves towards external libraries to implement its UI > so the degree to which VMMaker is simulated is reduced. Thus crashes in > external code cannot be handled with the same power as with errors > presented within the Smalltalk environment itself, and this (as harsh > experience over thirty five years has taught me) is far more important for > overall productivity than having powerful tailorable inspectors. > > I therefore wanted a Tonel that could both function for Squeak's > Monticello and for Pharo's Iceberg. I had modified the Tonel serialization > a little to provide well-formatted support for method timestamps, which are > still a key and extremely useful part of Squeak Monticello's "blame" > equivalent. Until git author attribution can be imported into Squeak's > Monticello (something I don't see happening) I wanted merely to be able to > have a variant of Tonel, enabled for example by a class variable, and hence > /not/ present in Pharo, that would allow VMMaker.oscog to use Tonel but > still be functional inside Squeak. I asked Esteban and was met by a flat > no. Not "OK, but this is an option only you will use", but a flat "not > under any circumstanceâ. > > > This is textually my answer (even with the English errors): > â¦ âAnyway the answer will be no :) > This was considered, and even the first implementation of tonel had it. > Now, this was discarded because it does not works with git (or other file > backends). It was not even me who complained first (as I said, I > implemented it). It was Dale and other people used to work on git. > > Thing is, putting timestamps it will generate conflicts massively when > there is no reason to it. > How can this be true? Since a method's time stamp changes only when it is modified it will only produce a change where a method is changed. I see no problem with this. I do see the possibility of a bug in Pharo when it was using Monticello and timestamps though. There was a time when you, Esteban, were contributing to VMMaker.oscog from Pharo and often there would be many changes where just the timestamp had changed. SO the problem seems to be not with timestamps but with mismanagement of them. So, we drop itâ¦ and we add support for the equivalent using the tool we > use (iceberg gives you not just the author that modified last the method > but all of them, along the history). > Who is we? I ask from a different perspective. I ask not too have Pharo use it but to allow Squeak to use it so that I can have timestamps for Squerask and still use Tonel. But still "âAnyway the answer will be no :)". So, your first statement is false. If things are correct there will *not* be massive generation of conflicts when there is no reason. Second, I am not asking you to change Tonel in Pharo. i am only asking you to allow Tonel to support timestamps in systems that want to use it. > I hope is an understandable reason?â > > And then in other mail of same thread I suggested an approach viable for > squeak: > > "Now, what Iâm sure is that if you are trying of using the 100% of > Monticello and to use git just as another repository backend, it will not > work (we already tried). It will consume far too much effort and you will > finish beating the purpose of use git and a file-based-format, and you will > be in the worst of two worlds :) > > We started like that, and we ended up implementing Iceberg to take benefit > of the tools we are using. > > In the middle, there was/is gitfiletree. > (I think I suggested you to look at it to adapt it for tonel and squeak). > > Gitfiletree uses OSProcess to call git as external tool and it makes all > the operations needed. â > > > Now, what I was suggesting was a way to use tonel backed with OSProcess > (which works in squeak) instead backing it with libgit2 as us. > Since they need the blame support, they could use OSProcess and external > git for it. > > Of course squeak (and any other dialect) are free to take tonel and adapt > it to their needs (in fact, Mariano extended Tonel for VA specific things). > And Pharo can read that format but it will ignore all extensions. > Now, another problem is to WRITE: Pharo would write those packages in > âpharo formatâ and that information would be lost. And in the case of > VMMaker, if the idea is to be able to work on both sides, then Pharo needs > to âhonourâ that format, it cannot just read it and ignore it later. So > this creates an incompatibility that needs to be handled. > > Anyway, as you can see my answer was not ânot under any circumstancesâ. > Was âno, because is not convenientâ. > It was still no. And my request was clear. I asked if you would allow Tonel to support timestamps, not that Pharo would use timestamps. This avoids forking Tonel, which I see as essential (it is essential that Tonel *not* fork) for Tonel to be a format that can serve as an interchange between Squeak and Pharo. > Esteban > > > > So here I am joining in this thread reluctantly. I'm extremely frustrated > by the state of Tonel in Squeak and between the two dialects. ClÃ©ment had > moved his Scorch optimizer to Tonel/git and I tried to use Metacello and > Jakob's Tonel code to at least allow me to load that code and try and push > forward on Sista/Scorch. The port *does not work*. Metacello fails to > load Scorch. Neither Jakob nor Fabio, after putting in some effort, were > able to fix the problem, and it is well beyond me. So I have accepted the > fact that I will have to use the Monticello repository for Scorch/Sista. > > I had deep concerns that the pursuit of git integration would end up > splitting the Pharo and Squeak communities and indeed this is now in > progress. I am utterly unmotivated by the lack of cooperation, the sheer > arrogance and bullying of those that say "you will move to git/tonel or > else", and considering leaving VMMaker altogether. The only things that > are keeping me interested are Ron Teitelbaum's Terf and me pursuing a PhD > on register allocation in the context of Sista/Scorch with Robert > Hirshfeld's group at HPI. > > Here's the kind of crap people like Ducasse throw at me: > > "Eliot > > At the end of the day I will probably ask the two phds that should work on language > design to use truffle or pypy > because let us face it we cannot work with the Pharo VM. Else we will > simply have to fork it (because we do not want to have > to jump over cuis, newspeak, squeak code constraints and I do not what) > and it will be another drama is in the pico world > of the âopenâ smalltalk VM. " > > I am so over this crap. > _,,,^..^,,,_ > best, Eliot > > > -- _,,,^..^,,,_ best, Eliot

Feb. 18, 2019

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