[erlang-questions] Erlang/OTP R12B-3 has been released

[Torbjorn Tornkvist]

Benjamin Tolputt wrote:
> Whilst this is a fantastic (and I am in no way belittling it - I am 
> impressed & grateful for said changes!), I must state that there is a 
> very good reason to be reluctant about native code for  Windows 
> developers. Unless something has changed while I wasn't paying 
> attention, Windows is still not supported for HiPE compilation/deployment.
> 
> This is the biggest hurdle I have to cross whenever suggesting Erlang 
> for custom development I undertake... especially now that I can show the 
> performance improvements possible with SMP on our 4-core servers.

This is an interesting question, i.e how much do you really gain
from using hipe (native) compiled code?

I suspect that in (Erlang written) production systems, I/O is where most
of the time is spent. So using Hipe compiled code will not have any real
impact. If would love to be proven wrong here, so if someone has got any
figures to present...

--Tobbe

> 
> --Ben
> 
> Kostis Sagonas wrote:
>> I just noticed that the README file reads as follows as far as the hipe 
>> application in R12B-3 is concerned.
>>
>> --- hipe-3.6.7 ---------------------------------------------------------
>>
>>      OTP-7388  Minor changes.
>>
>> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>
>> It's of course our fault that the README file reads this way -- we are 
>> too busy with other things -- but I just want to point out that the 
>> native code produced by the HiPE compiler in R12B-3 reports precise 
>> exception information (including stacktraces) similar to the exceptions 
>> that the code by the BEAM compiler generates.
>>
>> This is an important change which has been on our TODO list for far too 
>> long. In my opinion, the main reason to be reluctant to use native code 
>> in applications does not exist any longer. Anyway, the point is that 
>> this is not a "minor change"..