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# IRC, freenode, #hurd, 2012-07-20

    <braunr> for the curious, genode has a very interesting way to provide IPC
    <braunr> i think they're on the right path at least (synchronous rpc,
      shared memory, signals, no IDL)
    <braunr> (i just don't like their choosing C++ at the system core)
    <kilobug> braunr: hum, how do you write the rpc if there is no IDL ?
    <kilobug> braunr: in a dynamic language like Python or Ruby, you can have
      "transparent" RPC with no IDL, but in a language like C or C++ ?
    <kilobug> when you call them I mean
    <braunr> kilobug: they call this dynamic marshalling based on C++ streams
    <braunr> http://genode-labs.com/publications/dynrpc-2007.pdf
    <kilobug> sounds quite ugly to use :s but that may because I'm not fond of
      C++ itself ;)
    <braunr> same for me
    <braunr> they say inheritance in RPC interfaces is "a must"
    <braunr> makes me skeptical
    <braunr> other than that, it's very promising
    <kilobug> from the caller side, having the RPC appearing to be normal
      function calls (like you do with Mig or Corba) is quite pleasant, even if
      writing IDL is burdersome, you write IDL only once while calling RPC is
      done very often
    <braunr> oh but they have that as well
    <braunr> there is just an additional, thin layer of hand written code to
      provide that
    <kilobug> ok
    <braunr> basically, interfaces are C++ virtual classes, which are then
      inherited in client and server classes
    <braunr> (although they're changing that with recursive templates)
    <braunr> but i really like to idea of not relying on an IDL
    <kilobug> recursive templates :s
    <braunr> yeah :>
    <braunr> must be some tricky code, but i guess once it's there, it must be
      practical
    <braunr> see
      http://genode.org/documentation/release-notes/11.05#New_API_for_type-safe_inter-process_communication
    <braunr> they also added typed capabilities, but i don't really like that
      idea
    <antrik> braunr: shared memory for what?
    <braunr> antrik: for uh.. sharing ? :)
    <braunr> antrik: these systems don't provide ipc primitives able to share
      memory directly
    <braunr> messages are always copied (although zero copy can be used)
    <braunr> so sharing must be done separately
    <antrik> hm... I realise that I have no idea how the map operation in L4 is
      actually done...
    <braunr> iirc, privileged threads handle that
    <antrik> I guess you have to explicitly map before an RPC and revoke
      afterwards, which is some overhead...
    <braunr> so i guess it's separated as well
    <braunr> i have one question in mind for now, maybe you can help me with
      that :

[[open_issues/synchronous_ipc]].