John Resig on TraceMonkey(ejohn.org)

66 pointsby sant0sk1vor 18 Jahren20 comments

http://ejohn.org/blog/tracemonkey/

6 comments

I think the key point of this article over the other related article (http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=284192) is that John points out that tracing will be able to be applied to DOM manipulation/property access in the future.

  "Being able to trace through a DOM method would successfully speed up, not only, math and object-intensive applications (as it does now) but also regular DOM manipulation and property access."

As I said on the previous article, "I believe tracing very well could be the key to unlocking advances in that [DOM] area as well."

To me, this means that JavaScript will finally be integrated with the browser in a way that is required to advance the web. I've always wondered what would be the "big thing" to lead up to the move towards the web even more, and this is definitely the answer.

The only thing left now is making it so JavaScript can be compiled (the only way I can think of how to accomplish preventing stealing code).

gruseomvor 18 Jahren

speed up, not only, math and object-intensive applications (as it does now) but also regular DOM manipulation

Agreed. The sooner they get to that, the better!

Edit: As an aside, the web arguably wouldn't have happened without "stealing code". I see this as a strength not a weakness.

invisiblevor 18 Jahren

I'm not against open sourcing code, or giving away helpful small things, but at the moment anyone can copy every bit of useful functionality of a JS application and just create their own back-end. That is a very ridiculous concept, and there isn't much that can be done about it if that person isn't within the same country.

thwartedvor 18 Jahren

It might be more valuable to avoid basing your business on artificial scarcity to begin with.

invisiblevor 18 Jahren

Well, I guess if the business model were to not make a significant amount of money then no scarcity would be perfect! But really, scarcity (real or "fake") needs to exist or else I would be wasting time creating a PRODUCT (in other words: something that is sold).

thwartedvor 18 Jahren

The real scarcity is your time and reputation, which in the right combination can command a significant amount of money. Attempting to limit what can not be limited is creating scarcity where there is none, and it is only a matter of time until someone breaks your business model by figuring out that you've been attempting to control the uncontrollable. And that'll happen just at the point when you're dependent on it and unable to change. For a case study, see the RIAA.

ph0rquevor 18 Jahren

> scarcity (real or "fake") needs to exist or else I would be wasting time creating a PRODUCT (in other words: something that is sold).

Not true: see 37signals, for example.

invisiblevor 18 Jahren

I think you misunderstand what artificial scarcity means (or I do somehow). 37signals is proof that artificial scarcity must exist in some form to profit. Adding a price to something creates a form of artificial scarcity. From my perspective, you just agreed with me.

thwartedvor 18 Jahren

Artificial scarcity is trying to limit access to something which can not be limited. Once bits, for any purpose, are put in the right order to do something or represent something, the cost to replicate those bits to other parties is zero. In contrast with an automobile, even after it is designed, significant infrastructure (currently) needs to be built and exist to create another one. What you are paying for when you purchase a car is the PROCESS that went into creating JUST that ONE car you bought. Additional cars would not exist if the infrastructure didn't exist to create more of them (and then economies of scale come into play, making the car actually affordable). Bits do not have that limitation.

Scarcity and want must exist in order to set a legitimate price. Artificial scarcity sets a price on something that isn't actually scarce. It is a (unfortunate?) side-effect of the market that potential buyers think that because something has a price, it must be worth having (ie scarce). I don't think there's actually anything wrong with basing a business on this, but don't be surprised when your customers realize you've been selling them something that should have a price closer to zero because there is infinite supply.

trenchfevervor 18 Jahren

you need to run arbitrary binary code on my machine? the nerve.

tokipinvor 18 Jahren

true, but it's not as straightforward when the things you're stealing are whole applications

sh1mmervor 18 Jahren

John does a really job of discussion what implications this had as well as how it does it. Great article.

KirinDavevor 18 Jahren

Has anyone run a comparison between this new engine and SquirrelFish yet? It seems to me like two major ideas are competing:

1. Better JIT for interpreters. 2. Faster interpreters, period.

I'm really curious to see which has the faster ramp-up and which has the best end-game results.

jeresigvor 18 Jahren

One comparison was posted in the comments of the blog post: http://www.masonchang.com/2008/08/tracemonkey-vs-squirrelfis...

tokipinvor 18 Jahren

check out Steve Yegge's video/transcript about dynamic language optimization in case you missed it:

http://steve-yegge.blogspot.com/2008/05/dynamic-languages-st...

andreyfvor 18 Jahren

Things have been moving in this direction for quite some time, I think. Here's a master's thesis from March 2006:

http://www.cs.wustl.edu/~plezbert/contcom/

MaysonLvor 18 Jahren

Michael Franz, the PI for the work at UCI, has been working on this stuff for almost 20 years. See his 1994 PHD thesis: Code-Generation On-the-Fly ftp://ftp.inf.ethz.ch/pub/publications/diss/th10497.ps [postscript]. Reading it was one of my "Holy Shit!" moments.

ivankiriginvor 18 Jahren

Install the update and do the image manipulation test. For best results, run the test before and after. The difference is astounding.

babyshakevor 18 Jahren

I thought "astounding" would be an overstatement. Turns out you're right.

nostrademonsvor 18 Jahren

It's funny, 2 months after I give up on GameClay (partially because of performance issues in the prototypes), this comes out. Maybe I should go back to it. Well, that's why I chose not to open-source the code and my cofounder's hanging on to the domain names.

Though any application to games needs to get over the fact that 90% of the casual game market still uses IE...