Re: Janus/Ada 3.2.1 Released!

["Randy Brukardt" <randy@rrsoftware.com>]

"Optikos" <optikos@verizon.net> wrote in message 
news:228117e3-4382-4faf-807e-e562c41657c4@googlegroups.com...
...
>Randy, would putting Janus/Ada's front end on
>0) LLVM backend
>be more difficult than any major target feature listed above alone (e.g.:
>1) Janus/Ada as-is without LLVM plus ELF on x86;

These are almost completely orthogonal: the existing code generator would 
work for Linux, and the (old) Unix JLink did ELF. The issue with Linux is 
updating the runtime to use Linux system calls (these are different than the 
ones from the old Unix).

OTOH, attaching LLVM is a totally different level of work, and I don't know 
enough about LLVM to say how easy or hard it would be. OTOH, we did 
something similar of Unisys, so we already have most of the ability 
available.

But again, note that a code generator is a small (and usually easiest) part 
of porting to a new target. Making a usable runtime (that is, exception 
handling, finalization, overflow checking, divide-by-zero traps, basic I/O, 
and most of all, tasking) is generally a bigger job.

                                                          Randy.