[Python-Dev] Python 3 optimizations continued...

[Nick Coghlan]

On Tue, Aug 30, 2011 at 7:14 AM, Antoine Pitrou <solipsis at pitrou.net> wrote:
> On Mon, 29 Aug 2011 11:33:14 -0700
> stefan brunthaler <s.brunthaler at uci.edu> wrote:
>> * The optimized dispatch routine has a changed instruction format
>> (word-sized instead of bytecodes) that allows for regular instruction
>> decoding (without the HAS_ARG-check) and inlinind of some objects in
>> the instruction format on 64bit architectures.
>
> Having a word-sized "bytecode" format would probably be acceptable in
> itself, so if you want to submit a patch for that, go ahead.

Although any such patch should discuss how it compares with Cesare's
work on wpython.

Personally, I *like* CPython fitting into the "simple-and-portable"
niche in the Python interpreter space. Armin Rigo made the judgment
years ago that CPython was a poor platform for serious optimisation
when he stopped working on Psyco and started PyPy instead, and I think
the contrasting fates of PyPy and Unladen Swallow have borne out that
opinion. Significantly increasing the complexity of CPython for
speed-ups that are dwarfed by those available through PyPy seems like
a poor trade-off to me.

At a bare minimum, I don't think any significant changes should be
made under the "it will be faster" justification until the bulk of the
real-world benchmark suite used for speed.pypy.org is available for
Python 3. (Wasn't there a GSoC project about that?)

Cheers,
Nick.

-- 
Nick Coghlan   |   ncoghlan at gmail.com   |   Brisbane, Australia