franka@mmintl.UUCP (Frank Adams) (10/02/87)
In article <2913@husc6.UUCP> reiter@harvard.UUCP (Ehud Reiter) writes: |The special hardware that LISP machines tend to have are: | | 1) Tagged data. The tags give data type. A word in memory might, for |example, consist of 32 data bits and a 4 bit type field. | | 2) Memory management. Support for CONS and for garbage collection. | | 3) Special caches, instruction sets, etc., which are geared towards LISP. | |[This list is by no means exhaustive] This looks like much the same sort of stuff that one would want for Smalltalk. Has anyone looked at implementing Smalltalk on Lisp machines? (Of course, if Lisp machines really *don't* give better Lisp performance for the price than conventional architectures, it is unlikely that they would do better for Smalltalk.) -- Frank Adams ihnp4!philabs!pwa-b!mmintl!franka Ashton-Tate 52 Oakland Ave North E. Hartford, CT 06108