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| -rw-r--r-- | system/doc/efficiency_guide/binaryhandling.xml | 81 |
1 files changed, 26 insertions, 55 deletions
diff --git a/system/doc/efficiency_guide/binaryhandling.xml b/system/doc/efficiency_guide/binaryhandling.xml index 0295d18644..91fd9a7cd9 100644 --- a/system/doc/efficiency_guide/binaryhandling.xml +++ b/system/doc/efficiency_guide/binaryhandling.xml @@ -32,12 +32,9 @@ <file>binaryhandling.xml</file> </header> - <p>In R12B, the most natural way to construct and match binaries is - significantly faster than in earlier releases.</p> + <p>Binaries can be efficiently built in the following way:</p> - <p>To construct a binary, you can simply write as follows:</p> - - <p><em>DO</em> (in R12B) / <em>REALLY DO NOT</em> (in earlier releases)</p> + <p><em>DO</em></p> <code type="erl"><![CDATA[ my_list_to_binary(List) -> my_list_to_binary(List, <<>>). @@ -47,21 +44,13 @@ my_list_to_binary([H|T], Acc) -> my_list_to_binary([], Acc) -> Acc.]]></code> - <p>In releases before R12B, <c>Acc</c> is copied in every iteration. - In R12B, <c>Acc</c> is copied only in the first iteration and extra - space is allocated at the end of the copied binary. In the next iteration, - <c>H</c> is written into the extra space. When the extra space runs out, - the binary is reallocated with more extra space. The extra space allocated - (or reallocated) is twice the size of the - existing binary data, or 256, whichever is larger.</p> - - <p>The most natural way to match binaries is now the fastest:</p> + <p>Binaries can be efficiently matched like this:</p> - <p><em>DO</em> (in R12B)</p> + <p><em>DO</em></p> <code type="erl"><![CDATA[ my_binary_to_list(<<H,T/binary>>) -> [H|my_binary_to_list(T)]; -my_binary_to_list(<<>>) -> [].]]></code> +my_binary_to_list(<<>>) -> [].]]></code> <section> <title>How Binaries are Implemented</title> @@ -138,10 +127,7 @@ my_binary_to_list(<<>>) -> [].]]></code> pointer to the binary data. For each field that is matched out of a binary, the position in the match context is incremented.</p> - <p>In R11B, a match context was only used during a binary matching - operation.</p> - - <p>In R12B, the compiler tries to avoid generating code that + <p>The compiler tries to avoid generating code that creates a sub binary, only to shortly afterwards create a new match context and discard the sub binary. Instead of creating a sub binary, the match context is kept.</p> @@ -155,7 +141,7 @@ my_binary_to_list(<<>>) -> [].]]></code> <section> <title>Constructing Binaries</title> - <p>In R12B, appending to a binary or bitstring + <p>Appending to a binary or bitstring is specially optimized by the <em>runtime system</em>:</p> <code type="erl"><![CDATA[ @@ -292,7 +278,7 @@ Bin = <<Bin1,...>> %% Bin1 will be COPIED <p>Let us revisit the example in the beginning of the previous section:</p> - <p><em>DO</em> (in R12B)</p> + <p><em>DO</em></p> <code type="erl"><![CDATA[ my_binary_to_list(<<H,T/binary>>) -> [H|my_binary_to_list(T)]; @@ -304,15 +290,14 @@ my_binary_to_list(<<>>) -> [].]]></code> byte of the binary. 1 byte is matched out and the match context is updated to point to the second byte in the binary.</p> - <p>In R11B, at this point a - <seealso marker="#sub_binary">sub binary</seealso> - would be created. In R12B, - the compiler sees that there is no point in creating a sub binary, - because there will soon be a call to a function (in this case, + <p>At this point it would make sense to create a + <seealso marker="#sub_binary">sub binary</seealso>, + but in this particular example the compiler sees that + there will soon be a call to a function (in this case, to <c>my_binary_to_list/1</c> itself) that immediately will create a new match context and discard the sub binary.</p> - <p>Therefore, in R12B, <c>my_binary_to_list/1</c> calls itself + <p>Therefore <c>my_binary_to_list/1</c> calls itself with the match context instead of with a sub binary. The instruction that initializes the matching operation basically does nothing when it sees that it was passed a match context instead of a binary.</p> @@ -321,34 +306,10 @@ my_binary_to_list(<<>>) -> [].]]></code> the match context will simply be discarded (removed in the next garbage collection, as there is no longer any reference to it).</p> - <p>To summarize, <c>my_binary_to_list/1</c> in R12B only needs to create - <em>one</em> match context and no sub binaries. In R11B, if the binary - contains <em>N</em> bytes, <em>N+1</em> match contexts and <em>N</em> - sub binaries are created.</p> - - <p>In R11B, the fastest way to match binaries is as follows:</p> + <p>To summarize, <c>my_binary_to_list/1</c> only needs to create + <em>one</em> match context and no sub binaries.</p> - <p><em>DO NOT</em> (in R12B)</p> - <code type="erl"><![CDATA[ -my_complicated_binary_to_list(Bin) -> - my_complicated_binary_to_list(Bin, 0). - -my_complicated_binary_to_list(Bin, Skip) -> - case Bin of - <<_:Skip/binary,Byte,_/binary>> -> - [Byte|my_complicated_binary_to_list(Bin, Skip+1)]; - <<_:Skip/binary>> -> - [] - end.]]></code> - - <p>This function cleverly avoids building sub binaries, but it cannot - avoid building a match context in each recursion step. - Therefore, in both R11B and R12B, - <c>my_complicated_binary_to_list/1</c> builds <em>N+1</em> match - contexts. (In a future Erlang/OTP release, the compiler might be able - to generate code that reuses the match context.)</p> - - <p>Returning to <c>my_binary_to_list/1</c>, notice that the match context + <p>Notice that the match context in <c>my_binary_to_list/1</c> was discarded when the entire binary had been traversed. What happens if the iteration stops before it has reached the end of the binary? Will the optimization still work?</p> @@ -544,5 +505,15 @@ count3(<<>>, Count) -> Count.]]></code> not matched out.</p> </section> </section> + + <section> + <title>Historical Note</title> + + <p>Binary handling was significantly improved in R12B. Because + code that was efficient in R11B might not be efficient in R12B, + and vice versa, earlier revisions of this Efficiency Guide contained + some information about binary handling in R11B.</p> + </section> + </chapter> |