binary metadata

[Jakob Praher <jpraher at yahoo dot de>]

hi all,

I think I've heard that you are going to replace the generated class
file (currently as a generated c++ class) by binary metadata placed into
the object file. ( perhaps a .meta elf section ... )

Do you have already plans/specifications for the meta data?
Will the meta data spec be tied to java type system or is it generic
enough for any kind of meta data?
I am interested in that, since I am playing a little bit with a language
called D too, where such a meta data spec could be handy. (they don't
have a separation of header/implementation like c/c++ and thus it would
be interesting to put the metadata into the object files, so that you
can compile without the need of source/external type information)

Perhaps the oberon people have some interesting specs in this regard,
since they also support this kind of compilation. But afaik they simply
export the symbol table produced by the compiler, which is not the thing
I wanted.

thanks in advance
-- Jakob