<head>
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8">
<link rel="stylesheet" href="llvm.css" type="text/css">
- <title>LLVM 2.8 Release Notes</title>
+ <title>LLVM 3.0 Release Notes</title>
</head>
<body>
-<div class="doc_title">LLVM 2.8 Release Notes</div>
+<h1>LLVM 3.0 Release Notes</h1>
<img align=right src="http://llvm.org/img/DragonSmall.png"
width="136" height="136" alt="LLVM Dragon Logo">
<ol>
<li><a href="#intro">Introduction</a></li>
<li><a href="#subproj">Sub-project Status Update</a></li>
- <li><a href="#externalproj">External Projects Using LLVM 2.8</a></li>
- <li><a href="#whatsnew">What's New in LLVM 2.8?</a></li>
+ <li><a href="#externalproj">External Projects Using LLVM 3.0</a></li>
+ <li><a href="#whatsnew">What's New in LLVM 3.0?</a></li>
<li><a href="GettingStarted.html">Installation Instructions</a></li>
- <li><a href="#portability">Portability and Supported Platforms</a></li>
<li><a href="#knownproblems">Known Problems</a></li>
<li><a href="#additionalinfo">Additional Information</a></li>
</ol>
<div class="doc_author">
- <p>Written by the <a href="http://llvm.org">LLVM Team</a></p>
+ <p>Written by the <a href="http://llvm.org/">LLVM Team</a></p>
</div>
-<h1 style="color:red">These are in-progress notes for the upcoming LLVM 2.8
+<!--
+<h1 style="color:red">These are in-progress notes for the upcoming LLVM 3.0
release.<br>
You may prefer the
-<a href="http://llvm.org/releases/2.7/docs/ReleaseNotes.html">LLVM 2.7
+<a href="http://llvm.org/releases/2.9/docs/ReleaseNotes.html">LLVM 2.9
Release Notes</a>.</h1>
+ -->
<!-- *********************************************************************** -->
-<div class="doc_section">
+<h2>
<a name="intro">Introduction</a>
-</div>
+</h2>
<!-- *********************************************************************** -->
-<div class="doc_text">
+<div>
<p>This document contains the release notes for the LLVM Compiler
-Infrastructure, release 2.8. Here we describe the status of LLVM, including
+Infrastructure, release 3.0. Here we describe the status of LLVM, including
major improvements from the previous release and significant known problems.
All LLVM releases may be downloaded from the <a
href="http://llvm.org/releases/">LLVM releases web site</a>.</p>
<a href="http://llvm.org/releases/">releases page</a>.</p>
</div>
-
-
-<!--
-Almost dead code.
- include/llvm/Analysis/LiveValues.h => Dan
- lib/Transforms/IPO/MergeFunctions.cpp => consider for 2.8.
- llvm/Analysis/PointerTracking.h => Edwin wants this, consider for 2.8.
- GEPSplitterPass
--->
-
-<!-- Features that need text if they're finished for 2.8:
+<!-- Features that need text if they're finished for 3.1:
+ ARM EHABI
combiner-aa?
strong phi elim
- llvm.dbg.value: variable debug info for optimized code
loop dependence analysis
- TBAA
+ CorrelatedValuePropagation
+ lib/Transforms/IPO/MergeFunctions.cpp => consider for 3.1.
-->
-
- <!-- for announcement email:
- Logo web page.
- Many new papers added to /pubs/
- -->
-
+
<!-- *********************************************************************** -->
-<div class="doc_section">
+<h2>
<a name="subproj">Sub-project Status Update</a>
-</div>
+</h2>
<!-- *********************************************************************** -->
-<div class="doc_text">
+<div>
<p>
-The LLVM 2.8 distribution currently consists of code from the core LLVM
+The LLVM 3.0 distribution currently consists of code from the core LLVM
repository (which roughly includes the LLVM optimizers, code generators
and supporting tools), the Clang repository and the llvm-gcc repository. In
addition to this code, the LLVM Project includes other sub-projects that are in
development. Here we include updates on these subprojects.
</p>
-</div>
-
-
<!--=========================================================================-->
-<div class="doc_subsection">
+<h3>
<a name="clang">Clang: C/C++/Objective-C Frontend Toolkit</a>
-</div>
+</h3>
-<div class="doc_text">
+<div>
<p><a href="http://clang.llvm.org/">Clang</a> is an LLVM front end for the C,
C++, and Objective-C languages. Clang aims to provide a better user experience
standards, fast compilation, and low memory use. Like LLVM, Clang provides a
modular, library-based architecture that makes it suitable for creating or
integrating with other development tools. Clang is considered a
-production-quality compiler for C and Objective-C on x86 (32- and 64-bit).</p>
+production-quality compiler for C, Objective-C, C++ and Objective-C++ on x86
+(32- and 64-bit), and for darwin/arm targets.</p>
-<p>In the LLVM 2.8 time-frame, the Clang team has made many improvements:</p>
+<p>In the LLVM 3.0 time-frame, the Clang team has made many improvements:</p>
<ul>
+ <li>Greatly improved support for building C++ applications, with greater stability and better diagnostics.</li>
+
+ <li><a href="http://clang.llvm.org/cxx_status.html">Improved support</a> for the <a href="http://www.iso.org/iso/iso_catalogue/catalogue_tc/catalogue_detail.htm?csnumber=50372 ">C++ 2011</a> standard, including implementations of non-static data member initializers, alias templates, delegating constructors, the range-based for loop, and implicitly-generated move constructors and move assignment operators, among others.</li>
-</ul>
-</div>
+ <li>Implemented support for some features of the upcoming C1x standard, including static assertions and generic selections.</li>
+
+ <li>Better detection of include and linking paths for system headers and libraries, especially for Linux distributions.</li>
-<!--=========================================================================-->
-<div class="doc_subsection">
-<a name="clangsa">Clang Static Analyzer</a>
-</div>
+ <li>Implemented support for <a href="http://clang.llvm.org/docs/AutomaticReferenceCounting.html">Automatic Reference Counting</a> for Objective-C.</li>
-<div class="doc_text">
-
-<p>The <a href="http://clang-analyzer.llvm.org/">Clang Static Analyzer</a>
- project is an effort to use static source code analysis techniques to
- automatically find bugs in C and Objective-C programs (and hopefully <a
- href="http://clang-analyzer.llvm.org/dev_cxx.html">C++ in the
- future</a>!). The tool is very good at finding bugs that occur on specific
- paths through code, such as on error conditions.</p>
+ <li>Implemented a number of optimizations in <tt>libclang</tt>, the Clang C interface, to improve the performance of code completion and the mapping from source locations to abstract syntax tree nodes.</li>
+</ul>
-<p>In the LLVM 2.8 time-frame,
+
+<p>If Clang rejects your code but another compiler accepts it, please take a
+look at the <a href="http://clang.llvm.org/compatibility.html">language
+compatibility</a> guide to make sure this is not intentional or a known issue.
