The Design and Implementation of ConcurrentSmalltalk
http://www.amazon.com/Implementation-Concurrent-Smalltalk-Computer-Science/d...
From the Introduction: "In Concurrent Smalltalk, an object is not only
a unit of data abstraction but also a unit of execution."
On 10/25/07, Jason Johnson jason.johnson.081@gmail.com wrote:
On 10/24/07, Sebastian Sastre ssastre@seaswork.com wrote:
So I'm stating here that in a smalltalk image of the future *every object should have a process*. Every instance. All of them.
That is an interesting idea. That would open a door to a new way of Garbage collection, because it can then be tied to the exit of a process.
Said that I return to the problem you stated about the need of copy copy copy, saying that this premise changes things and you don't need to copy anymore because a VM like that, no matter who or when, an instVar of an object is to be modified it will provide you of guarantee that the write will be made by the process that corresponds to that instance.
Yes, in such a system, you don't need to copy because all that gets passed around are references to processes.