If you were to add some parallel language constructs to Python or Ruby or <insert your favourite language>, what would you add?
Lets assume you are only allowed to add 1 or 2 constructs so you dont go changing the whole language upside-down. Also assume that you are not allowed to take something out of the language only add to it.
Please describe in detail with actual examples if possible. Dont just say "I will add actors" at a very high level.
Keep in mind that Python 2.6 already has the new multiprocessing package, which presents a simple interface for multiprocess computation.<p>I'd like to poke around with Python's compiler module and look at the AST--you could enforce that a certain class of functions have no side effects, and then spawn multiple processes to execute them semi magically.<p>Futures like the ones in IO (<a href="http://www.iolanguage.com/scm/git/checkout/Io/docs/IoGuide.html#Concurrency-Futures" rel="nofollow">http://www.iolanguage.com/scm/git/checkout/Io/docs/IoGuide.h...</a>) always struck me as a pretty cool way to abstract away synchronization problems. Using the multiprocess stuff as a background would be fun.
One change to ruby that would be useful, would be to make Enumerable.collect run in parallel.<p>There's probably a whole bunch of other Enumerable methods that could be made to run in parallel as well.
If you use Coro with Perl, you can say something like:<p><pre><code> async {
do_something;
cede;
do_something;
}
do_something_else;
cede;
</code></pre>
See <a href="http://search.cpan.org/dist/Coro/Coro.pm" rel="nofollow">http://search.cpan.org/dist/Coro/Coro.pm</a> for more information.<p>[Edit: If you want to see a continuation-based web framework built with Coro, look at Continuity: <a href="http://search.cpan.org/~awwaiid/Continuity-0.994/lib/Continuity.pm" rel="nofollow">http://search.cpan.org/~awwaiid/Continuity-0.994/lib/Continu...</a><p>It's very cool.]
Hello randomhack,<p>Have you heard of Stackless Python? That might be what you are looking for. <a href="http://www.stackless.com/" rel="nofollow">http://www.stackless.com/</a>
Haven't you heard about the egregious buffer overflow vulnerabilities found recently in Ruby? Not a good idea to use it for anything serious in light of those, IMO.