guile-user
[Top][All Lists]
Advanced

[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next][Date Index][Thread Index]

Re: GMP module support


From: Marius Vollmer
Subject: Re: GMP module support
Date: Mon, 01 Mar 2004 01:43:59 +0100
User-agent: Gnus/5.1002 (Gnus v5.10.2) Emacs/21.3 (gnu/linux)

"Faraz Shahbazker" <address@hidden> writes:

> So when you say integrating big-floats, do you mean implementing a
> separate multi-precision format spec for guile, or do you mean using
> mpf_t in guile?

I meant using mpf_t in guile.  We now use mpz_t exclusively as our
multi-precision integers and we could add mpf_t as large floating
point numbers.  We might then have

   fixnum:   30 bits of signed long  (62 bits on 64 bit machines)
   bignum:   mpz_t
   float:    double
   bigfloat: mpf_t 

It would be nice to go from a float to a bigfloat when a calculation
overflows, I'd say.

>         If it's the first, I am afraid that I do not
> have the expertise or experience to talk about it.
> If the second, then perhaps you should reiterate in
> clear terms the official policy regarding mixing guile
> and other GPL'ed stuff (and add it to the docs or
> something, so that new-comers like myself don't
> go about asking the same question again and again)

GMP is LGPL now, as is Guile.  The two can be mixed without problem.

>         The big question then really is whether our
> garbage-collector can live-up to our expectations in the extreme
> high-performance environments, where GMP is normally employed?

What are those expectations?

Generally, I don't really see Guile fit to be a high-performance tool.
I do use it for number crunching, but interpreted Scheme is only used
to setup the calculation and the real crunching is done by small
kernels written in C.  Best of both worlds...

-- 
GPG: D5D4E405 - 2F9B BCCC 8527 692A 04E3  331E FAF8 226A D5D4 E405




reply via email to

[Prev in Thread] Current Thread [Next in Thread]