- FFI - Haskell.org

ADV: Save 10% today on Weight Loss
by Dana Johnson 23 May '02

23 May '02

1 0

ADV: Save 10% today at NaturalWellbeing
by Dana Johnson 12 May '02

12 May '02

1 0

Haskell FFI 1.0 vs Haskell/Direct: influence? loss of abstraction level?
by Hoehle, Joerg-Cyril 25 Apr '02

25 Apr '02

Hi, I've been busy with FFI design issues since 1995 (mostly Common Lisp). I was very impressed by the article "H/Direct: A Binary Foreign Language Interface for Haskell" (ICFP'98). It got me in touch with IDL. I'm quite surprised that the Haskell FFI 1.0 doesn't mention H/Direct or appears to take ideas from it. The H/Direct article says IIRC that it's the fruit of many years and iterations on FFI issues. I can confirm that by parallel experience in Lisp (OTOH, I can expand on low-level vs high-level FFI in a later email if you wish, esp. high-level failing to match some weird functions, but excellent 80-95% solutions). I very much appreciated the elegant declaration of many functions, especially the size_is() indication for the length of an array. It maps well onto many "pass buffer and length" functions, e.g. gethostname(), zlib:compress(). I'm disappointed that I do not find such an elegant approach reflected in the Haskell 98 Foreign Function Interface 1.0 (I read release Candidate 1). Therefore, I'd like to query the Haskell FFI mailing list for the reasons which may have lead to drop the very declarative approach of H/Direct in favour of the FFI 1.0, which to me, appears rather low-level (in contrast). To make things more concrete and to show the influence of H/Direct, here is what I dream of for the CLISP, an implementation of Common Lisp. Only is_size() (and :guard) are missing. :language, :[in-]out parameters, arbitrarily complex structure definitions, :alloca (vs :malloc-free), 0-terminated arrays (c-array-max & c-array-ptr) and the declarative style of definition have been in CLISP since 1995. (def-lib-call-out zlib-compress [eventually library] (:name "compress") (:arguments (dest (c-ptr (c-array uint8 is_size(destlen))) :out :alloca) (destlen ulong :in-out :alloca) (source (c-ptr (c-array uint8 is_size(sourcelen)))) (sourcelen ulong)) (:return-type int) ;; -- only dereference :out parameters when condition on return code is met: (:guard #'zerop) (:language :stdc)) Thanks for shedding light on this topic, Jörg Höhle. CLISP FFI documentation: http://clisp.cons.org/impnotes.html#dffi zlib: http://www.gzip.org/zlib/manual.html Feature Request: Searchable archives at haskell.org/pipermail :)

2 1

FFI Addendum, RC3 & Open Issues
by Manuel M. T. Chakravarty 24 Apr '02

24 Apr '02

I have put Release Candidate 3 up at http://www.cse.unsw.edu.au/~chak/haskell/ffi/ Changes wrt to the last version are the following: * 3.2: Clarified the description of foreign types; so far, `IO ()' was strictly speaking not included as a valid return type. * 4.1.5: New section discussing the traps & pitfalls of type promotion with C bindings. * 5.8: Clarified documentation for `MarshalAlloc.free'. * 5.8: Added `MarshalAlloc.realloc'. Moreover, I would like to draw your attention to the following points, which we should solve before I post the next version to %60haskell(a)haskell.org': * Olaf Chitil has pointed out some unclear points wrt to () and IO () as a result type in foreign declarations in the previous version of the Addendum. I have edited Section 3.2 to improve this, but you may want to check out that the new version meets your expectations. * I have added Section 4.1.5 as a consequence of the recent discussion on argument type promotion on this list. It seemed that everybody agreed what the FFI should do, but that a detailed explanation in the specification is needed, so I have added one. Please check whether you find it sufficient. * I think, for reasons of orthogonality `MarshalAlloc' should include realloc :: Storable b => Ptr a -> IO (Ptr b) I have added this in the document. Let me know if anybody disagrees with this. * There is the open question, raised by SPJ, of whether we like to have something like import_entity -> [String] export_entity -> [String] See my message from yesterday. * Sigbjorn, while adding support for OS threads to GHC, has introduced a new safety mode `threadsafe'. It seems worthwhile to include this into the Addendum. On systems that don't support OS threads, `threadsafe' might behave like `safe', but at least code that uses `threadsafe' would still be valid on other systems. The semantics is as follows: unsafe must not call back safe may call back; if it blocks outside Haskell, the whole Haskell system blocks threadsafe on systems supporting OS threads, the Haskell runtime will not block, even if the call blocks; must call an OS-thread safe procedure ('safe' remains the default.) If there are no objections, I will add the latter two changes to the FFI Addendum. Cheers, Manuel

2 2

ADV: Professional Internet Marketing
by Sydney Ferguson 12 Apr '02

12 Apr '02

1 0

testing without animation
by dave 11 Apr '02

11 Apr '02

1 0

FFI spec
by Simon Peyton-Jones 08 Apr '02

08 Apr '02

Manuel I've just had cause to look at the FFI spec. Here's an idea. Since we have two productions, one for foreign import and one for foreign export, let's separate the productions for "entity" into "import_entity" and "export_entity". That way we don't have to say "entity" in *both* 4.1 and 4.2. Would that be OK? If so, would you like to action it. This is for clarity only -- no change to semantics. Simon

2 1

Freeing arrays
by George Russell 08 Apr '02

08 Apr '02

Sorry if this has been raised before, I don't really follow this list. According to section 5.8 of the spec, MarshalAlloc.free will "free a block of memory that was allocated with malloc or mallocBytes". Fine. But will it also free blocks of memory allocated by MarshalArray.mallocArray and friends? Come to think of it, what about MarshalArray.reallocBytes? Also, what is the "realloc" function mentioned in the specification of reallocArray, or do you mean reallocBytes?