</p>
</div>
<!--=========================================================================-->
-<div class="doc_subsection">
-<a name="vmkit">VMKit: JVM/CLI Virtual Machine Implementation</a>
-</div>
+<h3>
+<a name="dragonegg">DragonEgg: GCC front-ends, LLVM back-end</a>
+</h3>
-<div class="doc_text">
+<div>
<p>
-The <a href="http://vmkit.llvm.org/">VMKit project</a> is an implementation of
-a JVM and a CLI Virtual Machine (Microsoft .NET is an
-implementation of the CLI) using LLVM for static and just-in-time
-compilation.</p>
+<a href="http://dragonegg.llvm.org/">DragonEgg</a> is a
+<a href="http://gcc.gnu.org/wiki/plugins">gcc plugin</a> that replaces GCC's
+optimizers and code generators with LLVM's.
+Currently it requires a patched version of gcc-4.5.
+The plugin can target the x86-32 and x86-64 processor families and has been
+used successfully on the Darwin, FreeBSD and Linux platforms.
+The Ada, C, C++ and Fortran languages work well.
+The plugin is capable of compiling plenty of Obj-C, Obj-C++ and Java but it is
+not known whether the compiled code actually works or not!
+</p>
-<p>With the release of LLVM 2.8, ...</p>
+<p>
+The 3.0 release has the following notable changes:
+<ul>
+<!--
+<li></li>
+-->
+</ul>
</div>
-
<!--=========================================================================-->
-<div class="doc_subsection">
+<h3>
<a name="compiler-rt">compiler-rt: Compiler Runtime Library</a>
-</div>
+</h3>
-<div class="doc_text">
+<div>
<p>
The new LLVM <a href="http://compiler-rt.llvm.org/">compiler-rt project</a>
is a simple library that provides an implementation of the low-level
this and other low-level routines (some are 3x faster than the equivalent
libgcc routines).</p>
+<p>In the LLVM 3.0 timeframe,</p>
+
+</div>
+
+<!--=========================================================================-->
+<h3>
+<a name="lldb">LLDB: Low Level Debugger</a>
+</h3>
+
+<div>
<p>
-All of the code in the compiler-rt project is available under the standard LLVM
-License, a "BSD-style" license. New in LLVM 2.8:
+<a href="http://lldb.llvm.org/">LLDB</a> is a brand new member of the LLVM
+umbrella of projects. LLDB is a next generation, high-performance debugger. It
+is built as a set of reusable components which highly leverage existing
+libraries in the larger LLVM Project, such as the Clang expression parser, the
+LLVM disassembler and the LLVM JIT.</p>
-Soft float support
-</p>
+<p>
+LLDB is has advanced by leaps and bounds in the 3.0 timeframe. It is
+dramatically more stable and useful, and includes both a new <a
+href="http://lldb.llvm.org/tutorial.html">tutorial</a> and a <a
+href="http://lldb.llvm.org/lldb-gdb.html">side-by-side comparison with
+GDB</a>.</p>
</div>
<!--=========================================================================-->
-<div class="doc_subsection">
-<a name="dragonegg">DragonEgg: llvm-gcc ported to gcc-4.5</a>
-</div>
+<h3>
+<a name="libc++">libc++: C++ Standard Library</a>
+</h3>
-<div class="doc_text">
+<div>
<p>
-<a href="http://dragonegg.llvm.org/">DragonEgg</a> is a port of llvm-gcc to
-gcc-4.5. Unlike llvm-gcc, which makes many intrusive changes to the underlying
-gcc-4.2 code, dragonegg in theory does not require any gcc-4.5 modifications
-whatsoever (currently one small patch is needed). This is thanks to the new
-<a href="http://gcc.gnu.org/wiki/plugins">gcc plugin architecture</a>, which
-makes it possible to modify the behaviour of gcc at runtime by loading a plugin,
-which is nothing more than a dynamic library which conforms to the gcc plugin
-interface. DragonEgg is a gcc plugin that causes the LLVM optimizers to be run
-instead of the gcc optimizers, and the LLVM code generators instead of the gcc
-code generators, just like llvm-gcc. To use it, you add
-"-fplugin=path/dragonegg.so" to the gcc-4.5 command line, and gcc-4.5 magically
-becomes llvm-gcc-4.5!
-</p>
+<a href="http://libcxx.llvm.org/">libc++</a> is another new member of the LLVM
+family. It is an implementation of the C++ standard library, written from the
+ground up to specifically target the forthcoming C++'0X standard and focus on
+delivering great performance.</p>
<p>
-DragonEgg is still a work in progress. Currently C works very well, while C++,
-Ada and Fortran work fairly well. All other languages either don't work at all,
-or only work poorly. For the moment only the x86-32 and x86-64 targets are
-supported, and only on linux and darwin (darwin needs an additional gcc patch).
-</p>
-
+In the LLVM 3.0 timeframe,</p>
+
<p>
-2.8 status here.
+Like compiler_rt, libc++ is now <a href="DeveloperPolicy.html#license">dual
+ licensed</a> under the MIT and UIUC license, allowing it to be used more
+ permissively.
