Right, I understand that.

Are any syntax properties used as heavily as source locations, though?

Vincent



On Sat, 05 Mar 2016 17:23:01 -0600,
Robby Findler wrote:
> 
> Our experience with the source location change suggests that there are
> many places where code is implicitly relying on syntax properties not
> being preserved in byte code. This entire thread is inspired by one
> such (errortrace performance), and I know that I fixed several
> lingering bugs like this in redex well after the initial change.
> (Those bugs manifested as poor source location reporting for errors in
> redex programs). That experience makes me think we should not preserve
> all properties. (I don't have a sense of what the performance costs
> would be, but we could measure that if we cared, I think.)
> 
> Robby
> 
> 
> On Sat, Mar 5, 2016 at 5:16 PM, Vincent St-Amour
> <[email protected]> wrote:
> > What would be use cases for ephemeral properties?
> >
> > I agree that most properties wouldn't need to be preserved, but I can't
> > think of a case where we would want to explicitly not have a property be
> > preserved.
> >
> > That, and having two kinds of syntax properties would be potentially
> > confusing. Your third solution does make the distinction pretty clear,
> > but having a single kind would make the interface simpler.
> >
> > Vincent
> >
> >
> > On Sat, 05 Mar 2016 16:23:00 -0600,
> > Matthew Flatt wrote:
> >>
> >> I agree that both of those are potential issues. I'd expect problems,
> >> but I don't know how common the problems would be.
> >>
> >> I think we would probably end up wanting ephemeral properties, anyway,
> >> so it makes more sense to be to leave ephemeral as the default and add
> >> a non-ephemeral option.
> >>
> >> At Sat, 5 Mar 2016 15:25:51 -0600, Robby Findler wrote:
> >> > Is avoiding the change to preserve of all properties a backwards
> >> > compatibility concern or a performance one? (I wouldn't ask, except
> >> > there were a surprising number of bugfixes for the source location
> >> > change.)
> >> >
> >> > Robby
> >> >
> >> >
> >> > On Sat, Mar 5, 2016 at 8:09 AM, Matthew Flatt <[email protected]> wrote:
> >> > > At Thu, 03 Mar 2016 11:00:23 -0600, Vincent St-Amour wrote:
> >> > >> On Wed, 02 Mar 2016 22:23:29 -0600,
> >> > >> Matthew Flatt wrote:
> >> > >> > Instead of using the existence of a source location to determine 
> >> > >> > where
> >> > >> > to add instrumentation, debugging should be based on the details of 
> >> > >> > the
> >> > >> > source location. I'm not immediately sure of the right rule, but 
> >> > >> > I'll
> >> > >> > work on it.
> >> > >>
> >> > >> Would `syntax-original?` help here?
> >> > >
> >> > > This is sort of job that `syntax-original?` was intended for, but I
> >> > > think it doesn't work well.
> >> > >
> >> > > For example, if you have
> >> > >
> >> > >  (define-syntax-rule (m x)
> >> > >    (* (+ x 1) 2))
> >> > >
> >> > > and you use `m` in the same module, then you want an error for a
> >> > > non-numeric `x` to highlight `(+ x 1)`. (Since `m` doesn't guard
> >> > > against a bad `x`, it's probably not intended as an abstraction.) A
> >> > > `syntax-original?` test would limit highlighting to the uses of `m`.
> >> > >
> >> > > I think this line of thought and other experience with
> >> > > `syntax-original?` is why we haven't used it in errortrace.
> >> > >
> >> > >
> >> > > One alternative is to make errortrace add a syntax property to the
> >> > > original program, and then then only instrument forms that have the
> >> > > syntax property after expansion. That implements a notion of
> >> > > "original?" that includes templates in the source program, and it would
> >> > > be consistent with the old use of source locations to determine
> >> > > "original?".
> >> > >
> >> > > DrRacket compiles files with errortrace instrumentation to bytecode,
> >> > > and that suggests preserving the syntax property in bytecode. We don't
> >> > > yet have a mechanism for designating new syntax properties for
> >> > > preservation in bytecode, but it was just a matter of time...
> >> > >
> >> > > I see a few possible approaches to preserving syntax properties:
> >> > >
> >> > >  * Add a parameter that lists keys to be preserved. The parameter's
> >> > >    default value would be `(list 'paren-shape)`.
> >> > >
> >> > >    This approach would probably work well enough for DrRacket and
> >> > >    errortrace, because DrRacket could set the parameter while writing
> >> > >    errortrace-instrumented bytecode. It's easy to imagine uses of
> >> > >    syntax properties where that kind of configuration from the outside
> >> > >    is inconvenient, though.
> >> > >
> >> > >  * Introduce a naming convention for symbols as syntax properties. For
> >> > >    example, a symbol that starts with the letters "preserved:" could
> >> > >    mean that the property should be preserved in bytecode.
> >> > >
> >> > >    A naming convention is easy, and it doesn't require cooperation from
> >> > >    the tool that's writing bytecode. We'd still have to declare
> >> > >    'paren-shape to be a special case.
> >> > >
> >> > >  * Introduce a prefab structure and a convention that a key is
> >> > >    preserved if it is an instance. For example, the designated prefab
> >> > >    structure type could be
> >> > >
> >> > >        (struct preserved (name) #:prefab)
> >> > >
> >> > >    and then '#s(preserved errortrace) as a syntax-property key would be
> >> > >    preserved.
> >> > >
> >> > >    To make this work, syntax-property keys would have to be compared
> >> > >    with `equal?` instead of `eq?`, but I think that change would be ok.
> >> > >
> >> > > Among these options, I'm leaning toward the last one.
> >> > >
> >> > > Any other ideas?
> >> > >
> >> > > --
> >> > > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google 
> >> > > Groups
> >> > "Racket Developers" group.
> >> > > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send 
> >> > > an
> >> > email to [email protected].
> >> > > To post to this group, send email to [email protected].
> >> > > To view this discussion on the web visit
> >> > https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/racket-dev/56dae8b5.4e2b620a.62d8b.ffffc560SM
> >> > TPIN_ADDED_MISSING%40gmr-mx.google.com.
> >> > > For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
> >>
> >> --
> >> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups 
> >> "Racket Developers" group.
> >> To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an 
> >> email to [email protected].
> >> To post to this group, send email to [email protected].
> >> To view this discussion on the web visit 
> >> https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/racket-dev/56db5c48.e9a2420a.265b2.09b9SMTPIN_ADDED_MISSING%40gmr-mx.google.com.
> >> For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.

-- 
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups 
"Racket Developers" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email 
to [email protected].
To post to this group, send email to [email protected].
To view this discussion on the web visit 
https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/racket-dev/m2twkkjygp.wl-stamourv%40eecs.northwestern.edu.
For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.

Reply via email to