jak-project/doc/changelog.md

Language Changes

V0.1

• The GOAL language version has been set to 0.1

• Calling a function with unknown argument/return types is now an error instead of a warning

• Getting a method of an object or type with method returns the correct type for methods using the _type_ feature

• The object-new macro will now type check arguments

• The size argument to (method object new) is now an int instead of int32

• Using set! incorrectly, like (set! 1 2) will now create an error instead of having no effect

• GOOS now has a fmt form which wraps libfmt for doing string formatting.

• GOOS now has an error form for throwing an error with a string to describe it

• GOAL if now throws errors on extra arguments instead of silently ignoring them

• The first 1 MB of GOAL memory now cannot be read/written/executed so dereferencing a GOAL null pointer will now segfault

• The runtime now accepts command line boot arguments

• The runtime now defaults to loading KERNEL.CGO and using its kernel-dispatcher function.

• The runtime now accepts a -nokernel parameter for running without KERNEL.CGO.

• The runtime will now refuse to load object files from another major GOAL version

• Using &+ and &+! now produces a pointer with the same type as the original.

• There is a &- which returns a uint and works with basically any input types

• The & operator works on fields and elements in arrays

• The &-> operator has been added

• The new operator can create arrays and inline arrays on heaps

• The value of deftype is now none

• Creating a method with more than 8 arguments is an error instead of a crash.

• The defconstant form for defining a constant in GOAL but not GOOS has been added

• Both defconstant and defglobalconstant throw an error if you define a constant with the same name as a symbol.

• The uint64 type now uses 8 bytes instead of 81 in a type (this was a typo)

• deftype allows basics/structures with a field that is the same type as the basic/structure.

• Doing a define-extern with a type of type will forward declare the type.

• deftype now has a :no-runtime-type flag to disable the creation of a runtime type.

• There is a declare-type form for forward declaring types to allow circular dependencies.

• Types that are structure but not basic can request that they be tightly packed when possible with :pack-me.

• Using method on a forward declared type is an error. The old behavior was to get a method of type, which is confusing.

• Loading an int64/uint64 gives a int/uint, like the other register integers.

• Defining a type with deftype will auto-generate an inspect method.

• The new operator can now create static structures and basics and set fields to integers or symbols.

• The neq? operator now works when used outside of a branch condition (previously it generated a syntax error)

• Methods which do not return a value no longer cause the compiler to abort

• The &+ form now accepts more than two arguments.

• The &+ form now works on inline-array and structure.

• In the case where the type system would use a result type of lca(none, x), the result type is now none instead of compiler abort.

• The "none value" is now (none) instead of none

• Creating a field of 128-bit value type no longer causes a compiler crash

• 128-bit fields are inspected as <cannot-print>

• Static fields can now contain floating point values

• Fixed a bug where loading a float from an object and immediately using it math would cause a compiler crash

• Arrays of value types can be created on the stack with new.

V0.2

• Breaking change: return type of a function using return-from #f to return a value from the entire function is now the lowest common ancestor of all possible return values.
• Fixed bug where return-from could reach outside of an inlined function.
• Fixed bug where return-from might not behave correctly when returning from inside a let inside an inlined function.
• Added fmin and fmax floating point min and max. These work on multiple arguments and use the minss/maxss instructions for the best performance.
• Added imul64 instruction for doing a real 64-bit multiplication. This must be used when porting code that looks at the hi register after an EE mult.
• Added shl, shr, and sar shifts which take a constant integer. These cannot be used with a variable shift amount.
• Added bitfield types to the type system
• Added the ability to cast integers to bitfield types
• Fixed a bug where casting between integer types with the that did not involve emitting code would permanently change the type of the variable.
• Added a :disassemble option to asm-file to disassemble functions for debugging purposes.

V0.3

• Added typechecking when setting fields of a type.
• Added inline assembly .ret, .sub, .push, and .pop.
• Added rlet to declare register variables.
• Added :color #f option to inline assembly forms to exclude them from the coloring system.
• Added asm-func to declare for purely assembly functions.
• Enum values now work where constant integers are expected.
• The boolean values #f and #t now are gotten as symbol objects, not values of symbols.
• In a static field initialization, you can use #f and #t instead of '#f and '#t
• Added no-typecheck option to define.
• Reworked type checking for set!. You may now use #f for non-numeric types.
• Fixed a bug where arguments to a method were unmodifiable.
• Fixed a bug where multiple anonymous lambda functions in the same file would throw a compiler error related to function name uniqueness.
• Method declarations can now use compound types. Previously they could only use simple types due to a mistake in deftype parser.
• Added a declare option for allow-saved-regs to let asm-funcs use saved registers in special cases
• Improved register allocation for the above case to avoid inserting extra moves to and from temp registers.
• Fixed a bug where early returns out of methods would not change the return type of the method.
• Fixed a bug where the return instruction was still emitted and the overridden return type of asm-func was ignored for methods
• Rearranged function stack frames so spilled register variable slots come after stack structures.
• Added stack allocated and constructed basic/structure types.
• Fixed a bug where functions with exactly 8 parameters created a compiler error.

V0.4

• Breaking change: added new link kind to link table format. Code compiled with previous versions will still work, but code compiled in V0.4 that uses static pairs will cause a "unknown link table code 5" error.
• Added support for static pairs and lists. Symbols, integers, and strings are supported.
• Added much better support for setting fields of statics. Now you can set constants, symbols, strings, pairs, integers, floats, or other statics, including inlined structures/basics! Also uses the full type system for typechecking
• Fixed a bug where accessing an inline basic field did not apply the 4-byte basic offset.
• Made string/float constants go in the main segment when they are declared in the top-level segment, instead of the top-level segment. This is what GOAL seems to do (not 100% sure yet) and avoids issues where you set something to a string constant in the top-level. This avoids the possibility of memory bugs at the cost of more memory usage (likely very little additional memory).
• Added support for boxed arrays. They can be created with new and indexed with ->. The compound type (array <elt-type>) is used to describe an array with a given content type.
• Added reset-here option for rlet.

V0.5

• Breaking change: the register class xmm for a single float was renamed to fpr to distinguish it from other uses of xmm registers.
• Breaking change: the message format for reset and shutdown messages sent between the listener and runtime has changed.
• Improved code-generation quality where accessing a field or similar with an offset of zero from a base register.
• The listener now uses message IDs to more robustly handle the situation where a response messages comes, but is extremely late, or if some sent messages are skipped.
• Fixed bug where references to the debug segment using RIP-relative links were not set to zero by the linker when the debug segment isn't loaded.
• The rlet form now supports 128-bit vector float registers with the vf register class.
• Added support for "vector float" assembly operations, including lvf, svf, xor, sub, add, and blend.
• Added the ability to spill floating point variables to the stack if there aren't enough registers.
• Improved back up and restore of xmm registers
• Fixed an off-by-one in move eliminator (previous version was correct, but did not generate as good code). Complicated functions are 2 to 10% smaller.
• Improved getting a stack address.
• Improved getting the value of #f, #t, and ().
• Accessing a constant field of an array now constant propagates the memory offset like field access and avoids a runtime multiply.
• Fixed a bug where loading or storing a vf register from a memory location + constant offset would cause the compiler to throw an error.
• Accessing array elements uses more efficient indexing for power-of-two element sizes.