pdclib:blog
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+ | ====== Development Blog ====== | ||
+ | Here I jot down thoughts, roadmaps, to-do' | ||
+ | |||
+ | ==== 2021-10-07 ==== | ||
+ | |||
+ | This past month seemed a lot longer than a month. There had been productivity elsewhere, new professional challenges, and some private heartbreak. | ||
+ | |||
+ | No progress on the library though. I hope this is excusable. | ||
+ | |||
+ | ==== 2021-09-09 ==== | ||
+ | |||
+ | The reimplementation is online. Please //do// pull the new version. I am a bit embarrassed at the poor quality of the previous attempt, and how long it took me to actually realize. | ||
+ | |||
+ | ==== 2021-09-06 ==== | ||
+ | |||
+ | Turns out my '' | ||
+ | |||
+ | ==== 2021-08-14 ==== | ||
+ | |||
+ | I decided to shut down the Subversion repository (which had been the master repo until now). I still consider Subversion to be the better option for a small project like PDCLib, but I guess it is time to move on. I basically need the practice with Git, so... yea. | ||
+ | |||
+ | ==== 2021-08-08 ==== | ||
+ | |||
+ | Technically it is not that much, but it feels like a huge step forward -- PDCLib now supports printing floating point values using the '' | ||
+ | |||
+ | Why this weird specifier that is not used by anybody out there? Because it is the one that works without changing the base of the mantissa, i.e. this is the one format that avoids all the issues of the other FP conversions. And //having// the ability to print //some// kind of FP output will help immensely when debugging the other conversions. | ||
+ | |||
+ | ==== 2021-07-12 ==== | ||
+ | |||
+ | Back in the groove with a new employer. In pursuit of floating point support, I pulled apart the rather monolithic '' | ||
+ | |||
+ | Big integer support is mostly done,so I can try my hand at implementing the Dragon algorithm for float support in '' | ||
+ | |||
+ | ==== 2021-04-12 ==== | ||
+ | |||
+ | Sorry for the long silence. An opportunity has opened up for me employment-wise which, however, requires my full attention. | ||
+ | |||
+ | I hope to return to PDCLib by mid '21. | ||
+ | |||
+ | ==== 2020-10-25 ==== | ||
+ | |||
+ | I was asked to add floating point support to my '' | ||
+ | |||
+ | ==== 2020-10-23 ==== | ||
+ | |||
+ | Two functions in stdio() (fread(), fgetpos()) did not handle ungetc()' | ||
+ | |||
+ | ==== 2020-08-03 ==== | ||
+ | |||
+ | I erased my previous work on tzcode, and started anew. This time, I kept the original mostly untouched for the initial setup (instead of trying to refactor major parts of it as I go, the way I tried in the first go). This means that, at this point, I got a lot of code in the PDCLib repo that is... well... unkempt. Also, no documentation. But the ''< | ||
+ | |||
+ | This is a dirty hack, but it gives me a base from which to refactor '' | ||
+ | |||
+ | ==== 2020-07-24 ==== | ||
+ | |||
+ | The last two months had been... unsavory. I had a lot of things on my hands, and unfortunately had to drop the ball on PDCLib for some time. | ||
+ | |||
+ | I've returned to the keyboard though. The current work will take some more polish before being checked in, but I am confident that I tackled the tzcode issue from the correct angle this time. | ||
+ | |||
+ | ==== 2020-05-29 ==== | ||
+ | |||
+ | Well, that was to be expected. In my effort to untangle the internal data flows of tzcode, I have painted myself into a corner. Nothing serious really, but something that requires a couple hours of uninterrupted focus. Which is hard to come by currently... I hope to get this done over the long weekend. | ||
+ | |||
+ | ==== 2020-04-23 ==== | ||
+ | |||
+ | I've made inroads on [[https:// | ||
+ | |||
+ | As opposed to '' | ||
+ | |||
+ | Progress has slowed a bit toward the end of the holidays; both work and real life have caught up with me again. But my partner has shown a remarkable interest in what I'm doing with PDCLib, and I guess that will keep me doing it whenever time allows. 8-) | ||
+ | |||
+ | ==== 2020-04-07 ==== | ||
+ | |||
+ | See that < | ||
+ | |||
+ | One thing that had bugged me (pun intended) for a long time was that I originally implemented the '' | ||
+ | |||
+ | So I sat down, wrote little test programs, and ran those on //all// the platforms at my disposal to figure out what was actually required. I also made an overview of what GCC / clang provided (which is //almost// identical across platforms and compilers, but not completely). This was not only for the types mentioned above, but (because that was what I was // | ||
+ | |||
