The Bag of Holding

I've finally launched Release 12 of the Epoch programming language!

Go check out the sources and binaries and also the...

I recently learned an interesting lesson in developing software that needs to scale to large capacities.

I can't get into the specifics of what I was working on, but the essential facts are more or less as follows:
It includes a cache algorithm
I tested it with as much load as my workstation could generate
In tests, it performed well as...

At long last, the checklist of major items to do for Epoch Release 12 is empty!

There are a few lingering TODOs in the code which I will probably try and knock out over the next few days, and then it's down to deciding how much additional work I really feel like doing before shipping R12. Considering that all the compiler tests pass, Era compiles...

The task list for Epoch Release 12 continues to shrink!

Right now there are basically six major things that definitely need to be done before I'd even consider shipping the release:
Operator precedence reimplementation (basically just need to do a quick Shunting Yard implementation in the new compiler)
Fix up code generation of...

A while ago I launched a site called Scribblings by Apoch with the intent of occasionally publishing little bits and pieces of useful code that didn't have any other particularly appropriate home.

At long last I've posted a new scribbling. As usual, it was motivated by something I really...

Did some more experimentation with LLVM and Epoch's JIT system; and damn I am pleased with the results.

After finally muddling through enough of the llvm-opt source code to figure out how to order all the optimization passes that LLVM offers, I got a lot of basic optimization and dead-code elimination working on the bitcode that the Epoch VM...

More hackery on Epoch/LLVM integration today; got some very promising results.

For comparison: at the end of my hacking marathon the other night, I had the VM running at about 950ms for the benchmark, and the JITted native code at around 720ms.


I'm now down to 920ms for the VM and 370ms for the native code.


The VM speed boost came from some minor...

What a hell of a night.


After much tinkering with the Epoch compiler and its internals, I decided to take some time and explore a diversion, just for fun. While the core language is much better off than it was a couple of weeks ago, I've spent so much energy on mundane bug fixes and tiny feature reimplementations that I needed a break.

I'd...

A funny thing happened on the way home from GDC the other day.

I was in the San Francisco airport, after having finished my previous journal post on the experiences of GDC 2012. I packed up my laptop, wandered over to the gate, and happened to spot a familiar face. We'll call him Steve, because that's his name.

So Steve is someone I've known...

I waffled for a bit on posting this to the "official" GDNet coverage for GDC 2012, but eventually settled on putting it here because honestly it's much more for my own personal wrap-up of the week than for stuff that most people would find interesting. I'm not even sure this is worth a public journal post since it won't mean a whole...