4 ms·

Someone should make a mini CM-2 -- desktop size. With the LEDs and everything. And then some kind of emulator (or FPGA) on the inside that could actually run

by timmg 5y ago

Someone should make a mini CM-2 -- desktop size. With the LEDs and everything. And then some kind of emulator (or FPGA) on the inside that could actually run their code. Maybe connect to a desktop via USB or something. I wonder if the compiler/whatever for the host machine is available anywhere?

mepian 5y ago
There is the *Lisp (StarLisp) simulator at least: http://www.cs.cmu.edu/afs/cs/project/ai-repository/ai/lang/lisp/impl/starlisp/0.html http://www.cs.cmu.edu/afs/cs/project/ai-repository/ai/lang/l... This seems to be a GitHub mirror: https://github.com/LdBeth/star-lisp https://github.com/LdBeth/star-lisp
torgoguys 5y ago
I have made a ~10% model of one with lights and all. The innards do not run CM software though. But I'd did try to stay true to the overall spirit of the design. I have a bunch of Intel Edison boards slotted into the cubes that can slide in and out to add processing capacity for my model setup. I copied the overall gist of the original cooling solution too. I agree that there should be kits for this sort of thing. The machine looks so cool.
convolvatron 5y ago
if anyone is interested..I'm sure there are other people more qualified, but I did spend quite a bit of time working with Paris and the underlying microcode system CMIS. it really wouldn't be that huge of a project to undertake. (@gmail.com) one FPGA cell looks a lot like a CM processor, but since it gets reprogrammed every cycle, idk that that direct mapping works. but something would. an interesting question though is the point. CM software wasn't anything like 'normal' software...so it took some subs tantial work to port codes. would anyone really use such a thing or it is just a curiosity? a _really_ cool project would be implementing CM-LISP edit: everything except the router that is. that would be a bit of trouble
- bosquefrio 5y ago
  @convolvatron Why do you say that implementing CM-LISP would be a really cool project?
  - convolvatron 5y ago
    unfortunately someone has managed to scrub all the PDFs off the internet. CM-LISP to me is kind of the holy grail of implicit parallelism. its kind of a relational paradigm but organized around recursive distributed mappings. the only way that I can think to compile it is to build something like a relational query optimizer. except (I'm pretty sure(?)) mappings are first-class objects and the distributions of the underlying sets are fully dynamic. so that's already a lot to try to come to grips with, but in this case the target is SIMD. which would in theory permit fulfillment of the CM thesis - arbitrarily scalable general computers without the overhead of reactive consistency (cache coherency). CM programming was actually not that bad - but you needed to lay everything out in 2^n cartesian meshes. CM-LISP is just a free-for-all in terms of domain organization. actually I do really want to find the pdf again because its a much nicer model than graph-ql I kind of suspect that it can't be compiled effectively, but last time I checked I'm only like 0.05 Steeles. I don't _know_ that it would turn out to be as compelling a programming model as I think, but would love to find out. edit: I did find some cm-lisp related material in Hillis's thesis at https://dspace.mit.edu/bitstream/handle/1721.1/14719/18524280-MIT.pdf https://dspace.mit.edu/bitstream/handle/1721.1/14719/1852428... [there is a strong implication in the thesis that layout was intended to be dynamically optimized - so maybe the compiler issue isn't as terrible as I think]
    - convolvatron 5y ago
      Thinking about it - the Tera MTA (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cray_MTA https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cray_MTA) would make a really nice platform for CMLISP.

by timmg 5y ago

mepian 5y ago

There is the *Lisp (StarLisp) simulator at least: http://www.cs.cmu.edu/afs/cs/project/ai-repository/ai/lang/lisp/impl/starlisp/0.html http://www.cs.cmu.edu/afs/cs/project/ai-repository/ai/lang/l... This seems to be a GitHub mirror: https://github.com/LdBeth/star-lisp https://github.com/LdBeth/star-lisp

torgoguys 5y ago

I have made a ~10% model of one with lights and all. The innards do not run CM software though. But I'd did try to stay true to the overall spirit of the design. I have a bunch of Intel Edison boards slotted into the cubes that can slide in and out to add processing capacity for my model setup. I copied the overall gist of the original cooling solution too. I agree that there should be kits for this sort of thing. The machine looks so cool.

convolvatron 5y ago

if anyone is interested..I'm sure there are other people more qualified, but I did spend quite a bit of time working with Paris and the underlying microcode system CMIS. it really wouldn't be that huge of a project to undertake. (@gmail.com) one FPGA cell looks a lot like a CM processor, but since it gets reprogrammed every cycle, idk that that direct mapping works. but something would. an interesting question though is the point. CM software wasn't anything like 'normal' software...so it took some subs tantial work to port codes. would anyone really use such a thing or it is just a curiosity? a _really_ cool project would be implementing CM-LISP edit: everything except the router that is. that would be a bit of trouble

bosquefrio 5y ago
@convolvatron Why do you say that implementing CM-LISP would be a really cool project?
- convolvatron 5y ago
  unfortunately someone has managed to scrub all the PDFs off the internet. CM-LISP to me is kind of the holy grail of implicit parallelism. its kind of a relational paradigm but organized around recursive distributed mappings. the only way that I can think to compile it is to build something like a relational query optimizer. except (I'm pretty sure(?)) mappings are first-class objects and the distributions of the underlying sets are fully dynamic. so that's already a lot to try to come to grips with, but in this case the target is SIMD. which would in theory permit fulfillment of the CM thesis - arbitrarily scalable general computers without the overhead of reactive consistency (cache coherency). CM programming was actually not that bad - but you needed to lay everything out in 2^n cartesian meshes. CM-LISP is just a free-for-all in terms of domain organization. actually I do really want to find the pdf again because its a much nicer model than graph-ql I kind of suspect that it can't be compiled effectively, but last time I checked I'm only like 0.05 Steeles. I don't _know_ that it would turn out to be as compelling a programming model as I think, but would love to find out. edit: I did find some cm-lisp related material in Hillis's thesis at https://dspace.mit.edu/bitstream/handle/1721.1/14719/18524280-MIT.pdf https://dspace.mit.edu/bitstream/handle/1721.1/14719/1852428... [there is a strong implication in the thesis that layout was intended to be dynamically optimized - so maybe the compiler issue isn't as terrible as I think]
  - convolvatron 5y ago
    Thinking about it - the Tera MTA (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cray_MTA https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cray_MTA) would make a really nice platform for CMLISP.