Generic VMs Key To Future of Coding

snydeq writes "Fatal Exception's Neil McAllister calls for generic VMs divorced from the syntactic details of specific languages in order to provide developers with some much-needed flexibility in the years ahead: 'Imagine being able to program in the language of your choice and then choose from any of several different underlying engines to execute your code, depending upon the needs of your application.' This 'next major stage in the evolution of programming' is already under way, he writes, citing Jim Hugunin's work with Python on the CLR, Microsoft's forthcoming Dynamic Language Runtime, Jython, Sun's Da Vinci Machine, and the long-delayed Perl/Python Parrot. And with modern JITs capable of outputting machine code almost as efficient as hand-coded C, the idea of running code through a truly generic VM may be yet another key factor that will shape the future of scripting."

Re:And...

[aproposofwhat]

And I read the headline as "Generic VMS ...", promptly shitting myself in the process :)

Following this Slashdot story

[Anonymous Coward]

Intel stock rose sharply as investors realized that ubiquitous VMs will require faster processors because more programs will be written in scripting languages. Shortly after, Intel stock plummeted as investors realized that intermediate VMs decouple the programs from the processor architecture.

Bollocks

[Colin Smith]

Oh, and real men write their own compilers.

Real men code in P".

 

Re:Sort of like generic database access layers?

[isny]

It's VMs all the way down! Or is it turtles...

Re:Sort of like generic database access layers?

[gazbo]

Gah! Database independent, yet almost invariably used on exactly one RDBMS. And you just know some of the more obscure query syntax makes the application on top of it database dependent anyway.

Yeah, it annoys the tits off me also.

Did someone say "Python" and "Parrot"?

[Rick Bentley]

Look, matey, I know a dead parrot when I see one, and I'm looking at one right now.

No no he's not dead, he's, he's restin'! Remarkable bird, the Norwegian Blue, idn'it, ay? Beautiful plumage! ...

Re:Wait, this sounds familliar!

[Anonymous Coward]

> The real point is that with .NET you can do things like write a class in VB and inherit and extend it in C#.

See, with C or Fortran you don't even _have_ that problem :-P

Oh, not genetic? Bummer.

[cjdavis]

I read that as Genetic VMs and that sounded really cool. It even made interesting sense almost all the way through the OP.

I was sadly disappointed when I realized my error. Generic VMs? Like everybody else said, boring.

Re:Sort of like generic database access layers?

[badkarmadayaccount]

So.... you're a girl interested in databases? *searches for wedding ring*

Re:Sort of like generic database access layers?

[gazbo]

I could have a shave and pretend, if you like?