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So it was easier to add an instruction in silicon to cater for an ill-designed programming language, than to change the language itself? I mean, if float-to-in

by nom 6y ago

So it was easier to add an instruction in silicon to cater for an ill-designed programming language, than to change the language itself? I mean, if float-to-integer performance is so critical, why was this not fixed a long time ago in the language? What am I missing?

deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
offtop5 6y ago
Consider Node JS is a top server side language, and arm for data centers is coming ( to the extent it's not already here), this makes sense. Technically someone can just make a better VM engine for JavaScript to execute inside of, but whatever I guess they decided this would be easier.
- dtech 6y ago
  I'd say JS on the mobile ARM devices is 10.000x more common, and thus important, than the NodeJS on ARM servers.
  - offtop5 6y ago
    Wait. Do you mean JS inside of browsers themselves ? Or JS running in another manner
  - hajile 6y ago
    Amazon has already rolled out their own ARM servers at a very cheap price. A lot of well-funded companies are headed in that same direction. Adding this instruction encourages those designs too (very good from a licensing standpoint).
untog 6y ago
> What am I missing? I guess the incredibly long tail of JavaScript deployments. You could change the language today and it would take years for it to percolate down to all the deployments out there. By comparison a silicon change requires zero code changes and is entirely backwards compatible. Plus there's a pretty simple marketing argument: "buy our CPU, it makes commonly-encountered workloads faster", vs "buy our CPU, when everyone upgrades the platform they use it'll be faster"
Skunkleton 6y ago
> What am I missing? ARM wants to be appropriate for more workloads. They don't want to have to wait for software to change. The want to sell processor designs now.
TameAntelope 6y ago
One is a technology change, the other is a culture change. The former is infinitely easier than the latter, in my opinion/experience.

by nom 6y ago

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

offtop5 6y ago

Consider Node JS is a top server side language, and arm for data centers is coming ( to the extent it's not already here), this makes sense. Technically someone can just make a better VM engine for JavaScript to execute inside of, but whatever I guess they decided this would be easier.

dtech 6y ago
I'd say JS on the mobile ARM devices is 10.000x more common, and thus important, than the NodeJS on ARM servers.
- offtop5 6y ago
  Wait. Do you mean JS inside of browsers themselves ? Or JS running in another manner
- hajile 6y ago
  Amazon has already rolled out their own ARM servers at a very cheap price. A lot of well-funded companies are headed in that same direction. Adding this instruction encourages those designs too (very good from a licensing standpoint).

untog 6y ago

> What am I missing? I guess the incredibly long tail of JavaScript deployments. You could change the language today and it would take years for it to percolate down to all the deployments out there. By comparison a silicon change requires zero code changes and is entirely backwards compatible. Plus there's a pretty simple marketing argument: "buy our CPU, it makes commonly-encountered workloads faster", vs "buy our CPU, when everyone upgrades the platform they use it'll be faster"

Skunkleton 6y ago

> What am I missing? ARM wants to be appropriate for more workloads. They don't want to have to wait for software to change. The want to sell processor designs now.

TameAntelope 6y ago

One is a technology change, the other is a culture change. The former is infinitely easier than the latter, in my opinion/experience.