Mixins and compile-time coding

[janderson]

janderson wrote:
> Walter Bright wrote:
>> janderson wrote:
>>> Here's a suggestion that I actually sent a couple of of years ago 
>>> that actually make sense now with the new mixin stuff.  What if you 
>>> could plugin dlls into DMD that would be run at compile time.  The 
>>> requirement of use would be that the input parameters would be constant.
>>
>> The main problem with this is the malware author who puts some source 
>> code up, and when you try to compile it, it would install a rootkit.
> 
> Good point.  What about the static version.  ie
> 
> //This would be compiled on the fly. It could be put into its own object 
> file so it doesn't need to be re-built everytime.
> mixin char[] stateMachine(char[] input)
> {
>  ...
> }
> 
> void main()
> {
>     stateMachine("ect...");
> }
> 
> or
> 
> plugin char[] stateMachine(char[] input)
> {
>  ...
> }
> 
> void main()
> {
>      mixin(stateMachine("ect..."));
> }
> 
> or
> 
> char[] stateMachine(char[] input)
> {
>  ...
> }
> 
> void main()
> {
>      mixin(plugin stateMachine("ect..."));
> }
> 
> 
> Something like that.
> 
> 
> I guess malware may still be possible, but you can do that with unit 
> tests now.  Essentially these are not much more then unit tests.
> 
> -Joel

Actually you could go one step better with this.  No calls to functions 
outside of D.  That way you'd have access to all of D's 
string/int/float/array operations but you wouldn't be able to make 
systems calls at all.   You could also disabled asm calls if you wanted 
to get really restrictive although I don't see that as necessary.

The only way you'd be able to hack the system is to do some sort of 
funky memory accessing.

-JOel