Re: Using the GNU GMP Library for Bignums in Emacs

[Tom Tromey]

>> #define lisp_h_CHECK_FIXNUM(x) CHECK_TYPE (FIXNUMP (x), Qintegerp, x)

Paul> That last line should use Qfixnump, surely.

The reason I hesitated is that it seems possible for some Lisp code to
notice this change.

This is also why I wasn't sure that intbig_to_lisp et al should be
converted.  (This one seems even a little worse since it'll be possible
to build without GMP.)

>> sed -i 's/INTEGERP/FIXNUMP/g' *.[ch]

Paul> I doubt whether this is the best option. Often, the code should
Paul> actually be checking for integers, not for fixnums. So the existing
Paul> code needs to be examined more carefully, with only some INTEGERP
Paul> instances changed to FIXNUMP. (Code should prefer INTEGERP to FIXNUMP,
Paul> for generality, but in some cases FIXNUMP will have to do.)

I probably should have explained a little more.

The basic idea behind the patch series is to do the conversion
incrementally.  So, the first patch is just these sed-based renamings --
the resulting Emacs works the same.

Next comes the configury; then the bignum type and type predicate.
After this come some patches to change various operations: eql,
comparisons, arithmetic, printing, the reader, Ffloat, ...

Some of these subsequent patches introduce things like the new INTEGERP:

    INLINE bool
    INTEGERP (Lisp_Object x)
    {
      return FIXNUMP (x) || BIGNUMP (x);
    }

... or the new make_number, etc.

So, the examination you want is done, just not all in a single patch.  I
think this will make review simpler for whoever does that.  Also this
avoids having to convert absolutely everything, which I am sure I can't
do alone.


It's not all so clean right now, so if you do happen to look the
patches, don't be worried, I plan to rework the whole series to be
cleaner before submitting it.


I made a few more things work tonight.  My "minimal viable feature"
to-do list is down to:

* documentation
* natnump
* since we can't have small bignums we can simplify eql a bit
* logcount
* check how rounding should be done for division and fix the code
* lsh / ash
* logb
* % and mod

Any ideas on things that might be missing from this list?

I wonder if Emacs should (provide 'bignum) when bignums are compiled in.

I still haven't looked at using the mpn_ API.

Tom