+ | In the end this necessitated a complete rework of all the files affected -- '' | ||
+ | |||
+ | But right now it's 4 AM. I am happy this is checked in, but I am even more happy to go to bed now. I guess I will take a break tomorrow (today?) and enjoy a day of //real// vacation for a change. | ||
+ | |||
+ | ==== 2020-04-01 ==== | ||
+ | |||
+ | We had a one-hour power outage this morning... and it took me another hour to figure out I had misconfigured the server so it didn't spin up on its own after the power came back. Sorry. | ||
+ | |||
+ | On the other hand, I'm chunking away at the ''< | ||
+ | |||
+ | < | ||
+ | |||
+ | ==== 2020-03-15 ==== | ||
+ | |||
+ | Between Stefan Schmidt' | ||
+ | |||
+ | Stay healthy, stay at home, meet you on the flip side. | ||
+ | |||
+ | ==== 2020-03-10 ==== | ||
+ | |||
+ | New priority is ''< | ||
+ | |||
+ | ==== 2020-03-08 ==== | ||
+ | |||
+ | I pushed the reworked '' | ||
+ | |||
+ | ==== 2020-03-05 ==== | ||
+ | |||
+ | Sorry for keeping quiet for so long. | ||
+ | |||
+ | There has been activity in the repo, I just didn't find the leisure to make a blog post. There had been fixes to the '' | ||
+ | |||
+ | I am in the last throes of '' | ||
+ | |||
+ | I got an implementation for '' | ||
+ | |||
+ | ==== 2019-09-20 ==== | ||
+ | |||
+ | Not much to report as I have been focussing on private matters (including a renovation project). | ||
+ | |||
+ | Another downstream request was to implement floating point output to my '' | ||
+ | |||
+ | But I took note of the state of the art, and will study it when the time comes... | ||
+ | |||
+ | ==== 2019-07-11 ==== | ||
+ | |||
+ | Coming back to my "to-do list" from early June, things are a bit ugly. | ||
+ | |||
+ | * I realized ''< | ||
+ | * Of Annex K, ''< | ||
+ | * What's there of Annex K isn't really well tested. AFAIK there is only one good reference implementation (slib), and it's not easy to reference that in PDCLib tests. | ||
+ | * ''< | ||
+ | * '' | ||
+ | * The elephant in the room, Unicode support to finally get going on locales, wide chars, and multibyte strings. | ||
+ | * Downstream expressed some dismay that PDCLib isn't really optimized yet. I could make huge improvements to this end by providing an overlay that uses GCC / CLang buildins instead of the naïve '' | ||
+ | * ''< | ||
+ | |||
+ | I feel a bit overwhelmed at the moment, as there are so many construction sites, and no easy way to reduce their number anytime soon. | ||
+ | |||
+ | I guess fixing '' | ||
+ | |||
+ | ==== 2019-07-02 ==== | ||
+ | |||
+ | My exit code -- the one handling process termination on '' | ||
+ | |||
+ | In fixing that particular bug, I came to realize that, while '' | ||
+ | |||
+ | Note that it is the duty of the C runtime support code -- the part that actually **calls** '' | ||
+ | |||
+ | ==== 2019-06-12 ==== | ||
+ | |||
+ | I finished '' | ||
+ | |||
+ | ==== 2019-06-04 ==== | ||
+ | |||
+ | As a summary update, my to-do list: | ||
+ | |||
+ | * implement '' | ||
+ | * fix '' | ||
+ | * double-check the ''< | ||
+ | * ...and then either the rest of Annex K, or return to the Unicode support functions for ''< | ||
+ | |||
+ | ==== 2019-05-20 (2) ==== | ||
+ | |||
+ | Turns out the '' | ||
+ | |||
+ | ==== 2019-05-20 ==== | ||
+ | |||
+ | Yes, I am aware of **breaking bugs** in the current PDCLib. There' | ||
+ | |||
+ | But I am definitely working on it. Especially since that '' | ||
+ | |||
+ | So... for now, you're probably better off to look to SVN revision 769 (pre 2019-04-16) if what you want is a halfway-stable, | ||
+ | |||
+ | So much to code, so little time... | ||
+ | |||
+ | ==== 2019-04-30 ==== | ||
+ | |||
+ | Adapting my ''< | ||
+ | |||
+ | Then I tried to adapt it to Windows / MinGW, just for the sake of giving it a try, and... oh, my. OK, there has to be some more work poured into this. | ||
+ | |||
+ | (Among other things, Windows / MinGW does some things //very// differently in pthreads.h, most importantly the data structures not being data structures at all but '' | ||
+ | |||
+ | Ah well. We're further down the road than we were a week ago, so all is good I guess. ;-) | ||
+ | |||
+ | ==== 2019-04-28 ==== | ||
+ | |||
+ | Back from vacation, and got around to commit the ''< | ||
+ | |||
+ | I know of the following shortcomings | ||
+ | |||
+ | * The implementation does not have test drivers yet (a.k.a. " | ||
+ | * ''< | ||
+ | * '' | ||
+ | |||
+ | On the upside, most of ''< | ||
+ | |||
+ | ==== 2019-04-18 ==== | ||
+ | |||
+ | Enjoying two weeks of vacation at the North Sea, I spend quite some time relaxing at the keyboard. (Yes, this can be actually relaxing, if you go at it the right way.) | ||
