[转]Trampoline style programming

原文：http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trampoline_(computing)

High-level programming[edit]

• Used in some Lisp implementations, a trampoline is a loop that iteratively invokes thunk-returning functions (continuation-passing style). A single trampoline is sufficient to express all control transfers of a program; a program so expressed is trampolined, or in trampolined style; converting a program to trampolined style is trampolining. Trampolined functions can be used to implement tail-recursive function calls in stack-oriented programming languages.^[1]
• In Java, trampoline refers to using reflection to avoid using inner classes, for example in event listeners. The time overhead of a reflection call is traded for the space overhead of an inner class. Trampolines in Java usually involve the creation of a GenericListener to pass events to an outer class.^[2]

 

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原文：http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tail_call#Through_trampolining

Through trampolining[edit]

However, since many Scheme compilers use C as an intermediate target code, the problem comes down to coding tail recursion in C without growing the stack, even if the back-end compiler does not optimize tail calls. Many implementations achieve this by using a device known as a trampoline, a piece of code that repeatedly calls functions. All functions are entered via the trampoline. When a function has to call another, instead of calling it directly it returns the address of the function to be called, the arguments to be used, and so on, to the trampoline. This ensures that the C stack does not grow and iteration can continue indefinitely.

It is possible to implement trampolining using higher-order functions in languages that support them, such as Groovy, Visual Basic .NET and C#.^[12]

Using a trampoline for all function calls is rather more expensive than the normal C function call, so at least one Scheme compiler, Chicken, uses a technique first described by Henry Baker from an unpublished suggestion by Andrew Appel,^[13] in which normal C calls are used but the stack size is checked before every call. When the stack reaches its maximum permitted size, objects on the stack are garbage-collected using the Cheney algorithm by moving all live data into a separate heap. Following this, the stack is unwound ("popped") and the program resumes from the state saved just before the garbage collection. Baker says "Appel's method avoids making a large number of small trampoline bounces by occasionally jumping off the Empire State Building."^[13] The garbage collection ensures that mutual tail recursion can continue indefinitely. However, this approach requires that no C function call ever returns, since there is no guarantee that its caller's stack frame still exists; therefore, it involves a much more dramatic internal rewriting of the program code: continuation-passing style.

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原文：http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Continuation-passing_style

Continuation passing style can be used to implement continuations and control flow operators in a functional language that does not feature first-class continuations but does have first-class functions and tail-call optimization. Without tail-call optimization, techniques such as trampolining, i.e. using a loop that iteratively invokes thunk-returning functions, can be used; without first-class functions, it is even possible to convert tail calls into just gotos in such a loop.

Writing code in CPS, while not impossible, is often error-prone. There are various translations, usually defined as one- or two-pass conversions of pure lambda calculus, which convert direct style expressions into CPS expressions. Writing in trampolined style, however, is extremely difficult; when used, it is usually the target of some sort of transformation, such as compilation.