2 1

Adv: Semiconductor Training Courses
by Heather Wilson 30 Mar '02

30 Mar '02

PTI Seminars is presenting the following courses for semiconductor and electronic personnel.... For more details call 636-343-1333 and ask for Heather Wilson. ABCs of IC DESIGN & FABRICATION http://www.ptiseminars.com April 9, 2002 Boston, MA April 19, 2002 Munich, Germany April 26 Penang, Malaysia http://www.psdc.org.my April 29, 2002 San Jose, CA April 30, 2002 Phoenix, AZ May 17, 2002 Austin, TX May 29, 2002 Singapore July 25, 2002 San Francisco (Semicon West) This course describes in simple terms a sequential format of information that constitutes the major fabrication processes and design for integrated devices. This one (1) day seminar gives you a comprehensive overview of the semiconductor industry & technology. The course will give you the background you need to understand the basics of semiconductor devices, how they work, the processing technologies & equipment to produce them, and circuit design techniques. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ABCs of BASIC ELECTRONICS AND DEVICES April 25 Penang, Malaysia http://www.psdc.org.my June 20, 2002 San Jose, CA CMOS DIGITAL DESIGN May 1-2 Penang, Malaysia http://www.psdc.org.my June 27-28, 2002 San Jose, CA DEVICE PHYSICS MADE EASY April 8, 2002 San Jose, CA June 10, 2002 San Jose, CA FLIP CHIP, WLCSP & MICROVIA TECHNOLOGIES June 3 Penang, Malaysia http://www.psdc.org.my July 19, 2002 San Francisco, CA (Semicon West) Fundamentals of CHEMICAL MECHANICAL PROCESSING Presented by: Srini Raghavan June 5, 2002 San Jose, CA Fundamentals of CHEMICAL VAPOR DEPOSITION June 27, 2002 San Jose, CA Fundamentals of ION IMPLANTATION June 26, 2002 San Jose, CA Fundamentals of MEMS DESIGN & FABRICATION April 10, 2002 San Jose, CA July 24, 2002 San Francisco, CA (Semicon West) Fundamentals of METALLIZATION May 30 Penang, Malaysia http://www.psdc.org.my June 28, 2002 San Jose, CA Fundamental RF Plasma Generation for Semiconductor Equipment July 24-25, 2002 San Francisco, CA (Semicon West) Fundamentals of WET & DRY ETCH June 6, 2002 San Jose, CA Fundamentals of PHOTOLITHOGRAPHY June 21, 2002 San Jose, CA Fundamentals of THERMAL PROCESSING June 26, 2002 San Jose, CA INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY STRATEGIES for SEMICONDUCTOR INDUSTRY COMPANIES April 9-10, 2002 San Jose, CA May 6-7 Penang, Malaysia http://www.psdc.org.my July 24-25, 2002 San Francisco, CA (Semicon West) Intro to MICRO CONTAMINATION CONTROL June 24, 2002 San Jose, CA Intro to INTEGRATED YIELD MANAGEMENT April 18-19, 2002 Munich, Germany (Semicon Europa) May 6-7, 2002 Singapore (Semicon Singapore) May 9-10 Penang, Malaysia http://www.psdc.org.my May 16-17, 2002 San Jose, CA July 18-19, 2002 (Semicon West) Intro to STATISTICAL PROCESSING CONTROL (SPC) April 9, 2002 San Jose, CA June 11, 2002 San Jose, CA PRODUCT MARKETING for the SEMICONDUCTOR INDUSTRY April 18, 2002 Munich, Germany (Semicon Europa) May 9, 2002 Singapore (Semicon Singapore) June 20, 2002 San Jose, CA July 24, 2002 San Francisco, CA (Semicon West) ADVANCED LITHOGRAPHY July 24, 2002 San Francisco, CA (Semicon West) CHECK OUR WEB SITE FOR ADDITIONAL COURSES !! http://www.ptiseminars.com For a FULL TRAINING SCHEDULE of "open" course dates visit http://www.pti-inc.com and click on the Schedule button TO REGISTER Go To http:www.pti-seminars.com and click on the Registration Button. TO SPEAK: * to an account manager about ATTENDING these courses or having them ONSITE contact us at (636) 343-1333 in the USA. Ask for HEATHER WILSON. * Fax (636) 343-8642 * Email: heather(a)pti-inc.com PTI SEMINARS, INC. "We Exceed Your Expectations!" * To unsubscribe please reply to heather(a)pti-inc.com and in the subject "Unsubscribe". We apologize for any inconvenience.

1 0

Welcome to the Cigarette Station!
by Station News 25 Mar '02

25 Mar '02

1 0