[LLVMdev] Predication on SIMD architectures and LLVM

[Marcello Maggioni]

Hi Ralf,

yeah, I've checked if on the list there were any kind of reference to 
that , but I only found scattered and incomplete information (maybe some 
good stuff is there, but very well hidden, I will try to check again by 
the way).

About your work on predication, I know of your IR-level if-conversion 
and vectorization and a lot of my knowledge on the matter actually comes 
from your talk in the last Euro-LLVM conference in London, so thanks for 
that! Also thank you for your availability on discussing the matter!

Marcello

On 10/19/2012 5:24 PM, Ralf Karrenberg wrote:
> Hi Marcello,
>
> I am sure I've seen some postings on the list concerning architectures 
> that support predicated execution and how to map that to LLVM IR, I'm 
> just not sure anymore when and who was involved :).
>
> I have implemented your first suggestion for targets that do not have 
> predicated instructions (where control flow to data flow conversion 
> with explicit maintaining of masks and blend operations is the only 
> option you have for SIMD vectorization). However, I agree with you 
> that this is not a good solution for you since you would basically 
> ignore one of the strengths of your platform. Should you still need 
> some code or help with this, feel free to drop me a message.
>
> Cheers,
> Ralf
>
> On 19.10.2012 17:38, Marcello Maggioni wrote:
>> Hello,
>> I'm working on a compiler based on LLVM for a SIMD architecture that
>> supports instruction predication. We would like to implement branching
>> on this architecture using predication.
>> As you know the LLVM-IR doesn't support instruction predication, so I'm
>> not exactly sure on what is the best way to implement it.
>> We came up with some ways to do it in LLVM:
>>
>> - Do not add any predication in the IR (except for load and stores
>> through intrinsics), linearize the branches and substitute PHI nodes
>> with selects for merging values . In the backend then we would custom
>> lower the select instruction to produce a predicated mov to choose the
>> right version of the value. I think this option doesn't make use of the
>> possible benefits of the architecture we are targeting at all.
>>
>> - Another way could be adding intrinsics for all instructions in the
>> target to make them support predication, still linearize all the
>> branches, but use instruction predication instead of generating cmovs .
>> The backend then would custom lower almost any instruction into
>> predicated custom nodes that are matched through tablegen patterns. We
>> could generate these intrinsics in the same IR pass that linearizes
>> branches.
>>
>> - Make a custom backend that actually directly outputs predicated
>> instructions (we really mainly only need one type of predicate , so
>> every instruction could use that kind of predicate ...) but I think this
>> is a nasty solution ...
>>
>> Did someone already tried to do this in LLVM and if yes what solution/s
>> did you use to solve the problem?
>>
>> Regards,
>> Marcello
>>

-- 
Marcello Maggioni
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