View source for Tamarin:WeeklyUpdates/Announcement

To: dev-tech-js-engine at lists.mozilla.org

Subject: Call for volunteers

The Tamarin project is looking for volunteers.    Tamarin is the open source, JIT’ing JavaScript (aka, ActionScript, ECMAScript) virtual machine currently used by the Flash Player 9.  The open-source Tamarin 2.0 virtual machine will add support for JavaScript 2 (ECMAScript 262 Edition 4), be integrated in SpiderMonkey for use in Mozilla 2,  and shipped in the next version of Flash Player. 

How can you help?  Join us for the Tamarin kick-off meeting  on Tuesday, August 7 at 21:00 GMT (2:00 US PT, 5:00 US ET -- meeting details below) to help shape our plans and see where you can contribute.  

Here are the topics  we’ll be discussing at the kickoff meeting:

JavaScript 2 features –This is an ideal time to start development of JavaScript 2 features.   The proposed feature set is already stable and will be frozen in the next month or so, to be followed by a period of specification writing and public review.  Developing real-world implementations in parallel with the specification production will help ensure the language is implementable and well defined.  The high-level schedule for completing the  ES4 specification is: freezing the feature set in Sept, converting the feature proposals into a language specification during the next 6 months, releasing a specification ‘beta’ in mid-Spring, and finalizing the spec by Oct ’08.  The specification will then be ready for a vote by Ecma before EOY 2008.  

We’ll discuss prioritizing the development of the JS2 features based on how fundamental they are to the core VM architecture, how likely the feature is to not change, and whether the feature is supported already in either ActionScript 3 or JavaScript 1.7.

More information on ECMAScript can be found at the Ecma TC-39/TG-1 working group portal (http://www.ecmascript.org/) .  This site contains pointers to the ES4 proposed features, a downloadable alpha-quality ES4 reference interpreter, and pointers to the in-progress specification. 

Self-hosting ECMAScript compiler (esc) – an ECMAScript compiler written in ECMAScript.   This project is working towards having an incomplete but  self-compiling ES4 compiler in the next two months.

Also, there are 3 new Tamarin projects announced by Brendan a couple weeks ago:

ActionMonkey – code-name for the project to integrate Tamarin and SpiderMonkey as part of Mozilla 2.  You can find some details at http://wiki.mozilla.org/JavaScript:ActionMonkey.  

IronMonkey - This project is developing a mapping of IronPython and IronRuby to Tamarin. The project page is   http://wiki.mozilla.org/Tamarin:IronMonkey.  


ScreamingMonkey – A project to add script engine integration to Tamarin so it can support JavaScript 2 in other browsers.  The first browser targeted will be IE.  More details available at http://wiki.mozilla.org/Tamarin:ScreamingMonkey.

The kick-off Tamarin engineering meeting will be on Tuesday, August 7 at 21:00 GMT.   This time maps to:
2:00 PM       Mtn View, USA 
5:00 PM       Boston, USA
11:00 PM    Oslo, Norway
6:00 AM     Korea (next day)
7:00 AM     Melbourne, Australia (next day)

There’s a stated preference for the weekly Tamarin meeting to happen on Tuesdays but let’s discuss at the first meeting if other days/times that are better.

The dial-in for the meeting is:
	Meeting ID:  8262746 (TAMARIN)
Local: 408-536-9900
International: +1-408-536-9900
Toll-Free(US & Canada): 877-220-5439
	Duration: 60 minutes



Please email me (dansmith at adobe.com) if you have questions.

Cheers, Dan