1 Erl_interface Release Notes

This document describes the changes made to the Erl_interface application.

1.1 Erl_Interface 3.7

Improvements and New Features

compact IEEE 754 double encoding in external binary format for ei
- Implement the compact IEEE 754 double encoding in external binary format for ei. Encoding for ei now always produces the NEW_FLOAT_EXT format. Decoding and term printing handle both the old ERL_FLOAT_EXT encoding and the new NEW_FLOAT_EXT encoding.
- Legacy erl_interface code also handles the new encoding, but still produces the ERL_FLOAT_EXT encoding by default.
- Also enable the DFLAG_NEW_FLOATS distribution flag.
- ei_get_type() will return ERL_FLOAT_EXT regardless if the external format is encoded with ERL_FLOAT_EXT or NEW_FLOAT_EXT for doubles.
- Reduce the number of copies of the code for encoding and decoding doubles throughout ei and erl_interface by instead calling the ei encoding and decoding functions wherever possible.
- Restore commented-out float tests in ei_decode_SUITE and ei_encode_SUITE in lib/erl_interface/test. Modify them to make them match the style of other tests in the same suites.
These changes are based on an ei float patch from Serge Aleynikov originally submitted against R12B-2 in July 2008 and reworked by Steve Vinoski May 2010.

*** POTENTIAL INCOMPATIBILITY ***

Own Id: OTP-8684

1.2 Erl_Interface 3.6.5

Improvements and New Features

Document debug support.

Debug trace output for connection activity could be enabled setting the trace level as an integer to the EI_TRACELEVEL environment variable. This option could also be read and set from a running program using ei_get_tracelevel(void) and ei_set_tracelevel(int).

Own Id: OTP-5037
Cross compilation improvements and other build system improvements.

Most notable:
- Lots of cross compilation improvements. The old cross compilation support was more or less non-existing as well as broken. Please, note that the cross compilation support should still be considered as experimental. Also note that old cross compilation configurations cannot be used without modifications. For more information on cross compiling Erlang/OTP see the $ERL_TOP/INSTALL-CROSS.md file.
- Support for staged install using DESTDIR. The old broken INSTALL_PREFIX has also been fixed. For more information see the $ERL_TOP/INSTALL.md file.
- Documentation of the release target of the top Makefile. For more information see the $ERL_TOP/INSTALL.md file.
- make install now by default creates relative symbolic links instead of absolute ones. For more information see the $ERL_TOP/INSTALL.md file.
- $ERL_TOP/configure --help=recursive now works and prints help for all applications with configure scripts.
- Doing make install, or make release directly after make all no longer triggers miscellaneous rebuilds.
- Existing bootstrap system is now used when doing make install, or make release without a preceding make all.
- The crypto and ssl applications use the same runtime library path when dynamically linking against libssl.so and libcrypto.so. The runtime library search path has also been extended.
- The configure scripts of erl_interface and odbc now search for thread libraries and thread library quirks the same way as erts do.
- The configure script of the odbc application now also looks for odbc libraries in lib64 and lib/64 directories when building on a 64-bit system.
- The config.h.in file in the erl_interface application is now automatically generated in instead of statically updated which reduces the risk of configure tests without any effect.
(Thanks to Henrik Riomar for suggestions and testing)

(Thanks to Winston Smith for the AVR32-Linux cross configuration and testing)

*** POTENTIAL INCOMPATIBILITY ***

Own Id: OTP-8323
Change erroneous "\\0" in documentation files erl_notes.xml and erl_eterm.xml.

Own Id: OTP-8326
Allow erl_match() to match ERL_LONGLONG and ERL_U_LONGLONG terms (Thanks to Scott Lystig Fritchie).

Own Id: OTP-8400

1.3 Erl_Interface 3.6.4

Improvements and New Features

The documentation is now built with open source tools (xsltproc and fop) that exists on most platforms. One visible change is that the frames are removed.

Own Id: OTP-8201

1.4 Erl_Interface 3.6.3

Fixed Bugs and Malfunctions

The manual states that erl_receive() return the reason in the ErlMessage struct. This was not the case and the function is now corrected.

*** POTENTIAL INCOMPATIBILITY ***

Own Id: OTP-4969
In send_exit.c an errorneous size of memory allocation could occur when reallocating a buffer.

In ei_decode_trace.c the index could be updated when the decoding failed.

In ei_printterm.c the index could be updated when the decoding failed in lists and tuples.

In ei_decode_term.c when decoding a double (ERL_FLOAT_EXT) no check was done to ensure that the last of the 31 bytes was null terminated.

In ei_decode_term.c when decoding references, only the first 3 bytes are read, but the index did not increment by the total size.

In ei_decode_fun.c no check of correct buffer allocation or data length was done.

In ei_decode_string.c the integer list string case did not decode the NIL tail correctly.

These errors has now been fixed. (Thanks to Romain Lenglet, Paul Mineiro and Paul Guyot).

Own Id: OTP-6117
ei_decode_big could be decoded with a garbage byte.

ei_encode_big and ei_x_encode_big is now available.

Own Id: OTP-7554
The function erl_init_resolve() did not conform to C99 standard which caused a build error on some platforms. This has now been fixed.

Own Id: OTP-8093
Makefile.in has been updated to use the LDFLAGS environment variable (if set). (Thanks to Davide Pesavento.)

Own Id: OTP-8157

Improvements and New Features

Added support for 64-bit integers in encoding/decoding.

Added support for better printouts of binaries.

Own Id: OTP-6091

1.5 Erl_Interface 3.6.2

Fixed Bugs and Malfunctions

A problem with gethostbyname in erl_start.c could cause a buffer overflow. This has now been fixed.

Clean up of code and removed compiler warnings.

