[Python-Dev] Google Summer of Code proposal: improvement of long int and adding new types/modules. (original) (raw)

Alex Martelli aleaxit at gmail.com
Fri Apr 21 19:37:01 CEST 2006

On 4/21/06, Mateusz Rukowicz <mateusz.rukowicz at vp.pl> wrote: ...

So I think the most valuable of my ideas would be improving long int + coding decimal in C. Anyway, I think it would be possible to add other ideas later.

I see "redo Decimal in C" (possibly with the addition of some fast elementary transcendentals) and "enhance operations on longs" (multiplication first and foremost, and base-conversions probably next, as you suggested -- possibly with the addition of some fast number-theoretical functions) as two separate projects, each of just about the right magnitude for an SoC project. I would be glad to mentor either (not both); my preference would be for the former -- it appears to me that attempting to do both together might negatively impact both. Remember, it isn't just the coding...: thorough testing, good docs, accurate performance measurements on a variety of platforms, ..., are all important part of a project that, assuming success, it's scheduled to become a core part of Python 2.6, after all.

Alex

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