Status of non-Hotspot VMs and Shark

[Xerxes Rånby]

On 09/24/2012 08:24 PM, Andrew Hughes wrote:
> ----- Original Message -----
>> Hi Florian,
>>
>> Mostly in complete agreement with Xerxes here,
>>
>> On 24/09/12 10:03 AM, Xerxes Rånby wrote:
>>> 2012-09-23 11:05, Florian Weimer skrev:
>>>> What's the status of Shark, JamVM and Cocoa for OpenJDK 6 and 7?
>>>>   Are
>>>> they officially released/supported?  What about the zero port?
>>>>
>>>> I'm wondering which of these VMs should be part of the upcoming
>>>> Debian
>>>> stable release.
>>>>
>>> ### Zero
>>> Zero is actively maintained and all around stable.
>>> Zero includes an assembler optimized interpreter for ARM and a
>>> thumb2 jit for armv7.
>>> Zero + OpenJDK 6  Icedtea 1.11.4 = OK
>>> Zero + OpenJDK 7  Icedtea 2.3.2 = OK
>> At least as far as I know the asm jit for arm is not yet working in
>> 2.3
>> will be fixed after I get last bits of jsr 292 for zero pasted back
>> together.

We default to use the 2.1 hotspot branch when zero is enabled in order to
workaround this issue for the 2.3.2 release. see below:

>>> tested configure flags:
>>> --enable-zero
>>> and
>>> --with-additional-vms=zero
>
> As far as I'm aware, the ARM port is only present in the 2.1 branch.  This needs rectifying.

No rectifying needed because we actually build the IcedTea 7 2.1 hotspot branch for all 
Zero builds of the IcedTea7 2.3.2 release!

examination:
http://icedtea.classpath.org/hg/release/icedtea7-2.3/file/e7117fcb33ed/acinclude.m4#l924
Here we run a check for zero builds and if found then switches the default hotspot.
line source of acinclude.m4
  926 AC_REQUIRE([IT_ENABLE_ZERO_BUILD])
  927 if test "x${use_zero}" = "xyes"; then
  928   DEFAULT_BUILD="zero"
  929 else
  930   DEFAULT_BUILD="default"
  931 fi

http://icedtea.classpath.org/hg/release/icedtea7-2.3/file/e7117fcb33ed/hotspot.map
Here we define the location for the zero hotspot src repository,
note that zero builds use the icedtea7-forest-2.1/hotspot that do include the ARM port!
line source of hotspot.map
    1 # version url changeset sha256sum
    2 default http://icedtea.classpath.org/hg/release/icedtea7-forest-2.3/hotspot 
ea39d76b3bde 25733b44590c950adc42a2e9c366b8a3992803c06dedcc16d2bf0d50fed54844
    3 zero http://icedtea.classpath.org/hg/release/icedtea7-forest-2.1/hotspot 
47a867dd3005 9f9c2fb9eea9cc2e2d44f23d46615522b09ad0b5dbce2e448458a44e05161e3e

Verification:
If your Zero VM version ends with "mixed mode" on ARM then it do contain the assembler 
optimizations and the Thumb2 JIT.

xranby at ac100-armel:~$ java -version
java version "1.7.0_07"
OpenJDK Runtime Environment (IcedTea7 2.3.2) (7u7-2.3.2a-0ubuntu0.12.04.1)
OpenJDK Zero VM (build 22.0-b10, mixed mode)

Yes, the ARM assembler optimized interpreter and Thumb2 JIT is included in 2.3.2 release!

>
> The supported way of building is with --enable-zero.
>
>>>
>>> ### Shark
>>> Shark (zero+shark) is unmaintained and considered broken.
>>> Do not package.
>>
>> Long term goal but dead at the moment.
>>>
>>> ### JamVM
>>> JamVM is actively maintained and all around stable.
>>> JamVM + OpenJDK 6  Icedtea 1.11.4 = OK, a more stable upstream
>>> release exist to be released with 1.12.
>>> use this patch
>>> http://icedtea.classpath.org/hg/icedtea6/rev/fb1137cef484
>>> to use the latest JamVM in combination with IcedTea6 1.11.x before
>>> the next IcedTea 6 1.12 hits the streets.
>>>
>>> JamVM + OpenJDK 7  Icedtea 2.3.2 = OK
>>> tested configure flags:
>>> --enable-jamvm
>
> --enable-jamvm is the support way of building.
>
> Is the same JamVM used by 6, 7 & 8?
Yes same source, JamVM got a configure flag
   --with-java-runtime-library=openjdk6
and
   --with-java-runtime-library=openjdk7
to handle the recent shared char buffer String change that got introduced
with the IcedTea 2.3 release.

