From: rich Date: Sat, 8 Sep 2007 12:46:16 +0000 (+0000) Subject: Return stack, DOCOL X-Git-Url: http://git.annexia.org/?p=jonesforth.git;a=commitdiff_plain;h=d82cc200f49729ea1708975c8f061529a69f997e Return stack, DOCOL --- diff --git a/jonesforth.S b/jonesforth.S index 4d043aa..40be7d7 100644 --- a/jonesforth.S +++ b/jonesforth.S @@ -61,6 +61,11 @@ Here is another "Why FORTH?" essay: http://www.jwdt.com/~paysan/why-forth.html + ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ---------------------------------------------------------------------- + + This code draws heavily on the design of LINA FORTH (http://home.hccnet.nl/a.w.m.van.der.horst/lina.html) + by Albert van der Horst. Any similarities in the code are probably not accidental. + SETTING UP ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Let's get a few housekeeping things out of the way. Firstly because I need to draw lots of @@ -228,6 +233,12 @@ 1C 00 00 00 the CALL prefix. 2C 00 00 00 + [Historical note: If the execution model that FORTH uses looks strange from the following + paragraphs, then it was motivated entirely by the need to save memory on early computers. + This code compression isn't so important now when our machines have more memory in their L1 + caches than those early computers had in total, but the execution model still has some + useful properties]. + Of course this code won't run directly any more. Instead we need to write an interpreter which takes each pair of bytes and calls it. @@ -355,11 +366,75 @@ (3) jumps to the indirect %eax jumps to the address in the codeword of +, ie. the assembly code to implement + + +------------------+ + | codeword | + +------------------+ + | addr of DOUBLE ---------------> +------------------+ + +------------------+ | codeword | + | addr of DOUBLE | +------------------+ + +------------------+ | addr of DUP --------------> +------------------+ + | addr of EXIT | +------------------+ | codeword -------+ + +------------------+ | addr of + --------+ +------------------+ | + +------------------+ | | assembly to <-----+ + %esi -> | addr of EXIT | | | implement DUP | + +------------------+ | | .. | + | | .. | + | | NEXT | + | +------------------+ + | + +-----> +------------------+ + | codeword -------+ + +------------------+ | + now we're | assembly to <------+ + executing | implement + | + this | .. | + function | .. | + | NEXT | + +------------------+ + + So I hope that I've convinced you that NEXT does roughly what you'd expect. This is + indirect threaded code. + + I've glossed over four things. I wonder if you can guess without reading on what they are? + + . + . + . + + My list of four things are: (1) What does "EXIT" do? (2) which is related to (1) is how do + you call into a function, ie. how does %esi start off pointing at part of QUADRUPLE, but + then point at part of DOUBLE. (3) What goes in the codeword for the words which are written + in FORTH? (4) How do you compile a function which does anything except call other functions + ie. a function which contains a number like : DOUBLE 2 * ; ? + THE INTERPRETER AND RETURN STACK ------------------------------------------------------------ + Going at these in no particular order, let's talk about issues (3) and (2), the interpreter + and the return stack. + Words which are defined in FORTH need a codeword which points to a little bit of code to + give them a "helping hand" in life. They don't need much, but they do need what is known + as an "interpreter", although it doesn't really "interpret" in the same way that, say, + Java bytecode used to be interpreted (ie. slowly). This interpreter just sets up a few + machine registers so that the word can then execute at full speed using the indirect + threaded model above. + One of the things that needs to happen when QUADRUPLE calls DOUBLE is that we save the old + %esi ("instruction pointer") and create a new one pointing to the first word in DOUBLE. + Because we will need to restore the old %esi at the end of DOUBLE (this is, after all, like + a function call), we will need a stack to store these "return addresses" (old values of %esi). + As you will have read, when reading the background documentation, FORTH has two stacks, + an ordinary stack for parameters, and a return stack which is a bit more mysterious. But + our return stack is just the stack I talked about in the previous paragraph, used to save + %esi when calling from a FORTH word into another FORTH word. + + In this FORTH, we are using the normal stack pointer (%esp) for the parameter stack. + We will use the i386's "other" stack pointer (%ebp, usually called the "frame pointer") + for our return stack. + + I've got two macros which just wrap up the details of using %ebp for the return stack: +*/ /* Macros to deal with the return stack. */ .macro PUSHRSP reg @@ -372,6 +447,74 @@ lea 4(%ebp),%ebp .endm +/* + And with that we can now talk about the interpreter. + + In FORTH the interpreter function is often called DOCOL (I think it means "DO COLON" because + all FORTH definitions start with a colon, as in : DOUBLE DUP + ; + + The "interpreter" (it's not really "interpreting") just needs to push the old %esi on the + stack and set %esi to the first word in the definition. Remember that we jumped to the + function using JMP *(%eax)? Well a consequence of that is that conveniently %eax contains + the address of this codeword, so just by adding 4 to it we get the address of the first + data word. Finally after setting up %esi, it just does NEXT which causes that first word + to run. +*/ + +/* DOCOL - the interpreter! */ + .text + .align 4 +DOCOL: + PUSHRSP %esi // push %esi on to the return stack + addl $4,%eax // %eax points to codeword, so make + movl %eax,%esi // %esi point to first data word + NEXT + +/* + Just to make this absolutely clear, let's see how DOCOL works when jumping from QUADRUPLE + into DOUBLE: + + QUADRUPLE: + +------------------+ + | codeword | + +------------------+ DOUBLE: + | addr of DOUBLE ---------------> +------------------+ + +------------------+ %eax -> | addr of DOCOL | + %esi -> | addr of DOUBLE | +------------------+ + +------------------+ | addr of DUP --------------> + | addr of EXIT | +------------------+ + +------------------+ | etc. | + + First, the call to DOUBLE causes DOCOL (the codeword of DOUBLE). DOCOL does this: It + pushes the old %esi on the return stack. %eax points to the codeword of DOUBLE, so we + just add 4 on to it to get our new %esi: + + QUADRUPLE: + +------------------+ + | codeword | + +------------------+ DOUBLE: + | addr of DOUBLE ---------------> +------------------+ + +------------------+ | addr of DOCOL | + | addr of DOUBLE | +------------------+ + +------------------+ %esi -> | addr of DUP --------------> + | addr of EXIT | +------------------+ + +------------------+ | etc. | + + Then we do NEXT, and because of the magic of threaded code that increments %esi again + and calls DUP. + + Well, it seems to work. + + One minor point here. Because DOCOL is the first bit of assembly actually to be defined + in this file (the others were just macros), and because I usually compile this code with the + text segment starting at address 0, DOCOL has address 0. So if you are disassembling the + code and see a word with a codeword of 0, you will immediately know that the word is + written in FORTH (it's not an assembler primitive) and so uses DOCOL as the interpreter. +*/ + + + + /* ELF entry point. */ .text .globl _start @@ -387,15 +530,6 @@ _start: cold_start: // High-level code without a codeword. .int COLD -/* DOCOL - the interpreter! */ - .text - .align 4 -DOCOL: - PUSHRSP %esi // push %esi on to the return stack - addl $4,%eax // %eax points to codeword, so make - movl %eax,%esi // %esi point to first data word - NEXT - /*---------------------------------------------------------------------- * Fixed sized buffers for everything. */