[LLVMdev] Greedy Register Allocation in LLVM 3.0

[John McCall]

On Sep 27, 2011, at 12:11 AM, Leo Romanoff wrote:
> It is true that names are not always reflecting the essense. But on the other hand, there is a lot of ongoing research on register allocation (and compilers in general) and it looks like more and more such efforts choose LLVM as a platform for experimentation. Quite some results and comparisons are published. So, it would be nice to have a somewhat concrete (but may be not ideal) name for the LLVM allocator rather than "LLVM register allocator".  In a few years, there may be another, even better register alloctor for LLVM. If it will be called "LLVM register allocator" again, it would lead to a lot of misunderstandings when reading descriptions and papers. The typical question then will be "Which LLVM register allocator  was meant?"  ;-)

I suppose you could call it the Tricky Jakob allocator. :)

John.