Re: Kaffe and Classpath (again)

[Stuart Ballard]

Nic Ferrier wrote:
> 
> I've decided I'll take on the integration project in my spare time
> (which is minimal) but I'm a little confused as to what the current
> status is.

Yay!

> As far as I can see from the website and HACKING what has to be done
> is:
> 
> - provide new Classpath versions of Kaffe's classes:
>   o java.lang.Runtime
>   o java.lang.Thread
>   o java.lang.Class
>   o java.lang.reflect.Constructor
>   o java.lang.reflect.Method
>   o java.lang.reflect.Field
> These will have to do all the things that Kaffe's need to do in terms
> of VM integration but must also talk to Classpath (ie: the example on
> the website, Thread needs to call Classpath's ThreadGroup.add()
> method).

As I understand it (and I wasn't directly involved, but I was on the
mailing list at the time of the original discussions) this isn't
necessary. Classpath provides implementations of these classes, which
*use*...

>    o java.lang.VMObject
>    o java.lang.VMClassLoader
>    o java.lang.VMSystem
>    o java.lang.VMSecurityManager
>    o java.lang.StackFrame
>    o java.lang.StackTrace
> using Kaffe native methods, eg: VMClassLoader will use Kaffe's
> defineClass0 native method to turn bytes into Class objects.

... these classes to do the stuff that is *really* VM-specific. In other
words, it is *these* classes that should do the things that Kaffe's
existing versions do, and (the majority of) classpath integration is
handled by the publically visible classes. I'm not sure what the
discussion of Thread and ThreadGroup.add is about, because I would have
assumed that Classpath's Thread class could do that, but I'm sure
someone (John?) knows how this works and can clarify for us.

> - are the StackFrame and StackTrace classes supposed to go into
> java.lang or gnu.vm.stack?
> - how is the config system supposed to work? ie: how do we select
> what the VM target is?

Don't know about this stuff, sorry. My only guess would be wherever the
Japhar ones (in the vm/reference directory) are today... who was it that
wrote the build system?

Stuart.