</p>
</div>
<!--=========================================================================-->
-<div class="doc_subsection">
-<a name="mc">llvm-mc: Machine Code Toolkit</a>
+<h3>
+<a name="LLBrowse">LLBrowse: IR Browser</a>
+</h3>
+
+<div>
+<p>
+<a href="http://llvm.org/svn/llvm-project/llbrowse/trunk/doc/LLBrowse.html">
+ LLBrowse</a> is an interactive viewer for LLVM modules. It can load any LLVM
+ module and displays its contents as an expandable tree view, facilitating an
+ easy way to inspect types, functions, global variables, or metadata nodes. It
+ is fully cross-platform, being based on the popular wxWidgets GUI toolkit.
+</p>
</div>
-<div class="doc_text">
+<!--=========================================================================-->
+<h3>
+<a name="vmkit">VMKit</a>
+</h3>
+
+<div>
+<p>The <a href="http://vmkit.llvm.org/">VMKit project</a> is an implementation
+ of a Java Virtual Machine (Java VM or JVM) that uses LLVM for static and
+ just-in-time compilation. As of LLVM 3.0, VMKit now supports generational
+ garbage collectors. The garbage collectors are provided by the MMTk framework,
+ and VMKit can be configured to use one of the numerous implemented collectors
+ of MMTk.
+</p>
+</div>
+
+
+<!--=========================================================================-->
+<!--
+<h3>
+<a name="klee">KLEE: A Symbolic Execution Virtual Machine</a>
+</h3>
+
+<div>
<p>
-The LLVM Machine Code (aka MC) sub-project of LLVM was created to solve a number
-of problems in the realm of assembly, disassembly, object file format handling,
-and a number of other related areas that CPU instruction-set level tools work
-in. It is a sub-project of LLVM which provides it with a number of advantages
-over other compilers that do not have tightly integrated assembly-level tools.
-For a gentle introduction, please see the <a
-href="http://blog.llvm.org/2010/04/intro-to-llvm-mc-project.html">Intro to the
-LLVM MC Project Blog Post</a>.
+<a href="http://klee.llvm.org/">KLEE</a> is a symbolic execution framework for
+programs in LLVM bitcode form. KLEE tries to symbolically evaluate "all" paths
+through the application and records state transitions that lead to fault
+states. This allows it to construct testcases that lead to faults and can even
+be used to verify some algorithms.
</p>
-<p>2.8 status here</p>
-</div>
+<p>UPDATE!</p>
+</div>-->
+</div>
<!-- *********************************************************************** -->
-<div class="doc_section">
- <a name="externalproj">External Open Source Projects Using LLVM 2.8</a>
-</div>
+<h2>
+ <a name="externalproj">External Open Source Projects Using LLVM 3.0</a>
+</h2>
<!-- *********************************************************************** -->
-<div class="doc_text">
+<div>
<p>An exciting aspect of LLVM is that it is used as an enabling technology for
a lot of other language and tools projects. This section lists some of the
- projects that have already been updated to work with LLVM 2.8.</p>
-</div>
+ projects that have already been updated to work with LLVM 3.0.</p>
+<!--=========================================================================-->
+<h3>Crack Programming Language</h3>
-<!-- *********************************************************************** -->
-<div class="doc_section">
- <a name="whatsnew">What's New in LLVM 2.8?</a>
+<div>
+<p>
+<a href="http://code.google.com/p/crack-language/">Crack</a> aims to provide the
+ease of development of a scripting language with the performance of a compiled
+language. The language derives concepts from C++, Java and Python, incorporating
+object-oriented programming, operator overloading and strong typing.</p>
+</div>
+
+
+<!--=========================================================================-->
+<h3>TTA-based Codesign Environment (TCE)</h3>
+
+<div>
+<p>TCE is a toolset for designing application-specific processors (ASP) based on
+the Transport triggered architecture (TTA). The toolset provides a complete
+co-design flow from C/C++ programs down to synthesizable VHDL and parallel
+program binaries. Processor customization points include the register files,
+function units, supported operations, and the interconnection network.</p>
+
+<p>TCE uses Clang and LLVM for C/C++ language support, target independent
+optimizations and also for parts of code generation. It generates new LLVM-based
+code generators "on the fly" for the designed TTA processors and loads them in
+to the compiler backend as runtime libraries to avoid per-target recompilation
+of larger parts of the compiler chain.</p>
+</div>
+
+
+
+<!--=========================================================================-->
+<h3>PinaVM</h3>
+
+<div>
+<p><a href="http://gitorious.org/pinavm/pages/Home">PinaVM</a> is an open
+source, <a href="http://www.systemc.org/">SystemC</a> front-end. Unlike many
+other front-ends, PinaVM actually executes the elaboration of the
+program analyzed using LLVM's JIT infrastructure. It later enriches the
+bitcode with SystemC-specific information.</p>
</div>
-<!-- *********************************************************************** -->
-<div class="doc_text">
+<!--=========================================================================-->
+<h3>Pure</h3>
+
+<div>
+<p><a href="http://pure-lang.googlecode.com/">Pure</a> is an
+ algebraic/functional
+ programming language based on term rewriting. Programs are collections
+ of equations which are used to evaluate expressions in a symbolic
+ fashion. The interpreter uses LLVM as a backend to JIT-compile Pure
+ programs to fast native code. Pure offers dynamic typing, eager and lazy
+ evaluation, lexical closures, a hygienic macro system (also based on
+ term rewriting), built-in list and matrix support (including list and
+ matrix comprehensions) and an easy-to-use interface to C and other
+ programming languages (including the ability to load LLVM bitcode
+ modules, and inline C, C++, Fortran and Faust code in Pure programs if
+ the corresponding LLVM-enabled compilers are installed).</p>
+
+<p>Pure version 0.47 has been tested and is known to work with LLVM 3.0
+ (and continues to work with older LLVM releases >= 2.5).</p>
+</div>
-<p>This release includes a huge number of bug fixes, performance tweaks and
-minor improvements. Some of the major improvements and new features are listed
-in this section.
+<!--=========================================================================-->
+<h3 id="icedtea">IcedTea Java Virtual Machine Implementation</h3>
+
+<div>
+<p>
+<a href="http://icedtea.classpath.org/wiki/Main_Page">IcedTea</a> provides a
+harness to build OpenJDK using only free software build tools and to provide
+replacements for the not-yet free parts of OpenJDK. One of the extensions that
+IcedTea provides is a new JIT compiler named <a
+href="http://icedtea.classpath.org/wiki/ZeroSharkFaq">Shark</a> which uses LLVM
+to provide native code generation without introducing processor-dependent
+code.