Own Id: OTP-7978

1.6 Erl_Interface 3.6.1

Fixed Bugs and Malfunctions

A faulty validation in ei_reg_getpval caused it to never return the key-value. This has now been fixed. (Thanks to Matt Stancliff)

Own Id: OTP-7960

Improvements and New Features

Minor update to the configure script.

Own Id: OTP-7959

1.7 Erl_Interface 3.6.1

Improvements and New Features

Minor update to the configure script.

Own Id: OTP-7959

1.8 Erl_Interface 3.6

Improvements and New Features

Nodes belonging to different independent clusters can now co-exist on the same host with the help of a new environment variable setting ERL_EPMD_PORT.

Own Id: OTP-7826

1.9 Erl_Interface 3.5.9

Fixed Bugs and Malfunctions

A type-casting bug in ei_skip_term and ei_printterm on 64bit platforms rendering undefined results is now corrected.

Own Id: OTP-7577
A bug in the hostent copying code of erl_interface on MacOS X/Darwin is now corrected.

Own Id: OTP-7593
A problem with building erl_interface on FreeBSD has been fixed (Thanks to Akira Kitada).

Own Id: OTP-7611

1.10 Erl_Interface 3.5.8

Fixed Bugs and Malfunctions

Fixed bug in erl_interface when decoding broken data

Own Id: OTP-7448

1.11 Erl_Interface 3.5.7

Fixed Bugs and Malfunctions

An erroneous freeing of memory could occur when using ei_x_format_wo_ver in erl_interface, resulting in a segmentation fault.

Own Id: OTP-6795
A faulty compare in erl_marshal has now been fixed. (Thanks to Simon Cornish and Paul Mineiro)

Own Id: OTP-7368

1.12 Erl_Interface 3.5.6

Fixed Bugs and Malfunctions

Minor documentation fixes.

Own Id: OTP-7183 Aux Id: OTP-7118

1.13 Erl_Interface 3.5.5.4

Fixed Bugs and Malfunctions

The symbol __erl_errno was undefined in the single thread version of the ei library, but is now defined.

Own Id: OTP-6887
Corrected FreeBSD build error.

Own Id: OTP-7093

1.14 Erl_Interface 3.5.5.3

Improvements and New Features

Calls to alloca in erl_marshal.c have been removed. A static buffer is now used instead to store node names temporarily.

Own Id: OTP-6331 Aux Id: seq10468
ei_print_term interprets a list of integers with values from 0 to 255 as a string. If the original list contains the integer 0, this is considered terminator of the string. This is incorrect. The function has now been modified to not look for '\0' in a string, but always print all characters.

Own Id: OTP-6339 Aux Id: seq10492

1.15 Erl_Interface 3.5.5.2

Fixed Bugs and Malfunctions

The combination of xeon processors with 64bit x86 extensions and a 32bit linux could cause ei_decode_long and ei_decode_longlong to fail for the value LONG_MIN and LONGLONG_MIN. The conversion is now made more portable.

Own Id: OTP-6216

1.16 Erl_Interface 3.5.5.1

Improvements and New Features

Portability enhancements.

Own Id: OTP-6132

1.17 Erl_Interface 3.5.5

Fixed Bugs and Malfunctions

Different (and old) config.guess files in the erts and erl_interface applications would cause build problems on the new Intel-based iMacs. (Thanks to Sebastion Strollo.)

Own Id: OTP-5967
pthread header and library mismatch on linux systems (at least some SuSE and Debian) with both NPTL and Linuxthreads libraries installed.

Own Id: OTP-5981

Improvements and New Features

Support for a C node to connect to an Erlang node on a standalone host has been added.

Own Id: OTP-5883 Aux Id: seq10170

1.18 Erl_interface 3.5.2

Improvements and New Features

A configuration test error caused erl_interface to be built without support for threads. This has been corrected.

Own Id: OTP-5456

1.19 Erl_interface 3.5.1

Improvements and New Features

Changes and improvements have been made to the build and test environment to solve problems with failing erl_interface test cases.

Own Id: OTP-5295 Aux Id: OTP-5387

1.20 Erl_interface 3.5

Improvements and New Features

Process identifiers and port identifiers have been made more unique. Previously 18 bits were used as id in the internal representation of process and port identifiers. Now 28 bits are used.

The maximum limit on the number of concurrently existing processes due to the representation of pids has been increased to 268435456 processes. The same is true for ports. This limit will at least on a 32-bit architecture be impossible to reach due to memory shortage.

NOTE: By default, the ERTS, and the erl_interface, ei, and jinterface libraries are now only guaranteed to be compatible with other Erlang/OTP components from the same release. It is possible to set each component in compatibility mode of an earlier release, though. See the documentation for respective component on how to set it in compatibility mode.

*** POTENTIAL INCOMPATIBILITY ***

Own Id: OTP-4968 Aux Id: OTP-4196

1.21 Erl_interface 3.4.5

Fixed Bugs and Malfunctions

Corrections for mistakes done for patch erl_605/OTP-4874.

Own Id: OTP-4995 Aux Id: OTP-4874

1.22 Erl_interface 3.4.4

Fixed Bugs and Malfunctions

A small optimization in ei_rpc*() was added and a bug in ei_decode_longlong() was corrected.

Own Id: OTP-4784

1.23 Erl_interface 3.4.2

Fixed Bugs and Malfunctions

Strings longer than 65535 bytes were encoded wrong in ei/erl_interface.

Own Id: OTP-4865 Aux Id: EABln07451

1.24 Erl_interface 3.4.1

Fixed Bugs and Malfunctions

erl_call -a parsed erlang terms incorrectly due to a bug in ei_format, which is now corrected.

Own Id: OTP-4777 Aux Id: seq8099