Date: Mon, 11 Feb 2019 05:25:03 GMT From: iam@sdf.org To: bjb@sourcerer.ca, freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Subject: Re: any way asm people could contribute? Message-ID: <201902110525.x1B5P3gB018453@sdf.org> In-Reply-To: <20190210224610.bjx6a5jchi7rb6tg@blueeyes.stuffed.animals> References: <U-T5V9GBTMH0X4T_hYmtSc4B19QRNPzkirSo_g45l-czdcQaEvhYekzafkZcQOM_Nb9IQ6Qx3EXEQ-aeRrDJkPrqMnQky88TZZlDfr9iTGA=@protonmail.ch>, <20190210213504.0B9E5200E1BA25@ary.qy>, <20190210224610.bjx6a5jchi7rb6tg@blueeyes.stuffed.animals>
next in thread | previous in thread | raw e-mail | index | archive | help
> From owner-freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Sun Feb 10 22:46:50 2019 > From: "Brenda J. Butler" <bjb@sourcerer.ca> > To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org > Subject: Re: any way asm people could contribute? > > On Sun, Feb 10, 2019 at 04:35:03PM -0500, John Levine wrote: > > In article <U-T5V9GBTMH0X4T_hYmtSc4B19QRNPzkirSo_g45l-czdcQaEvhYekzafkZcQOM_Nb9IQ6Qx3EXEQ-aeRrDJkPrqMnQky88TZZlDfr9iTGA=@protonmail.ch> you write: > > >If anyone can give more precise information about how to > > >contribute in assembly language, I would find it interesting too. > > > > I think there are a few libraries that have optional assembly language > > versions of speed critical parts. But in general I agree with you > > that drivers are the place to look. > > > > Keep in mind that every different architecture has its own assembly > > language, so if you've fixed a driver in i386 assembler, there's > > probably another version in amd64 assembler and possibly in the > > various powerpc and arm assemblers. > > There are assembly bits in valgrind, you could also look in > libc and equivalents, also the other tools like strace, ld, etc. > > Compilers might have some parts in assembly (gcc, clang, etc). > > I don't know of any project that is largely in assembly - the only > ones I know of are mainly C with some small bits in assembly. > So could be a steep learning curve learning the intricacies of > the thing in which the assembly is embedded (so to speak). > > Maybe also look for embedded type projects, or non-usual > architectures. Maybe also libm, data science, graphics libraries - > places where there are cpu-intensive operations that need > optimization. What about the projects that run on graphics > processors (boinc project or other distributed/crowd computing > for example). Bitcoin mining (might run on dedicated ASICs). > > I would be interested to hear if you find something interesting > to work on. > > bjb > _______________________________________________ > freebsd-questions@freebsd.org mailing list > https://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-questions > To unsubscribe, send any mail to "freebsd-questions-unsubscribe@freebsd.org" > i am currently learning x86 assembly and will be going further on to x86_64 assembly soon. i think i will focus on the x86_64 platform only and work at improving support for more modern x86_64 extensions like avx, avx2, avx-512, simd and others as they come along. for the same, i have looked into a the method employed by the solaris linker loader due to which a single binary can have multiple capabilities as per the capabilities offered by the processor. this i believe is a much better approach than having compile time binary generation which leads to multiple binaries floating around. i think, as i get better as assembly, i'll look into improving the freebsd linker loader and then later work on a newer assembler for x86_64.
Want to link to this message? Use this URL: <https://mail-archive.FreeBSD.org/cgi/mid.cgi?201902110525.x1B5P3gB018453>