</p>
+<p> OpenJDK 7 b112, IcedTea6 1.9 and IcedTea7 1.13 and later have been tested
+and are known to work with LLVM 3.0 (and continue to work with older LLVM
+releases >= 2.6 as well).</p>
</div>
<!--=========================================================================-->
-<div class="doc_subsection">
-<a name="orgchanges">LLVM Community Changes</a>
+<h3>Glasgow Haskell Compiler (GHC)</h3>
+
+<div>
+<p>GHC is an open source, state-of-the-art programming suite for Haskell,
+a standard lazy functional programming language. It includes an
+optimizing static compiler generating good code for a variety of
+platforms, together with an interactive system for convenient, quick
+development.</p>
+
+<p>In addition to the existing C and native code generators, GHC 7.0 now
+supports an LLVM code generator. GHC supports LLVM 2.7 and later.</p>
</div>
-<div class="doc_text">
+<!--=========================================================================-->
+<h3>Polly - Polyhedral optimizations for LLVM</h3>
+
+<div>
+<p>Polly is a project that aims to provide advanced memory access optimizations
+to better take advantage of SIMD units, cache hierarchies, multiple cores or
+even vector accelerators for LLVM. Built around an abstract mathematical
+description based on Z-polyhedra, it provides the infrastructure to develop
+advanced optimizations in LLVM and to connect complex external optimizers. In
+its first year of existence Polly already provides an exact value-based
+dependency analysis as well as basic SIMD and OpenMP code generation support.
+Furthermore, Polly can use PoCC(Pluto) an advanced optimizer for data-locality
+and parallelism.</p>
+</div>
-<p>In addition to changes to the code, between LLVM 2.7 and 2.8, a number of
-organization changes have happened:
-</p>
+<!--=========================================================================-->
+<h3>Rubinius</h3>
-<ul>
-</ul>
+<div>
+ <p><a href="http://github.com/evanphx/rubinius">Rubinius</a> is an environment
+ for running Ruby code which strives to write as much of the implementation in
+ Ruby as possible. Combined with a bytecode interpreting VM, it uses LLVM to
+ optimize and compile ruby code down to machine code. Techniques such as type
+ feedback, method inlining, and deoptimization are all used to remove dynamism
+ from ruby execution and increase performance.</p>
</div>
+
<!--=========================================================================-->
-<div class="doc_subsection">
-<a name="majorfeatures">Major New Features</a>
+<h3>
+<a name="FAUST">FAUST Real-Time Audio Signal Processing Language</a>
+</h3>
+
+<div>
+<p>
+<a href="http://faust.grame.fr">FAUST</a> is a compiled language for real-time
+audio signal processing. The name FAUST stands for Functional AUdio STream. Its
+programming model combines two approaches: functional programming and block
+diagram composition. In addition with the C, C++, JAVA output formats, the
+Faust compiler can now generate LLVM bitcode, and works with LLVM 2.7-3.0.</p>
+
+</div>
+
</div>
-<div class="doc_text">
+<!-- *********************************************************************** -->
+<h2>
+ <a name="whatsnew">What's New in LLVM 3.0?</a>
+</h2>
+<!-- *********************************************************************** -->
-<p>LLVM 2.8 includes several major new capabilities:</p>
+<div>
+
+<p>This release includes a huge number of bug fixes, performance tweaks and
+minor improvements. Some of the major improvements and new features are listed
+in this section.
+</p>
+
+<!--=========================================================================-->
+<h3>
+<a name="majorfeatures">Major New Features</a>
+</h3>
+
+<div>
+
+<p>LLVM 3.0 includes several major new capabilities:</p>
<ul>
-<li>.</li>
-</ul>
+<!--
+<li></li>
+-->
+
+</ul>
+
</div>
<!--=========================================================================-->
-<div class="doc_subsection">
+<h3>
<a name="coreimprovements">LLVM IR and Core Improvements</a>
-</div>
+</h3>
-<div class="doc_text">
+<div>
<p>LLVM IR has several new features for better support of new targets and that
expose new optimization opportunities:</p>
<ul>
-
-<li>LLVM 2.8 changes the internal order of operands in <a
- href="http://llvm.org/doxygen/classllvm_1_1InvokeInst.html"><tt>InvokeInst</tt></a>
- and <a href="http://llvm.org/doxygen/classllvm_1_1CallInst.html"><tt>CallInst</tt></a>.
- To be portable across releases, resort to <tt>CallSite</tt> and the
- high-level accessors, such as <tt>getCalledValue</tt> and <tt>setUnwindDest</tt>.
-</li>
-<li>
- You can no longer pass use_iterators directly to cast<> (and similar), because
- these routines tend to perform costly dereference operations more than once. You
- have to dereference the iterators yourself and pass them in.
-</li>
-<li>
- llvm.memcpy.*, llvm.memset.*, llvm.memmove.* (and possibly other?) intrinsics
- take an extra parameter now (i1 isVolatile), totaling 5 parameters.
- If you were creating these intrinsic calls and prototypes yourself (as opposed
- to using Intrinsic::getDeclaration), you can use UpgradeIntrinsicFunction/UpgradeIntrinsicCall
- to be portable accross releases.
- Note that you cannot use Intrinsic::getDeclaration() in a backwards compatible
- way (needs 2/3 types now, in 2.7 it needed just 1).
-</li>
-<li>
- SetCurrentDebugLocation takes a DebugLoc now instead of a MDNode.
- Change your code to use
- SetCurrentDebugLocation(DebugLoc::getFromDILocation(...)).
-</li>
-<li>
- VISIBILITY_HIDDEN is gone.
-</li>
-<li>
- The <tt>RegisterPass</tt> and <tt>RegisterAnalysisGroup</tt> templates are
- considered deprecated, but continue to function in LLVM 2.8. Clients are
- strongly advised to use the upcoming <tt>INITIALIZE_PASS()</tt> and
- <tt>INITIALIZE_AG_PASS()</tt> macros instead.
