Simple Meta Object Programming / Simple Matter Of Programming

SMOP is an alternative implementation of a C engine to run Perl 6. It is focused in getting the most pragmatic approach possible, but still focusing in being able to support all Perl 6 features. Its core resembles Perl 5 in some ways, and it differs from Parrot in many ways, including the fact that SMOP is not a Virtual Machine. SMOP is simply a runtime engine that happens to have a interpreter run loop.

Important topics on SMOP

SMOP doesn't recurse in the C stack, and it doesn't actually define a mandatory paradigm (stack-based or register-based). SMOP has a Polymorphic Eval, that allows you to switch from one interpreter loop to another using Continuation Passing Style. See SMOP Stackless.
SMOP doesn't define a object system in its own. The only thing it defines is the concept of SMOP Responder Interface, which then encapsulates whatever object system. This feature is fundamental to implement the SMOP Native Types.
SMOP is intended to bootstrap itself from the low-level to the high-level. This is achieved by the fact that everything in SMOP is an Object. This way, even the low-level objects can be exposed to the high level runtime. See SMOP OO Bootstrap.
SMOP won't implement a parser in its own, it will use KindaPerl6 parser or whatever parser gets ported to its runtime first.
SMOP defines two [Domain Specific Language]s for low-level aid:

SMOP sm0p Language: A small macro language that builds node for the Default SMOP Interpreter Implementation in C.
SMOP s1p Language: (read "swamp") A language to help building the high-level built in types, but still translatable to C.

In order to enable the bootstrap, the runtime have a set of SMOP Constant Identifiers that are available for the sub-language compilers to use.
There are some special SMOP Values Not Subject to Garbage Collection.

Other matters

The array and hash autovivification is discussed in SMOP Autovivification.
SMOP Boot Sequence.
SMOP REFERENCE and RELEASE Policy.
SMOP Inter Continuation Communication.
SMOP Interpreter Implementation API.
SMOP Run Loop.

SMOP Development ROADMAP

In order to keep this simple, the ROADMAP will stay here and will be edited as needed.

sm0p - Lame Default SMOP Interpreter Implementation

0.1.2 - SMOP SLIME prototypes and lowlevel operators
0.1.3 - sm0p preprocessor

S1P - Read it "Swamp"

0.2.0 - Signature type (lowlevel implementation)0.1.1.3 - Code type (lowlevel implementation)
0.2.1 - Sub type (lowlevel implementation)
0.2.2 - Multi Sub type (definition)
0.2.3 - multi sub infix:<~~> ( Signature, Capture )
0.2.4 - Multi Sub (lowlevel implementation)
0.2.5 - Some operators (the ones kp6 uses?)
0.2.6 - int type (lowlevel implementation)
0.2.7 - bytes type (lowlevel byte buffer)
0.2.8 - multi sub infix:<~~> ( IdentifierNameConstant, IdentifierNameConstant )
0.2.9 - multi sub say ( bytes )
0.2.10 - An equivalent to: say 'Hello World';
0.2.11 - S1P language

Completing SMOP runtime

0.3.0 - SMOP NATIVE prototypes and lowlevel operators
0.3.1 - Undef builtin types.
0.3.2 - Immutable builtin types.
0.3.3 - Mutable builtin types.
0.3.4 - Lexical Scope / Namespaces.

Perl 6 SMOP

0.4.0 - AST types.
0.4.1 - AST -> Stack runtime transformation (real interpreter)
0.4.2 - KP6 backend
0.4.3 - KP6 can compile grammars to SMOP
0.5.0 - KP6 grammar compiled
0.9.0 - KP6 bootstrapped in SMOP
1.0.0 - STD ported to SMOP

Other Features

x.x.x - perl5 embedded - libperl
x.x.x - parrot embedded - libparrot
x.x.x - python embedded (stackless python?)
x.x.x - jvm embedded - libgcj
x.x.x - spidermonkey embedded - libmoz-js

SMOP Changelog

Usually, things from ROADMAP should come to here when its done.

2008-01-23 - Daniel Ruoso

x.x.x - native bool type

2008-01-21 - Daniel Ruoso

0.1.1 - Capture type (lowlevel implementation)

2008-01-18 - Daniel Ruoso

0.1.0 - Port YAP6__CORE__Value code to SMOP__Object code.
0.x.x.x - "Identifier Name Constant" type and the definition of the pool of constants.