Re: Improving handling of ranges (was: Re: mutable considered harmful, Range edition)

[Olaf Till]

On Mon, Jun 29, 2020 at 02:48:21PM -0400, John W. Eaton wrote:
> On 6/9/20 9:43 AM, I wrote:
> > On 6/9/20 12:11 AM, I wrote:
> > 
> > > Separately, I see that other than the Range::matrix_value method, we
> > > set the cache value in the operators, like this:
> > > 
> > >    Range operator + (const Range& r, double x)
> > >    {
> > >      Range result (r.base () + x, r.limit () + x, r.inc (), r.numel ());
> > >      if (result.m_numel < 0)
> > >        result.m_cache = r.matrix_value () + x;
> > > 
> > >      return result;
> > >    }
> > > 
> > > As I recall, setting the cache in these functions (and not just the
> > > matrix_value method) is done so that, for example, adding a constant
> > > to a range and then converting to a matrix will produce exactly the
> > > same result as converting a range to a matrix and then adding a
> > > constant to the matrix (in psuedo code):
> > > 
> > >    matrix (r) + c == matrix (r + c)
> > > 
> > > Using the cache this way does avoid the cost of any repeated
> > > conversions to a matrix value, but it also forces the cache to be
> > > created for any operation on a range, not just the result.  So it
> > > largely defeats the purpose of the efficient range object storage,
> > > and I'm wondering whether it is worth having a special range data
> > > type at all?  What do we really gain for the additional complexity?
> > 
> > I see now that there are limited cases where result.m_numel will be
> > negative, so the cache is not updated for every operation.  However, the
> > problems with the mutable cache remain, as do the issues with operations
> > on ranges not being identical to the operations on the equivalent
> > matrices.  Here is a simple example:
> > 
> >    r0 = 1:0.1:10;
> >    r1 = r0 + 2.3;   # range + scalar
> >    r2 = [r0] + 2.3; # matrix + scalar
> >    all (r1 == r2)   # returns false for me
> >    d = r1 - r2;     # show elements with differences
> >    idx = find (d)
> >    d(idx)
> > 
> > I understand the arguments about Octave being a numerical tool and not
> > expecting exact results for floating point operations, but I'm still
> > wondering whether the complexity of these range operations is justified.
> >  If we do want to support operations that avoid immediate conversion to
> > Matrix data, maybe we should only do so when we can guarantee that
> > 
> >    matrix (r) OP val == matrix (r OP val)
> > 
> > is true?  We should be able to do this when VAL and all elements of R
> > are integers and will remain so after the operation.  Other cases might
> > be possible as well, but harder to detect.  And maybe the cache should
> > be eliminated and this test handled in the octave_value class hierarchy?
> 
> Are there any thoughts on this topic?
> 
> At the very leas, I would like to support integer ({u,}int{8,16,32,64}) and
> single-precision ranges in Octave.  If possible, I'd like to have a unified
> solution for all range types, but that might be a somewhat disruptive
> change.
> 
> Comments would be helpful.

I don't know if the following will be helpful, just some shared
thoughts:

Under the point of view (which I'd share) that differences in floating
point results got in numerically different ways are not critical, it
could suffice to mark the cache as invalid for each operation on a
range(?).

I don't know, but maybe the above would eliminate the need for the
cache to be mutable?

(Don't know if it's of interest, but I think the decision to store
ones(1,n) as ranges was made mostly to facilitate the use of ones(1,n)
in repmat.m.)

Olaf

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