-<li>
- SMDiagnostic takes different parameters now. //FIXME: how to upgrade?
-</li>
-<li>
- The constructor for the Triple class no longer tries to understand odd triple
- specifications. Frontends should ensure that they only pass valid triples to
- LLVM. The Triple::normalize utility method has been added to help front-ends
- deal with funky triples.
-<li>
- Some APIs got renamed:
- <ul>
- <li>llvm_report_error -> report_fatal_error</li>
- <li>llvm_install_error_handler -> install_fatal_error_handler</li>
- <li>llvm::DwarfExceptionHandling -> llvm::JITExceptionHandling</li>
- </ul>
-</li>
+<!--
+<li></li>
+-->
</ul>
</div>
<!--=========================================================================-->
-<div class="doc_subsection">
+<h3>
<a name="optimizer">Optimizer Improvements</a>
-</div>
+</h3>
-<div class="doc_text">
+<div>
<p>In addition to a large array of minor performance tweaks and bug fixes, this
release includes a few major enhancements and additions to the optimizers:</p>
<ul>
-
+<!--
<li></li>
-
+-->
+</li>
+
</ul>
</div>
-
<!--=========================================================================-->
-<div class="doc_subsection">
-<a name="executionengine">Interpreter and JIT Improvements</a>
-</div>
+<h3>
+<a name="mc">MC Level Improvements</a>
+</h3>
-<div class="doc_text">
+<div>
+<p>
+The LLVM Machine Code (aka MC) subsystem was created to solve a number
+of problems in the realm of assembly, disassembly, object file format handling,
+and a number of other related areas that CPU instruction-set level tools work
+in.</p>
<ul>
+<!--
<li></li>
-
+-->
</ul>
+<p>For more information, please see the <a
+href="http://blog.llvm.org/2010/04/intro-to-llvm-mc-project.html">Intro to the
+LLVM MC Project Blog Post</a>.
+</p>
+
</div>
<!--=========================================================================-->
-<div class="doc_subsection">
+<h3>
<a name="codegen">Target Independent Code Generator Improvements</a>
-</div>
+</h3>
-<div class="doc_text">
+<div>
<p>We have put a significant amount of work into the code generator
infrastructure, which allows us to implement more aggressive algorithms and make
it run faster:</p>
<ul>
-<li>MachO writer works.</li>
+<!--
+<li></li>
+-->
</ul>
</div>
<!--=========================================================================-->
-<div class="doc_subsection">
+<h3>
<a name="x86">X86-32 and X86-64 Target Improvements</a>
-</div>
+</h3>
-<div class="doc_text">
-<p>New features of the X86 target include:
+<div>
+<p>New features and major changes in the X86 target include:
</p>
<ul>
-<li>The X86 backend now supports holding X87 floating point stack values
- in registers across basic blocks, dramatically improving performance of code
- that uses long double, and when targetting CPUs that don't support SSE.</li>
+<li>The CRC32 intrinsics have been renamed. The intrinsics were previously
+ @llvm.x86.sse42.crc32.[8|16|32] and @llvm.x86.sse42.crc64.[8|64]. They have
+ been renamed to @llvm.x86.sse42.crc32.32.[8|16|32] and
+ @llvm.x86.sse42.crc32.64.[8|64].</li>
</ul>
</div>
<!--=========================================================================-->
-<div class="doc_subsection">
+<h3>
<a name="ARM">ARM Target Improvements</a>
-</div>
+</h3>
-<div class="doc_text">
+<div>
<p>New features of the ARM target include:
</p>
<ul>
-
+<!--
<li></li>
-
+-->
</ul>
-
-
</div>
-
+
<!--=========================================================================-->
-<div class="doc_subsection">
-<a name="newapis">New Useful APIs</a>
-</div>
-
-<div class="doc_text">
-
-<p>This release includes a number of new APIs that are used internally, which
- may also be useful for external clients.
-</p>
+<h3>
+<a name="OtherTS">Other Target Specific Improvements</a>
+</h3>
+<div>
<ul>
+<!--
<li></li>
+-->
</ul>
-
-
</div>
<!--=========================================================================-->
-<div class="doc_subsection">
-<a name="otherimprovements">Other Improvements and New Features</a>
-</div>
+<h3>
+<a name="changes">Major Changes and Removed Features</a>
+</h3>
+
+<div>
-<div class="doc_text">
-<p>Other miscellaneous features include:</p>
+<p>If you're already an LLVM user or developer with out-of-tree changes based on
+ LLVM 2.9, this section lists some "gotchas" that you may run into upgrading
+ from the previous release.</p>
<ul>
-<li></li>
+ <li>The <code>LLVMC</code> front end code was removed while separating
+ out language independence.</li>
+ <li>The <code>LowerSetJmp</code> pass wasn't used effectively by any
+ target and has been removed.</li>
+ <li>The old <code>TailDup</code> pass was not used in the standard pipeline
+ and was unable to update ssa form, so it has been removed.
+ <li>The syntax of volatile loads and stores in IR has been changed to
+ "<code>load volatile</code>"/"<code>store volatile</code>". The old
+ syntax ("<code>volatile load</code>"/"<code>volatile store</code>")
+ is still accepted, but is now considered deprecated.</li>
</ul>
+<h4>Windows (32-bit)</h4>
+<div>
+<ul>
+ <li>On Win32(MinGW32 and MSVC), Windows 2000 will not be supported.
