BT

Facilitating the Spread of Knowledge and Innovation in Professional Software Development

Write for InfoQ

Topics

Choose your language

InfoQ Homepage Virtual Machines Content on InfoQ

  • Sun Clarifies on the G1 Garbage Collector Licensing Controversy

    A couple of days ago InfoQ posted an article about the fact that the release notes for G1 in the latest Java update, mandated that it was to be used in production only by organizations with a Sun support contract. Following the debate and the reactions that where raised in the community, Sun has explicitly updated the release notes and has removed the controversial clause.

  • OpenJDK 7 / JDK 7 Milestone 3 Released

    A new milestone of the next generation JDK has been released, which includes several new features and enhancements in many functional areas, like garbage collection, NIO and more. This is also the first version where OpenJDK and JDK will have (almost) identical code-bases.

  • Is Sun offering the new G1 Garbage Collector Only with a Paid Support Contract?

    Sun's Garbage First garbage collector (nicknamed G1) has been released with Java Update 1.6.0_14 (6u14). Although this low pause, server style collector has been long awaited by the developer's community, at this point Sun allows production usage only to paying customers and this has raised concerns.

  • Squeak Smalltalk and Seaside come to the iPhone

    Squeak Smalltalk is the latest language to be supported on the iPhone platform. We talked to John M McIntosh who ported Squeak to the iPhone and also released software built with Squeak (and its cleaned up version Pharo) in the AppStore. The applications make use of Squeak, but also use the Seaside web framework for building GUIs.

  • Performance Roundup: Heap Stacks Boost Threads in 1.8.x, MacRuby AOT, ZenProfile and EventHooks

    New patches by Joe Damato improve the efficiency of Ruby 1.8.x's green threads with heap stacks: instead of copying the entire stack at every context switch, the patches actually switch between different stacks. Ryan Davis released zenprofile and event_hook for efficient profiling. Also: work on a MacRuby Ahead of Time compiler using LLVM has started.

  • CrossTwine Linker Aims to Boost MRI and 1.9.1 Performance

    CrossTwine aims to improve the performance of MRI, 1.9.1, and Python. Unlike new Ruby VMs, the CrossTwine Linker allows to improve efficiency of the existing interpreters and VMs, while keeping their complete feature set. The company plans to offer services to use the CrossTwine Linker technology to speed up specific applications.

  • Ruby On... SAP: One More Step In The Enterprise With A New Ruby VM

    SAP, the market share leader in CRM & ERP and second largest business software company is adopting Ruby as part of their SAP NetWeaver and SAP ERP 6.0 solution. ABAP Virtual Machine will be able to run Ruby Code through the Blue Ruby extension. With recent debates on Ruby VMs, we talked with Juergen Schmerder from SAP and Charles Nutter from Sun (JRuby).

  • Sun's Garbage First Collector Largely Eliminates Low Latency/High Throughput Tradeoff

    In a recent podcast, James Gosling talked to Danny Coward about the significance of Sun's new Hotspot garbage collector Garbage First for developers of large-scale enterprise systems.

  • Critical Security Vulnerability Found in Quicksort

    In what is sure to become one of the most wide-reaching security vulnerabilities yet known, a researcher with L0pht Heavy Industries has uncovered a flaw in the standard implementation of the Quicksort algorithm. InfoQ spoke with Dildog of L0pht to learn more about this vulnerability and it's ramifications.

  • MacRuby 0.5 Will Have Faster VM Based on LLVM,

    The first results of performance work on the next version of MacRuby are now available in an experimental branch. A new VM based on LLVM is used and already shows significant speed improvements over earlier MacRuby versions.

  • Is It Premature to Talk About C++ and Java’s Legacy?

    Bruce Eckel’s recent blog post on the legacy left by C++ and Java generated a lot of reaction. While mentioning some design mistakes, he concludes that both languages have had a significant role in programming languages evolution and an important positive legacy. But is it not too early to talk about their legacy?

  • Presentation: Evolving the Java Platform

    In this presentation recorded at QCon London 2008, Ola Bini talks about the current status of the JVM regarding languages running on top of it and the need to evolve in order to support dynamic languages.

  • Presentation: Ruby VMs: A Comparison

    In this presentation from QCon San Francisco 2008, Jason Seifer takes a look at the different Ruby virtual machines (JRuby, MagLev, IronRuby, Rubinius, MacRuby) and how to choose what fits best within the enterprise.

  • JRuby 1.2 RC1 Released, Initial support for Android

    JRuby 1.2 RC1 is now available, complete with improved 1.9 support, performance improvements and bug fixes. Also: initial support for using JRuby on Android.

  • Rubinius Progress - Interview with Brian Ford

    The Ruby implementation Rubinius has attracted a lot of interest. After the project completed a major rewrite of its VM, we caught up with Brian Ford, Rubinius team member, to talk about the state of the project.

BT