[LLVMdev] Making GEP into vector illegal?

[Mon Ping Wang]

Hi,

I ran into a case where ScalarReplAggregates can not promote an array  
of vectors into registers, e..g,
   	%a = alloca [8 x <2 x float>], align 8
         %arrayidx74597 = getelementptr [8 x <2 x float>]* %a, i32 0,  
i32 1, i32 0		; <float*> [#uses=2]
	%tmp76 = load float* %arrayidx74597, align 8
         %arrayidx74598 = getelementptr [8 x <2 x float>]* %a, i32 0,  
i32 1, i32 1		; <float*> [#uses=2]
	%tmp77 = load float* %arrayidx74598, align 4

Though we could change the algorithm to look through the vector index,  
it lead to an interesting question about if we should allow a  
getelementptr (GEP) into a vector.

A vector is not like an short array of elements.  It is more of an  
entity in itself.  When dealing with vectors, it seems to me that it  
is  cleaner to think of them as an entity and GEP to the vector and  
then use extract element to access the element of the vector instead  
of using a GEP to get a pointer into a vector and loading it  
directly.  If a client wants to do this, it would seem cleaner to  
force the client to bitcast it to an array and then do a GEP to the  
element.  This would it more similar to what clients have to do to get  
to a pointer to a byte in a word today.  For ScalarReplAggr, we would  
want to promote the vector itself and not to treat it as promoting the  
float elements.

I would like to make it illegal to GEP into a vector as I think it is  
cleaner and more consistent.  Opinions?  Comments?

   -- Mon Ping