Hacker News
When Compilers Disagree About UTF‑8
40 points by rbanffy
ago
|
6 comments
MiroslavPokorny
|next
[-]
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
|previous
[-]
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
|root
|parent
|next
[-]
> 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.
vlovich123
|root
|parent
|next
|previous
[-]
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.
zX41ZdbW
|root
|parent
|previous
[-]
This is one of the optimizations from ClickHouse - detect ASCII and go a fast path: https://github.com/ClickHouse/ClickHouse/blob/6cde32de1a2463...