+ Windows XP or higher is required.</li>
+</ul>
</div>
+</div>
<!--=========================================================================-->
-<div class="doc_subsection">
-<a name="changes">Major Changes and Removed Features</a>
-</div>
+<h3>
+<a name="api_changes">Internal API Changes</a>
+</h3>
-<div class="doc_text">
+<div>
-<p>If you're already an LLVM user or developer with out-of-tree changes based
-on LLVM 2.7, this section lists some "gotchas" that you may run into upgrading
-from the previous release.</p>
+<p>In addition, many APIs have changed in this release. Some of the major
+ LLVM API changes are:</p>
<ul>
-<li>.ll file doesn't produce #uses comments anymore, to get them, run a .bc file
- through "llvm-dis --show-annotations".</li>
-<li>MSIL Backend removed.</li>
-<li>ABCD and SSI passes removed.</li>
-<li>'Union' LLVM IR feature removed.</li>
-</ul>
-
-<p>In addition, many APIs have changed in this release. Some of the major LLVM
-API changes are:</p>
-
+<li>The biggest and most pervasive change is that llvm::Type's are no longer
+ returned or accepted as 'const' values. Instead, just pass around non-const
+ Type's.</li>
+
+<li><code>PHINode::reserveOperandSpace</code> has been removed. Instead, you
+ must specify how many operands to reserve space for when you create the
+ PHINode, by passing an extra argument into <code>PHINode::Create</code>.</li>
+
+<li>PHINodes no longer store their incoming BasicBlocks as operands. Instead,
+ the list of incoming BasicBlocks is stored separately, and can be accessed
+ with new functions <code>PHINode::block_begin</code>
+ and <code>PHINode::block_end</code>.</li>
+
+<li>Various functions now take an <code>ArrayRef</code> instead of either a pair
+ of pointers (or iterators) to the beginning and end of a range, or a pointer
+ and a length. Others now return an <code>ArrayRef</code> instead of a
+ reference to a <code>SmallVector</code> or <code>std::vector</code>. These
+ include:
<ul>
-</ul>
-
-</div>
+<!-- Please keep this list sorted. -->
+<li><code>CallInst::Create</code></li>
+<li><code>ComputeLinearIndex</code> (in <code>llvm/CodeGen/Analysis.h</code>)</li>
+<li><code>ConstantArray::get</code></li>
+<li><code>ConstantExpr::getExtractElement</code></li>
+<li><code>ConstantExpr::getGetElementPtr</code></li>
+<li><code>ConstantExpr::getInBoundsGetElementPtr</code></li>
+<li><code>ConstantExpr::getIndices</code></li>
+<li><code>ConstantExpr::getInsertElement</code></li>
+<li><code>ConstantExpr::getWithOperands</code></li>
+<li><code>ConstantFoldCall</code> (in <code>llvm/Analysis/ConstantFolding.h</code>)</li>
+<li><code>ConstantFoldInstOperands</code> (in <code>llvm/Analysis/ConstantFolding.h</code>)</li>
+<li><code>ConstantVector::get</code></li>
+<li><code>DIBuilder::createComplexVariable</code></li>
+<li><code>DIBuilder::getOrCreateArray</code></li>
+<li><code>ExtractValueInst::Create</code></li>
+<li><code>ExtractValueInst::getIndexedType</code></li>
+<li><code>ExtractValueInst::getIndices</code></li>
+<li><code>FindInsertedValue</code> (in <code>llvm/Analysis/ValueTracking.h</code>)</li>
+<li><code>gep_type_begin</code> (in <code>llvm/Support/GetElementPtrTypeIterator.h</code>)</li>
+<li><code>gep_type_end</code> (in <code>llvm/Support/GetElementPtrTypeIterator.h</code>)</li>
+<li><code>GetElementPtrInst::Create</code></li>
+<li><code>GetElementPtrInst::CreateInBounds</code></li>
+<li><code>GetElementPtrInst::getIndexedType</code></li>
+<li><code>InsertValueInst::Create</code></li>
+<li><code>InsertValueInst::getIndices</code></li>
+<li><code>InvokeInst::Create</code></li>
+<li><code>IRBuilder::CreateCall</code></li>
+<li><code>IRBuilder::CreateExtractValue</code></li>
+<li><code>IRBuilder::CreateGEP</code></li>
+<li><code>IRBuilder::CreateInBoundsGEP</code></li>
+<li><code>IRBuilder::CreateInsertValue</code></li>
+<li><code>IRBuilder::CreateInvoke</code></li>
+<li><code>MDNode::get</code></li>
+<li><code>MDNode::getIfExists</code></li>
+<li><code>MDNode::getTemporary</code></li>
+<li><code>MDNode::getWhenValsUnresolved</code></li>
+<li><code>SimplifyGEPInst</code> (in <code>llvm/Analysis/InstructionSimplify.h</code>)</li>
+<li><code>TargetData::getIndexedOffset</code></li>
+</ul></li>
+
+<li>All forms of <code>StringMap::getOrCreateValue</code> have been remove
+ except for the one which takes a <code>StringRef</code>.</li>
+
+<li>The <code>LLVMBuildUnwind</code> function from the C API was removed. The
+ LLVM <code>unwind</code> instruction has been deprecated for a long time and
+ isn't used by the current front-ends. So this was removed during the
+ exception handling rewrite.</li>
+
+<li>The <code>LLVMAddLowerSetJmpPass</code> function from the C API was removed
+ because the <code>LowerSetJmp</code> pass was removed.</li>
+
+<li>The <code>DIBuilder</code> interface used by front ends to encode debugging
+ information in the LLVM IR now expects clients to use <code>DIBuilder::finalize()</code>
+ at the end of translation unit to complete debugging information encoding.</li>
+
+<li>The way the type system works has been rewritten: <code>PATypeHolder</code>
+and <code>OpaqueType</code> are gone, and all APIs deal with <code>Type*</code>
+instead of <code>const Type*</code>.
+If you need to create recursive structures, then create a named structure,
+and use <code>setBody()</code> when all its elements are built.
+Type merging and refining is gone too: named structures are not
+merged with other structures, even if their layout is identical.
+(of course anonymous structures are still uniqued by layout).
