https://github.com/miniboxing/miniboxing-plugin
Miniboxing is a program transformation that improves the performance of Scala generics when used with primitive types. It can speed up generic collections by factors between 1.5x and 22x, while maintaining bytecode duplication to a minimum. You can easily add miniboxing to your sbt project:
https://github.com/miniboxing/miniboxing-plugin
arrays collections generics jvm optimization specialization user-defined-structures
Last synced: 6 months ago
JSON representation
Miniboxing is a program transformation that improves the performance of Scala generics when used with primitive types. It can speed up generic collections by factors between 1.5x and 22x, while maintaining bytecode duplication to a minimum. You can easily add miniboxing to your sbt project:
- Host: GitHub
- URL: https://github.com/miniboxing/miniboxing-plugin
- Owner: miniboxing
- License: other
- Created: 2012-04-26T09:52:25.000Z (about 13 years ago)
- Default Branch: wip
- Last Pushed: 2020-04-11T22:53:02.000Z (about 5 years ago)
- Last Synced: 2024-05-02T11:13:18.543Z (about 1 year ago)
- Topics: arrays, collections, generics, jvm, optimization, specialization, user-defined-structures
- Language: Java
- Homepage: http://scala-miniboxing.org
- Size: 22.8 MB
- Stars: 120
- Watchers: 12
- Forks: 17
- Open Issues: 45
-
Metadata Files:
- Readme: README.md
- License: LICENSE.md
Awesome Lists containing this project
README
# Miniboxing Plugin for Scala
Miniboxing is a Scala compiler transformation that [improves the performance of generics](http://scala-miniboxing.org/benchmarks.html) for primitive numeric types. Unlike [specialization](http://infoscience.epfl.ch/record/150134/files/p42-dragos.pdf), miniboxing reduces the amount of generated bytecode without sacrificing execution speed, therefore being capable of [transforming the Scala collections hierachy](http://scala-miniboxing.org/example_linkedlist.html).
#### Check out [the scala-miniboxing.org website](http://scala-miniboxing.org).
[](https://gitter.im/miniboxing/miniboxing-plugin)
[](https://travis-ci.org/miniboxing/miniboxing-plugin)
[](https://www.codacy.com/app/vladureche/miniboxing)
[](http://codecov.io/github/miniboxing/miniboxing-plugin?branch=wip)
## Why use Miniboxing? ##
**Short answer:** because it matches the performance of specialization, without the bytecode blowup. For the `Tuple3` class:
```
case class Tuple3[@specialized +T1, @specialized +T2, @specialized +T3](_1: T1, _2: T2, _3: T3)
```
Specialization generates **1000 classes**. Just change `@specialized` to `@miniboxed` and you get **only 8 classes**.
**Long answer:** Aside from reducing the bytecode size, the miniboxing technique improves several other aspects of specialization:
* miniboxing-specialized classes don't inherit generic fields (see [SI-3585](https://issues.scala-lang.org/browse/SI-3585));
* miniboxing-specialized classes can inherit from their miniboxing-specialized parents (see [SI-8405](https://issues.scala-lang.org/browse/SI-8405) and [this restriction](https://github.com/scala/scala/blob/master/src/compiler/scala/tools/nsc/transform/SpecializeTypes.scala#L572)).
To see the benchmarks we performed, have a look at the [OOPSLA 2013 paper](https://github.com/miniboxing/miniboxing-plugin/blob/wip/docs/2013-07-oopsla-preprint.pdf) we just prepared. They include performance evaluations, bytecode size comparisons and many more. Also, the [docs](https://github.com/miniboxing/miniboxing-plugin/tree/wip/docs) directory contains a series of papers and presentations which explain many aspects of the miniboxing transformation.
## Using the Plugin ##
At this point, the miniboxing plugin is not production-ready, although it can compile [spire](https://github.com/non/spire). However, we do publish a [nightly maven artifact](https://scala-webapps.epfl.ch/jenkins/view/All/job/miniboxing-wip-nightly/) on Sonatype, so anyone can try the current transformation. To get started, have a look at the [example project](https://github.com/miniboxing/miniboxing-example) we prepared.
**Mind the gap:** there are still many [bugs](https://github.com/miniboxing/miniboxing-plugin/issues?state=open) and [known limitations](https://github.com/miniboxing/miniboxing-plugin/wiki/Details-|-Known-Limitations), so you're in for a thrill! Also, don't hesitate to add bugs to the tracker, good reductions that can be easily reproduced are highly appreciated!
## Hacking the Plugin ##
The [wiki](https://github.com/miniboxing/miniboxing-plugin/wiki) is a good place to start looking into installing, testing, benchmarking and hacking on the miniboxing plugin. Also have a look at the [docs](https://github.com/miniboxing/miniboxing-plugin/tree/wip/docs) directory, which contains some good resources.
The development branches are:
- [master](https://github.com/miniboxing/miniboxing-plugin/tree/master) is always stable, usually outdated
- [wip](https://github.com/miniboxing/miniboxing-plugin/tree/wip) is pretty stable, usually has the last resonably stable developments
- [topic/erasure-rebase](https://github.com/miniboxing/miniboxing-plugin/tree/topic/erasure-rebase) contains the most recent developments, but expect tests to be broken most of the time
### Repository organization ###
- wip is the working branch, most current version of the plugin
- master is usually a bit behind wip, but should be stable (alpha-stable, not production-ready!)
- sbt is used for compilation and testing
- the repository contains several sbt sub-projects:
- `components/plugin` - the actual Scala compiler plugin
- `components/runtime` - the runtime support for the transformed code
- `components/classloader` - the classloader used for runtime class specialization
- `tests/benchmarks` - the benchmarks for the project
- `tests/correctness` - the tests for the plugin transformation
- `docs` - documents released as the development goes on
## Questions? ##
If you have any question, you can contact me at vlad dot ureche at epfl dot ch.