When Compilers Disagree About UTF‑8

44 pointsposted 7 days ago
by rbanffy

7 Comments

MiroslavPokorny

2 days ago

Title is misleading, the compilers do not disagree, running the compiled code produces the same output. The difference is one binary(instructions) are slightly different...

kstenerud

7 days ago

You could actually use SIMD instructions to detect sequences of bytes with the top bit cleared, thus allowing bulk copies of ASCII text without a per-byte loop.

Another optimization would be to take advantage of the fact that codepoint usage tends to cluster around the language of the text. So if you detect usage of 3-byte encodings, chances are you'll continue encountering only 3-byte encodings, with the odd ASCII or emoji codepoints. This opens up even more state machine possibilities.

duskwuff

2 days ago

> So if you detect usage of 3-byte encodings, chances are you'll continue encountering only 3-byte encodings, with the odd ASCII or emoji codepoints.

Depends on what kind of text you're processing. Many languages use the ASCII range for spaces/newlines, digits, and punctuation.

mort96

2 days ago

That, plus markup, be it something XML/HTML-like or something Markdown-like.

vlovich123

2 days ago

FWIW I believe the second optimization is at odds with the first. It’s really hard to do this kind of conditional historical check in SIMD.

user

2 days ago

[deleted]