4 ms·

What's the current status of the Mill project? Is there a proof of concept compiler / emulator? What's the bootstrap strategy to get things rolling?

by polarix 12y ago

willvarfar 12y ago
We are hard at work :) There is no public SDK yet, and hardware is also under development. We've had a simulator for a long time, and we show it off a bit in the Specification talk: http://millcomputing.com/docs/specification/ http://millcomputing.com/docs/specification/
Symmetry 12y ago
Last I heard they're still limited to sims and are concentrating on patent filings. The bootstrap strategy is LLVM (once they get around LLVM assuming addresses are integers as opposed to the Mill's compound things) and to get Linux running on top of L4 which seems doable[1]. They say they're looking for a niche to start in before going after PCs. [1]http://l4linux.org/ http://l4linux.org/
- xorcist 12y ago
  Why on L4? Is Mill somehow tied to it, architecture-wise? Or is it just that L4 has a smaller footprint and is easier to port?
  - Symmetry 12y ago
    Because the Mill has a single address space with memory protection, which works a lot better with L4 than it does with Linux. Porting Linux directly would probably be possible, but a huge effort the team wouldn't be able to pull off without a lot of extra resources.
  - willvarfar 12y ago
    Its about footprint. We certainly will run Linux on the Mill, but its work we don't have to put on the critical path. L4 is just a familiar lightweight OS, and we're keen to play with Mill-specific security features which are particularly applicable to microkernels too. When we do port Linux, I expect it to become much more microkernel like, as in why would you want your disk drivers to be able to read write video memory etc?
    - xorcist 12y ago
      > why would you want your disk drivers to be able to read write video memory etc? That is a much bigger issue than the CPU architecture, as it has more to do with how the peripheral hardware works (firmware, DMA, etc.), but I appreciate the effort.
      - willvarfar 12y ago
        Well its how the CPU architecture exposes the hardware to software i.e. drivers. The Mill does MMIO but doesn't have rings.

What's the current status of the Mill project? Is there a proof of concept compiler / emulator? What's the bootstrap strategy to get things rolling?

by polarix 12y ago

What's the current status of the Mill project? Is there a proof of concept compiler / emulator? What's the bootstrap strategy to get things rolling?

willvarfar 12y ago

We are hard at work :) There is no public SDK yet, and hardware is also under development. We've had a simulator for a long time, and we show it off a bit in the Specification talk: http://millcomputing.com/docs/specification/ http://millcomputing.com/docs/specification/

Symmetry 12y ago

Last I heard they're still limited to sims and are concentrating on patent filings. The bootstrap strategy is LLVM (once they get around LLVM assuming addresses are integers as opposed to the Mill's compound things) and to get Linux running on top of L4 which seems doable[1]. They say they're looking for a niche to start in before going after PCs. [1]http://l4linux.org/ http://l4linux.org/

xorcist 12y ago
Why on L4? Is Mill somehow tied to it, architecture-wise? Or is it just that L4 has a smaller footprint and is easier to port?
- Symmetry 12y ago
  Because the Mill has a single address space with memory protection, which works a lot better with L4 than it does with Linux. Porting Linux directly would probably be possible, but a huge effort the team wouldn't be able to pull off without a lot of extra resources.
- willvarfar 12y ago
  Its about footprint. We certainly will run Linux on the Mill, but its work we don't have to put on the critical path. L4 is just a familiar lightweight OS, and we're keen to play with Mill-specific security features which are particularly applicable to microkernels too. When we do port Linux, I expect it to become much more microkernel like, as in why would you want your disk drivers to be able to read write video memory etc?
  - xorcist 12y ago
    > why would you want your disk drivers to be able to read write video memory etc? That is a much bigger issue than the CPU architecture, as it has more to do with how the peripheral hardware works (firmware, DMA, etc.), but I appreciate the effort.
    - willvarfar 12y ago
      Well its how the CPU architecture exposes the hardware to software i.e. drivers. The Mill does MMIO but doesn't have rings.