+ | |||
+ | I integrated dlmalloc (using default settings only for the time being), and am making some progress toward implementing ''< | ||
+ | |||
+ | The example platform will implement ''< | ||
+ | |||
+ | It's also simpler to implement those pthread wrapper functions than digging through the Unicode specs. ;-) | ||
+ | |||
+ | Once I got the functionality nailed down, I will wade through the existing code to implement thread safety as required. (Looking at you, ''< | ||
+ | |||
+ | So... yes. Progress is being made. ;-) | ||
+ | |||
+ | ==== 2019-03-26 ==== | ||
+ | |||
+ | It's been a long time since I last did anything with / for PDCLib, but I won't make excuses for it. I just could not get myself to dig into that Unicode standard again. And as I said to a fellow developer some time ago: | ||
+ | |||
+ | > A hobby should always be a CAN do, not a TO do. Have a good hard look at what each of your hobbies is giving you, and be ready to drop hobbies that drain your energy instead of recharging it. | ||
+ | |||
+ | After the ePub debacle, and due to several other (private) issues, my energy was drained. So I focussed on more enjoyable things... but I'm back. | ||
+ | |||
+ | Since I //still// could not bear the thought of going full Unicode mode again, I had a look at integrating [[https:// | ||
+ | |||
+ | To do this with a minimum of changes to the '' | ||
+ | |||
+ | That in turn meant I had to //test// the stuff, which in turn meant it was time to enable building PDCLib as a //shared// library instead of the static one it currently is. But that meant touching '' | ||
+ | |||
+ | So I started working toward supporting [[https:// | ||
+ | |||
+ | Let's see if I get back on track on this. ;-) | ||
+ | |||
+ | ==== 2018-10-29 ==== | ||
+ | |||
+ | Quickly saving a link for later reference: [[https:// | ||
+ | |||
+ | ==== 2018-09-24 ==== | ||
+ | |||
+ | The ePub conversion was a dead end; I should have spent the time reading instead of working on " | ||
+ | |||
+ | *sigh* | ||
+ | |||
+ | ==== 2018-08-17 ==== | ||
+ | |||
+ | Since I was asked, I thought I could just as well give the answer here: | ||
+ | |||
+ | > Why are you doing ''< | ||
+ | |||
+ | Three reasons, really. The first is just a minor snag -- FP I/O is locale-dependent (decimal point vs. decimal comma). | ||
+ | |||
+ | The second is that, to do the FP logic //right// (instead of naïve 80-20 solutions), you need to take //lots// of platform specifics into account. This will blow up ''< | ||
+ | |||
+ | Third, it is quite simply the area I have the least expertise in. I want to save the hardest part for last. | ||
+ | |||
+ | ==== 2018-08-07 ==== | ||
+ | |||
+ | Sometimes we find ourselves approaching new technologies from rather unexpected angles. Right now I am working on an ePub conversion of The Unicode Standard for easier reading, as PDF handles poorly on my tolino ebook reader. | ||
+ | |||
+ | I would probably never have bothered with looking into the ePub format if it had not been for PDCLib... we live and learn. | ||
+ | |||
+ | ==== 2018-08-05 ==== | ||
+ | |||
+ | There is no way around it. Too much of the whole ctype, wctype, uchar, locale issue is pointing to Unicode all over again. And I have been cursing at getting tangled by lots of cross-references and internal dependencies, | ||
+ | |||
+ | So... yeah. Stay put. | ||
+ | |||
+ | ==== 2018-07-27 ==== | ||
+ | |||
+ | In these past two days, I learned a lot about the Unicode Collation Algorithm. Yes, I can do this, I can make this part of the PDCLib. | ||
+ | |||
+ | But no, not in the immediate future. That will have to "make do" with the " | ||
+ | |||
+ | ==== 2018-07-25 ==== | ||
+ | |||
+ | I have added '' | ||
+ | |||
+ | The one thing left is '' | ||
+ | |||
+ | Let's just say that the [[http:// | ||
+ | |||
+ | ==== 2018-07-02 (2) ==== | ||
+ | |||
+ | Bah. //Think first.// There already **is** a function to load contents for the various locale-data structures from file, and it's name is '' | ||
+ | |||
+ | Also, while loading from the filesystem is rather " | ||
+ | |||
+ | So stop dithering and make '' | ||
+ | |||
+ | ==== 2018-07-02 ==== | ||
+ | |||
+ | Looking at what I already had in ''< | ||
+ | |||
+ | I am currently thinking in terms of '' | ||
+ | |||
+ | ==== 2018-06-29 ==== | ||
+ | |||
+ | With '' | ||
+ | |||
+ | The '' | ||
+ | |||
+ | Now I have to provide a way to actually //use// the derived information in PDCLib proper. |
pdclib/blog.txt · Last modified: 2021/10/07 15:53 by 127.0.0.1