>
>>> and
>>> --with-additional-vms=jamvm
>>> * This --with-additional-vms=jamvm combination require a SONAME
>>> patch on top of JamVM.
>>> This jamvm-avoid-version-soname.patch SONAME patch is currently
>>> only in use by ubuntu.
>>> http://bazaar.launchpad.net/~ubuntu-branches/ubuntu/quantal/openjdk-7/quantal/revision/30#debian/patches/jamvm-avoid-version-soname.patch
>>> Sent and waiting for review upstream.
>>> http://sourceforge.net/mailarchive/message.php?msg_id=29763831
>>>
>
> Why is this patch not in IcedTea or JamVM itself?

Robert have not yet responded to the patch sent to the JamVM mailinglist.
I wanted to first merge it in JamVM upstream before introducing it into IcedTea.

>
>>> ### CACAO
>>> Cacao is actively maintained and stable in combination with OpenJDK
>>> 6.
>>> Cacao + OpenJDK 6  Icedtea 1.11.4 = OK
>>> --enable-cacao
>>> and
>>> --with-additional-vms=cacao
>
> Again, --enable-cacao is the supported way of building.
>
>>> There is a new upstream cacao 1.6.0 release that should be merged
>>> and used by IcedTea6.
>>> http://www.cacaojvm.org/
>>>
>
> Is anyone working on this?
>
>>> Cacao + OpenJDK 7  Icedtea 2.3.2 = unstable
>>> The CACAO OpenJDK 7 port is immature, it can run HelloWorld and
>>> some numerical simple benchmarks
>>> but refuses to run real world applications that access file IO.
>>> Do not package.
>>>
>
> Ok, should this also be upgraded to 1.6?  Are there CACAO bugs for these issues?
>
>>> ### Avian
>>> Avian is actively maintained and rapidly approaching stable.
>>> Avian + OpenJDK 7  IcedTea 2.3.2 = OK
>>> Avian is preferably built separately from src after the main
>>> OpenJDK 7 build.
>>> Avian is packaged in Ubuntu 12.10 and show great performance on
>>> embeded devices.
>>> Latest deb source and merge request:
>>> https://code.launchpad.net/~xranby/ubuntu/quantal/avian/avian_0.6+20120924/+merge/126005
>>> http://oss.readytalk.com/avian/
>>>
>
> This is the first I've heard of this.  Any reason support wasn't added to IcedTea?
>
Avian is preparing their 1.0 release that will be the first release with OpenJDK 7 support.
By keeping it outside IcedTea enable distributions that package Avian to have a rapid 
release cycle during its stabilization process.
I plan to introduce Avian into IcedTea when it have reached 1.0 and is found to be self 
hosting.

>>> Cheers
>>> Xerxes
>> Thanks Xerxes!
>>
>> Cheers!
>> Chris
>> PS
>> The definition of support I am using  here is
>>      "mostly working will try to fix bugs on best effort basis".
>>
>> --
>> --
>> --     Woda: "Java: write once, debug anywhere" Hong Zhang
>>                        http://thehenrys.ca
>>    | Chris Phillips @ T.O. Red Hat OpenJDK JVM Engineer,            |
>>    | mailto:ChrisPhi at RedHat.Com                  (416)483-3768      |
>>    | http://LGonQn.Org/www/Chris.Phillips  cell: (416)505-3610      |
>>    "EPIC stands for Expects Perfectly Intuitive Compilers" P. Bannon
>>                     http://www.hazmatmodine.com
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>>
>
> Cheers,
>

Cheers!