• "Essien Ita Essien" <essiene gmail.com> Dec 06 2004
• Thomas Kuehne <thomas-dloop kuehne.thisisspam.cn> Dec 07 2004
• Ilya Minkov <minkov cs.tum.edu> Dec 08 2004

Can i use D to write a Linux Kernel MOdule?

If yes, any ideas on how to proceed?

If not why?

I seem to understand (from what i've been seeing around), that D, is closer 
to C than C++ and that its closer to the machine too than C++, so i'm 
wondering, can D, go where no C++ has gone before? 

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Essien Ita Essien schrieb am Tue, 7 Dec 2004 04:12:46 +0100:
 Can i use D to write a Linux Kernel MOdule?

 If yes, any ideas on how to proceed?

 If not why?

 I seem to understand (from what i've been seeing around), that D, is closer 
 to C than C++ and that its closer to the machine too than C++, so i'm 
 wondering, can D, go where no C++ has gone before? 


The only potential problem that spring to mind is GC.

I know too little about the memory management of LKMs to provide any
decisive answer. 

The next version of gdc is rumored to have a standalone GC implementation...

Thomas

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Essien Ita Essien schrieb:
 Can i use D to write a Linux Kernel MOdule?


Perhaps, but i don't think it's a good idea.

 If yes, any ideas on how to proceed?
 
 If not why?


I just don't think it may make sense. :)

If you don't get a garbage collector working, you loose almost every 
other feature of D. Besides, i don't know the exact implications, but i 
would tend to strictly limit memory usage in a kernel unit, which pretty 
much rules out the usage of Phobos (the D standard library) because it 
uses copy-on-write convention.

 I seem to understand (from what i've been seeing around), that D, is closer 
 to C than C++ and that its closer to the machine too than C++, so i'm 
 wondering, can D, go where no C++ has gone before? 


C++ is an exact superset of C (minus one or two purely syntactic and not 
notable exceptions), and is in principle much more flexible than D. 
There are a few areas where D has potential to beat C++, and these would 
mostly lie when writing large and complex software, and lie mostly in 
manageability, but may also touch large-scale optimization.

If you consider usual programming style, than some areas, like array 
handling, are made in D more transparent and machine-near than usually 
done in C++ with STL. However i would hesitate to make a general 
conclusion from that, because there many examples to the opposite, and 
C++ by itself doesn't force you to use STL.

-eye