[LLVMdev] LLVM as a DLL

[Michael T. Richter]

On Sat, 2008-05-10 at 19:42 +1000, kr512 wrote:

> On that page, you can see that sqlite.org provides a 
> precompiled sqlite DLL for MS Windows.  That is great, 
> because it means that a developer can simply grab the 
> compiled DLL, and start using it, incorporating it into 
> their project, without having to go through all of the 
> difficulty of compiling SQLite (or LLVM) themselves, and 
> without having to make their program awkwardly invoke the 
> LLVM command-line tools.


Apparently the APIs in the LLVM docs missed your attention.  They're
sneaky that way because, you know, they just form the bulk of available
documentation.

The command-line tools are convenience wrappers around the APIs, not the
other way around.


> Furthermore, an LLVM DLL should go "all the way".   Your 
> "llc" tool is supposed to be a back-end tool, but it is more 
> like an almost-back-end tool, because it generates assembly 
> language to a text file, rather than a native code 
> executable program file.



I'm sure the LLVM lead (Chris, was it?) will gratefully accept any such
functioning, tested code you can supply that generates the native object
format you prefer.  This is, after all, how open source projects work
for the most part.


> So we need a precompiled LLVM DLL that can be invoked, 
> passing in LLVM bytecode, and it should generate a native 
> code ready-to-execute MS Windows .EXE or .DLL file.   This 
> would make it more practical to use in a real-world 
> situation.


So... here's a thought.  Why don't you do that one-time work and host
the compiled package up on a web page somewhere as a service to this
open source community that will so eagerly embrace it?  You will
certainly not be criticized for it and will likely instead have your
name sung to the heavens by the myriad of Windows developers who've
wanted to use LLVM but haven't had the opportunity because of the
barrier of source code distribution.


> GCC needs to be cut out of the back-end picture.  Currently, 
> it is impossible to use LLVM as a back-end without GCC 
> because GCC is still required to convert the assembly 
> language .S text file into a native machine code .EXE or 
> .DLL file.


So... your world doesn't include "gas" or "nasm" or any other such
assembler?  You know.  The "gas" that GCC itself uses to assemble the .S
files?  The "nasm" that's freely available on a bewildering variety of
native platforms?  That's a mighty strange world to be living in,
pardner.


> A back-end that is totally free of GCC is needed.


Again I'm sure that Chris (?) will gladly accept any functioning, tested
source that implements this tossed into the pot that is the open source
project LLVM.

-- 
Michael T. Richter <ttmrichter at gmail.com> (GoogleTalk:
ttmrichter at gmail.com)
So much of what we call management consists in making it difficult for
people to work. (Peter Drucker)
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