research-article

Towards fully reflective environments

Authors:

Diego Garbervetsky,

Stéphane DucasseAuthors Info & Claims

Onward! 2015: 2015 ACM International Symposium on New Ideas, New Paradigms, and Reflections on Programming and Software (Onward!)

Pages 240 - 253

https://doi.org/10.1145/2814228.2814241

Published: 21 October 2015 Publication History

Abstract

Modern development environments promote live programming (LP) mechanisms because it enhances the development experience by providing instantaneous feedback and interaction with live objects. LP is typically supported with advanced reflective techniques within dynamic languages. These languages run on top of Virtual Machines (VMs) that are built in a static manner so that most of their components are bound at compile time. As a consequence, VM developers are forced to work using the traditional edit-compile-run cycle, even when they are designing LP-supporting environments. In this paper we explore the idea of bringing LP techniques to the VM domain for improving their observability, evolution and adaptability at run-time. We define the notion of fully reflective execution environments (EEs), systems that provide reflection not only at the application level but also at the level of the VM. We characterize such systems, propose a design, and present Mate v1, a prototypical implementation. Based on our prototype, we analyze the feasibility and applicability of incorporating reflective capabilities into different parts of EEs. Furthermore, the evaluation demonstrates the opportunities such reflective capabilities provide for unanticipated dynamic adaptation scenarios, benefiting thus, a wider range of users.

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Cited By

Misse-Chanabier PRogliano TKotselidis CProkopec A(2022)Ease Virtual Machine Level Tooling with Language Level Ordinary Object PointersProceedings of the 14th ACM SIGPLAN International Workshop on Virtual Machines and Intermediate Languages10.1145/3563838.3567676(1-12)Online publication date: 29-Nov-2022
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3563838.3567676
Chari GGarbervetsky DMarr SDucasse S(2019)Fully Reflective Execution Environments: Virtual Machines for More Flexible SoftwareIEEE Transactions on Software Engineering10.1109/TSE.2018.281271545:9(858-876)Online publication date: 1-Sep-2019
https://doi.org/10.1109/TSE.2018.2812715
Pimás JBurroni JArnaud JMarr S(2017)Garbage collection and efficiency in dynamic metacircular runtimes: an experience reportACM SIGPLAN Notices10.1145/3170472.313384552:11(39-50)Online publication date: 24-Oct-2017
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3170472.3133845
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Index Terms

Towards fully reflective environments
1. Software and its engineering
  1. Software notations and tools
    1. Compilers
    2. Development frameworks and environments

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cover image ACM Conferences

Onward! 2015: 2015 ACM International Symposium on New Ideas, New Paradigms, and Reflections on Programming and Software (Onward!)

October 2015

307 pages

ISBN:9781450336888

DOI:10.1145/2814228

Program Chairs:
Gail C. Murphy
University of British Columbia, Canada
,
Guy L. Steele Jr.

Copyright © 2015 ACM.

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Published: 21 October 2015

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October 25 - 30, 2015

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Cited By

Misse-Chanabier PRogliano TKotselidis CProkopec A(2022)Ease Virtual Machine Level Tooling with Language Level Ordinary Object PointersProceedings of the 14th ACM SIGPLAN International Workshop on Virtual Machines and Intermediate Languages10.1145/3563838.3567676(1-12)Online publication date: 29-Nov-2022
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3563838.3567676
Chari GGarbervetsky DMarr SDucasse S(2019)Fully Reflective Execution Environments: Virtual Machines for More Flexible SoftwareIEEE Transactions on Software Engineering10.1109/TSE.2018.281271545:9(858-876)Online publication date: 1-Sep-2019
https://doi.org/10.1109/TSE.2018.2812715
Pimás JBurroni JArnaud JMarr S(2017)Garbage collection and efficiency in dynamic metacircular runtimes: an experience reportACM SIGPLAN Notices10.1145/3170472.313384552:11(39-50)Online publication date: 24-Oct-2017
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3170472.3133845
Pimás JBurroni JArnaud JMarr SAncona D(2017)Garbage collection and efficiency in dynamic metacircular runtimes: an experience reportProceedings of the 13th ACM SIGPLAN International Symposium on on Dynamic Languages10.1145/3133841.3133845(39-50)Online publication date: 24-Oct-2017
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3133841.3133845
Chari GGarbervetsky DMarr S(2017)A Metaobject Protocol for Optimizing Application-Specific Run-Time VariabilityProceedings of the 12th Workshop on Implementation, Compilation, Optimization of Object-Oriented Languages, Programs and Systems10.1145/3098572.3098577(1-5)Online publication date: 19-Jun-2017
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3098572.3098577
Chari GGarbervetsky DMarr SUchitel SOrso ARobillard M(2017)Fully-reflective VMs for ruling software adaptationProceedings of the 39th International Conference on Software Engineering Companion10.1109/ICSE-C.2017.144(229-231)Online publication date: 20-May-2017
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1109/ICSE-C.2017.144
Chari GGarbervetsky DMarr S(2016)Building efficient and highly run-time adaptable virtual machinesACM SIGPLAN Notices10.1145/3093334.298923452:2(60-71)Online publication date: 1-Nov-2016
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3093334.2989234
Salgado RDucasse SLaval JEtien A(2016)LowcodeProceedings of the 11th edition of the International Workshop on Smalltalk Technologies10.1145/2991041.2991064(1-10)Online publication date: 23-Aug-2016
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/2991041.2991064
Chari GGarbervetsky DMarr SIerusalimschy R(2016)Building efficient and highly run-time adaptable virtual machinesProceedings of the 12th Symposium on Dynamic Languages10.1145/2989225.2989234(60-71)Online publication date: 1-Nov-2016
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/2989225.2989234
Clark TFuentes LBatory DCzarnecki K(2016)Static meta-object protocols: towards efficient reflective object-oriented languagesCompanion Proceedings of the 15th International Conference on Modularity10.1145/2892664.2892694(160-167)Online publication date: 14-Mar-2016
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/2892664.2892694

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