+</li>
+<li>TargetSelect.h moved to Support/ from Target/</li>
+<li>UpgradeIntrinsicCall no longer upgrades pre-2.9 intrinsic calls
+(for example <code>llvm.memset.i32</code>).</li>
-<!-- *********************************************************************** -->
-<div class="doc_section">
- <a name="portability">Portability and Supported Platforms</a>
-</div>
-<!-- *********************************************************************** -->
+<li>It is mandatory to initialize all out-of-tree passes too and their dependencies now with
+<code>INITIALIZE_PASS{BEGIN,END,}</code> and <code>INITIALIZE_{PASS,AG}_DEPENDENCY</code>.</li>
-<div class="doc_text">
+<li>The interface for MemDepResult in MemoryDependenceAnalysis has been enhanced
+ with new return types Unknown and NonFuncLocal, in addition to the existing
+ types Clobber, Def, and NonLocal.</li>
-<p>LLVM is known to work on the following platforms:</p>
-
-<ul>
-<li>Intel and AMD machines (IA32, X86-64, AMD64, EMT-64) running Red Hat
- Linux, Fedora Core, FreeBSD and AuroraUX (and probably other unix-like
- systems).</li>
-<li>PowerPC and X86-based Mac OS X systems, running 10.4 and above in 32-bit
- and 64-bit modes.</li>
-<li>Intel and AMD machines running on Win32 using MinGW libraries (native).</li>
-<li>Intel and AMD machines running on Win32 with the Cygwin libraries (limited
- support is available for native builds with Visual C++).</li>
-<li>Sun x86 and AMD64 machines running Solaris 10, OpenSolaris 0906.</li>
-<li>Alpha-based machines running Debian GNU/Linux.</li>
</ul>
-
-<p>The core LLVM infrastructure uses GNU autoconf to adapt itself
-to the machine and operating system on which it is built. However, minor
-porting may be required to get LLVM to work on new platforms. We welcome your
-portability patches and reports of successful builds or error messages.</p>
+</div>
</div>
<!-- *********************************************************************** -->
-<div class="doc_section">
+<h2>
<a name="knownproblems">Known Problems</a>
-</div>
+</h2>
<!-- *********************************************************************** -->
-<div class="doc_text">
+<div>
<p>This section contains significant known problems with the LLVM system,
listed by component. If you run into a problem, please check the <a
href="http://llvm.org/bugs/">LLVM bug database</a> and submit a bug if
there isn't already one.</p>
-<ul>
-<li>LLVM will not correctly compile on Solaris and/or OpenSolaris
-using the stock GCC 3.x.x series 'out the box',
-See: <a href="GettingStarted.html#brokengcc">Broken versions of GCC and other tools</a>.
-However, A <a href="http://pkg.auroraux.org/GCC">Modern GCC Build</a>
-for x86/x86-64 has been made available from the third party AuroraUX Project
-that has been meticulously tested for bootstrapping LLVM & Clang.</li>
-<li>There have been reports of Solaris and/or OpenSolaris build failures due
-to an incompatibility in the nm program as well. The nm from binutils does seem
-to work.</li>
-</ul>
-
-</div>
-
<!-- ======================================================================= -->
-<div class="doc_subsection">
+<h3>
<a name="experimental">Experimental features included with this release</a>
-</div>
+</h3>
-<div class="doc_text">
+<div>
<p>The following components of this LLVM release are either untested, known to
be broken or unreliable, or are in early development. These components should
href="http://lists.cs.uiuc.edu/mailman/listinfo/llvmdev">LLVMdev list</a>.</p>
<ul>
-<li>The Alpha, SPU, MIPS, PIC16, Blackfin, MSP430, SystemZ and MicroBlaze
- backends are experimental.</li>
-<li><tt>llc</tt> "<tt>-filetype=asm</tt>" (the default) is the only
- supported value for this option. XXX Update me</li>
+<li>The Alpha, Blackfin, CellSPU, MicroBlaze, MSP430, MIPS, PTX,
+ and XCore backends are experimental.</li>
+<li><tt>llc</tt> "<tt>-filetype=obj</tt>" is experimental on all targets
+ other than darwin and ELF X86 systems.</li>
+
</ul>
</div>
<!-- ======================================================================= -->
-<div class="doc_subsection">
+<h3>
<a name="x86-be">Known problems with the X86 back-end</a>
-</div>
+</h3>
-<div class="doc_text">
+<div>
<ul>
<li>The X86 backend does not yet support
all <a href="http://llvm.org/PR879">inline assembly that uses the X86
floating point stack</a>. It supports the 'f' and 't' constraints, but not
'u'.</li>
- <li>Win64 code generation wasn't widely tested. Everything should work, but we
- expect small issues to happen. Also, llvm-gcc cannot build the mingw64
- runtime currently due to lack of support for the 'u' inline assembly
- constraint and for X87 floating point inline assembly.</li>
<li>The X86-64 backend does not yet support the LLVM IR instruction
<tt>va_arg</tt>. Currently, front-ends support variadic
argument constructs on X86-64 by lowering them manually.</li>
+ <li>Windows x64 (aka Win64) code generator has a few issues.
+ <ul>
+ <li>llvm-gcc cannot build the mingw-w64 runtime currently
+ due to lack of support for the 'u' inline assembly
+ constraint and for X87 floating point inline assembly.</li>
+ <li>On mingw-w64, you will see unresolved symbol <tt>__chkstk</tt>
+ due to <a href="http://llvm.org/bugs/show_bug.cgi?id=8919">Bug 8919</a>.
+ It is fixed in <a href="http://lists.cs.uiuc.edu/pipermail/llvm-commits/Week-of-Mon-20110321/118499.html">r128206</a>.</li>
+ <li>Miss-aligned MOVDQA might crash your program. It is due to
+ <a href="http://llvm.org/bugs/show_bug.cgi?id=9483">Bug 9483</a>,
+ lack of handling aligned internal globals.</li>
+ </ul>
+ </li>
+
</ul>
</div>
<!-- ======================================================================= -->
-<div class="doc_subsection">
+<h3>
<a name="ppc-be">Known problems with the PowerPC back-end</a>
-</div>
+</h3>
-<div class="doc_text">
+<div>
<ul>
<li>The Linux PPC32/ABI support needs testing for the interpreter and static
</div>
<!-- ======================================================================= -->
-<div class="doc_subsection">
+<h3>
<a name="arm-be">Known problems with the ARM back-end</a>
-</div>
+</h3>
-<div class="doc_text">
+<div>
<ul>
<li>Thumb mode works only on ARMv6 or higher processors. On sub-ARMv6
</div>
<!-- ======================================================================= -->
-<div class="doc_subsection">
+<h3>
<a name="sparc-be">Known problems with the SPARC back-end</a>
-</div>
+</h3>
-<div class="doc_text">
+<div>
<ul>
<li>The SPARC backend only supports the 32-bit SPARC ABI (-m32); it does not
</div>
<!-- ======================================================================= -->
-<div class="doc_subsection">
+<h3>
<a name="mips-be">Known problems with the MIPS back-end</a>
-</div>
+</h3>
-<div class="doc_text">
+<div>
<ul>
<li>64-bit MIPS targets are not supported yet.</li>
</div>
<!-- ======================================================================= -->
-<div class="doc_subsection">
+<h3>
<a name="alpha-be">Known problems with the Alpha back-end</a>
-</div>
+</h3>
-<div class="doc_text">
+<div>
<ul>
</div>
<!-- ======================================================================= -->
-<div class="doc_subsection">
+<h3>
<a name="c-be">Known problems with the C back-end</a>
-</div>
+</h3>
+
+<div>
-<div class="doc_text">
+<p>The C backend has numerous problems and is not being actively maintained.
