[Openmcl-devel] M1 port: Call for funding

[Tim McNerney]

Don’t beat yourself up Ron. Most lone wolf hackers aren’t great at documenting how to port as they are porting. (Humans only have so much short-term/working memory). But we can and should, since we will be working as a team. One of the existing problems is undocumented complexity in the compiler. I think we can figure out the GC. Yes, there will be a lot of time spent learning details with “boots of the ground.” I can and have written down a plan from the “5,000 level.” You are right that the work Alya and I did would not affect RME’s path forward, but for anyone else, it will prove to be a useful “scouting expedition,” and goes beyond the internals document. I’d especially like to hear how Matt would bootstrap the fasloader. 

--Tim

> On Dec 30, 2023, at 15:31, Ron Garret <ron at flownet.com> wrote:
> 
> The limiting factor is the plan, not the funding.  If we had a plan, getting the funding would be much easier.
> 
> The problem is that there are only two people on earth who have actually done a CCL port, and a handful of others who are reputed to know how, but none of these people are actually available.  So we have people who know what to do but don't have the time, and people who have the time but don't know what to do.  We need to fix that problem first.
> 
> (I take some responsibility for this.  I could have asked Gary to document the process, or walk me through it, back in the day when he did the Rad6000 port, but I was young and foolish.  Lesson learned.  This is one of the reasons I really want to get all this knowledge written down.  There is far too much value here to continue to entrust it all to mere mortals.)
> 
> rg
> 
>> On Dec 30, 2023, at 5:42 AM, Gail Zacharias <gz at clozure.com> wrote:
>> 
>> I'm willing to contribute on a milestone-based plan.
>> 
>>>> On Dec 28, 2023, at 12:46 PM, Gilbert Baumann <gilbert at bauhh.de> wrote:
>>> 
>>> Hello,
>>> 
>>> I have a brilliant hacker at hand who is motivated, well-qualified, and
>>> available to do the M1 port of CCL. She is an expert with garbage collectors
>>> and well-versed in runtime and compiler design. I am personally happy to
>>> contribute both time and a considerable chunk of the needed funding.
>>> 
>>> However, I ask for additional funds.
>>> 
>>> Some already have mentioned here that they would contribute. We can take
>>> rme's mentioned three month as an estimate of the needed work.
>>> 
>>> So please raise your hand if you're interested or send me a personal message
>>> by mail. Or catch me as gilberth on libera.chat, if you're on IRC. I'd like
>>> to coordinate this joined effort.
>>> 
>>> I hope that together we could pull this off and keep CCL alive and kicking
>>> on the Apple platform.
>>> 
>>> --
>>> Gilbert.
>>> 
> 
> 
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