[cfe-dev] Targeting Clang?

[Douglas Gregor]

Hello Rick,

On Nov 13, 2009, at 10:22 AM, Rick R wrote:
> I am considering writing a LLVM back end for Scala. A major goal of  
> mine is interoperability with C (and perhaps C++)
> Would it make sense to try to leverage parts of Clang for this  
> purpose?
> Is there an intermediate language for c/c++/objc that languages are  
> compiled into before being compiled to LLVM?

There is no intermediate language in Clang. Clang builds its own  
abstract syntax trees, which are *very* specific to C/C++/Objective-C,  
and lowers them directly to LLVM IR.

> That would be optimal. If that's not possible, are there parts of  
> clang that are recommended for use with other languages?

Parts of Clang's "Basic" library, such as the source manager, file  
manager, and diagnostics engine, would be useful for building another  
front end. Everything else is very specific to the C family of  
languages.

	- Doug