+Depending on it for anything serious is not advised.</p>
<ul>
<li><a href="http://llvm.org/PR802">The C backend has only basic support for
<!-- ======================================================================= -->
-<div class="doc_subsection">
- <a name="c-fe">Known problems with the llvm-gcc C and C++ front-end</a>
-</div>
-
-<div class="doc_text">
+<h3>
+ <a name="llvm-gcc">Known problems with the llvm-gcc front-end</a>
+</h3>
-<p>The only major language feature of GCC not supported by llvm-gcc is
- the <tt>__builtin_apply</tt> family of builtins. However, some extensions
- are only supported on some targets. For example, trampolines are only
- supported on some targets (these are used when you take the address of a
- nested function).</p>
+<div>
-</div>
+<p><b>LLVM 3.0 will be the last release of llvm-gcc.</b></p>
-<!-- ======================================================================= -->
-<div class="doc_subsection">
- <a name="fortran-fe">Known problems with the llvm-gcc Fortran front-end</a>
-</div>
+<p>llvm-gcc is generally very stable for the C family of languages. The only
+ major language feature of GCC not supported by llvm-gcc is the
+ <tt>__builtin_apply</tt> family of builtins. However, some extensions
+ are only supported on some targets. For example, trampolines are only
+ supported on some targets (these are used when you take the address of a
+ nested function).</p>
-<div class="doc_text">
-<ul>
-<li>Fortran support generally works, but there are still several unresolved bugs
- in <a href="http://llvm.org/bugs/">Bugzilla</a>. Please see the
- tools/gfortran component for details.</li>
-</ul>
-</div>
+<p>Fortran support generally works, but there are still several unresolved bugs
+ in <a href="http://llvm.org/bugs/">Bugzilla</a>. Please see the
+ tools/gfortran component for details. Note that llvm-gcc is missing major
+ Fortran performance work in the frontend and library that went into GCC after
+ 4.2. If you are interested in Fortran, we recommend that you consider using
+ <a href="#dragonegg">dragonegg</a> instead.</p>
-<!-- ======================================================================= -->
-<div class="doc_subsection">
- <a name="ada-fe">Known problems with the llvm-gcc Ada front-end</a>
+<p>The llvm-gcc 4.2 Ada compiler has basic functionality, but is no longer being
+actively maintained. If you are interested in Ada, we recommend that you
+consider using <a href="#dragonegg">dragonegg</a> instead.</p>
</div>
-<div class="doc_text">
-The llvm-gcc 4.2 Ada compiler works fairly well; however, this is not a mature
-technology, and problems should be expected.
-<ul>
-<li>The Ada front-end currently only builds on X86-32. This is mainly due
-to lack of trampoline support (pointers to nested functions) on other platforms.
-However, it <a href="http://llvm.org/PR2006">also fails to build on X86-64</a>
-which does support trampolines.</li>
-<li>The Ada front-end <a href="http://llvm.org/PR2007">fails to bootstrap</a>.
-This is due to lack of LLVM support for <tt>setjmp</tt>/<tt>longjmp</tt> style
-exception handling, which is used internally by the compiler.
-Workaround: configure with <tt>--disable-bootstrap</tt>.</li>
-<li>The c380004, <a href="http://llvm.org/PR2010">c393010</a>
-and <a href="http://llvm.org/PR2421">cxg2021</a> ACATS tests fail
-(c380004 also fails with gcc-4.2 mainline).
-If the compiler is built with checks disabled then <a href="http://llvm.org/PR2010">c393010</a>
-causes the compiler to go into an infinite loop, using up all system memory.</li>
-<li>Some GCC specific Ada tests continue to crash the compiler.</li>
-<li>The <tt>-E</tt> binder option (exception backtraces)
-<a href="http://llvm.org/PR1982">does not work</a> and will result in programs
-crashing if an exception is raised. Workaround: do not use <tt>-E</tt>.</li>
-<li>Only discrete types <a href="http://llvm.org/PR1981">are allowed to start
-or finish at a non-byte offset</a> in a record. Workaround: do not pack records
-or use representation clauses that result in a field of a non-discrete type
-starting or finishing in the middle of a byte.</li>
-<li>The <tt>lli</tt> interpreter <a href="http://llvm.org/PR2009">considers
-'main' as generated by the Ada binder to be invalid</a>.
-Workaround: hand edit the file to use pointers for <tt>argv</tt> and
-<tt>envp</tt> rather than integers.</li>
-<li>The <tt>-fstack-check</tt> option <a href="http://llvm.org/PR2008">is
-ignored</a>.</li>
-</ul>
</div>
<!-- *********************************************************************** -->
-<div class="doc_section">
+<h2>
<a name="additionalinfo">Additional Information</a>
-</div>
+</h2>
<!-- *********************************************************************** -->
-<div class="doc_text">
+<div>
<p>A wide variety of additional information is available on the <a
-href="http://llvm.org">LLVM web page</a>, in particular in the <a
+href="http://llvm.org/">LLVM web page</a>, in particular in the <a
href="http://llvm.org/docs/">documentation</a> section. The web page also
contains versions of the API documentation which is up-to-date with the
Subversion version of the source code.