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author | Gordon Henriksen <gordonhenriksen@mac.com> | 2007-10-26 03:03:51 +0000 |
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committer | Gordon Henriksen <gordonhenriksen@mac.com> | 2007-10-26 03:03:51 +0000 |
commit | 55cbec317d9c30c8ae1d35eaa008ca63d1f2fce9 (patch) | |
tree | 75d2b201047bc3f25a6118bc0058ac38f1fa0a76 /docs | |
parent | 2bd122c4d934a70e031dc0ca5171719bac66c2c9 (diff) | |
download | external_llvm-55cbec317d9c30c8ae1d35eaa008ca63d1f2fce9.zip external_llvm-55cbec317d9c30c8ae1d35eaa008ca63d1f2fce9.tar.gz external_llvm-55cbec317d9c30c8ae1d35eaa008ca63d1f2fce9.tar.bz2 |
More fleshing out of docs/Passes.html, plus some typo fixes and
improved wording in source files.
git-svn-id: https://llvm.org/svn/llvm-project/llvm/trunk@43377 91177308-0d34-0410-b5e6-96231b3b80d8
Diffstat (limited to 'docs')
-rw-r--r-- | docs/Passes.html | 370 |
1 files changed, 313 insertions, 57 deletions
diff --git a/docs/Passes.html b/docs/Passes.html index fb1359f..192f442 100644 --- a/docs/Passes.html +++ b/docs/Passes.html @@ -313,9 +313,8 @@ perl -e '$/ = undef; for (split(/\n/, <>)) { s:^ *///? ?::; print " <p>\n" if ! </div> <div class="doc_text"> <p> - This pass, only available in <code>opt</code>, prints - the call graph into a <code>.dot</code> graph. This graph can then be processed with the - "dot" tool to convert it to postscript or some other suitable format. + This pass, only available in <code>opt</code>, prints the call graph to + standard output in a human-readable form. </p> </div> @@ -325,8 +324,8 @@ perl -e '$/ = undef; for (split(/\n/, <>)) { s:^ *///? ?::; print " <p>\n" if ! </div> <div class="doc_text"> <p> - This pass, only available in <code>opt</code>, prints - the SCCs of the call graph to standard output in a human-readable form. + This pass, only available in <code>opt</code>, prints the SCCs of the call + graph to standard output in a human-readable form. </p> </div> @@ -336,8 +335,8 @@ perl -e '$/ = undef; for (split(/\n/, <>)) { s:^ *///? ?::; print " <p>\n" if ! </div> <div class="doc_text"> <p> - This pass, only available in <code>opt</code>, prints - the SCCs of each function CFG to standard output in a human-readable form. + This pass, only available in <code>opt</code>, prints the SCCs of each + function CFG to standard output in a human-readable form. </p> </div> @@ -495,7 +494,12 @@ perl -e '$/ = undef; for (split(/\n/, <>)) { s:^ *///? ?::; print " <p>\n" if ! <a name="memdep">Memory Dependence Analysis</a> </div> <div class="doc_text"> - <p>Yet to be written.</p> + <p> + An analysis that determines, for a given memory operation, what preceding + memory operations it depends on. It builds on alias analysis information, and + tries to provide a lazy, caching interface to a common kind of alias + information query. + </p> </div> <!-------------------------------------------------------------------------- --> @@ -503,7 +507,11 @@ perl -e '$/ = undef; for (split(/\n/, <>)) { s:^ *///? ?::; print " <p>\n" if ! <a name="no-aa">No Alias Analysis (always returns 'may' alias)</a> </div> <div class="doc_text"> - <p>Yet to be written.</p> + <p> + Always returns "I don't know" for alias queries. NoAA is unlike other alias + analysis implementations, in that it does not chain to a previous analysis. As + such it doesn't follow many of the rules that other alias analyses must. + </p> </div> <!-------------------------------------------------------------------------- --> @@ -511,7 +519,10 @@ perl -e '$/ = undef; for (split(/\n/, <>)) { s:^ *///? ?::; print " <p>\n" if ! <a name="no-profile">No Profile Information</a> </div> <div class="doc_text"> - <p>Yet to be written.</p> + <p> + The default "no profile" implementation of the abstract + <code>ProfileInfo</code> interface. + </p> </div> <!-------------------------------------------------------------------------- --> @@ -519,7 +530,10 @@ perl -e '$/ = undef; for (split(/\n/, <>)) { s:^ *///? ?::; print " <p>\n" if ! <a name="postdomfrontier">Post-Dominance Frontier Construction</a> </div> <div class="doc_text"> - <p>Yet to be written.</p> + <p> + This pass is a simple post-dominator construction algorithm for finding + post-dominator frontiers. + </p> </div> <!-------------------------------------------------------------------------- --> @@ -527,7 +541,10 @@ perl -e '$/ = undef; for (split(/\n/, <>)) { s:^ *///? ?::; print " <p>\n" if ! <a name="postdomtree">Post-Dominator Tree Construction</a> </div> <div class="doc_text"> - <p>Yet to be written.</p> + <p> + This pass is a simple post-dominator construction algorithm for finding + post-dominators. + </p> </div> <!-------------------------------------------------------------------------- --> @@ -535,7 +552,11 @@ perl -e '$/ = undef; for (split(/\n/, <>)) { s:^ *///? ?::; print " <p>\n" if ! <a name="print">Print function to stderr</a> </div> <div class="doc_text"> - <p>Yet to be written.</p> + <p> + The <code>PrintFunctionPass</code> class is designed to be pipelined with + other <code>FunctionPass</code>es, and prints out the functions of the module + as they are processed. + </p> </div> <!-------------------------------------------------------------------------- --> @@ -551,7 +572,11 @@ perl -e '$/ = undef; for (split(/\n/, <>)) { s:^ *///? ?::; print " <p>\n" if ! <a name="print-callgraph">Print Call Graph to 'dot' file</a> </div> <div class="doc_text"> - <p>Yet to be written.</p> + <p> + This pass, only available in <code>opt</code>, prints the call graph into a + <code>.dot</code> graph. This graph can then be processed with the "dot" tool + to convert it to postscript or some other suitable format. + </p> </div> <!-------------------------------------------------------------------------- --> @@ -559,7 +584,11 @@ perl -e '$/ = undef; for (split(/\n/, <>)) { s:^ *///? ?::; print " <p>\n" if ! <a name="print-cfg">Print CFG of function to 'dot' file</a> </div> <div class="doc_text"> - <p>Yet to be written.</p> + <p> + This pass, only available in <code>opt</code>, prints the control flow graph + into a <code>.dot</code> graph. This graph can then be processed with the + "dot" tool to convert it to postscript or some other suitable format. + </p> </div> <!-------------------------------------------------------------------------- --> @@ -567,7 +596,12 @@ perl -e '$/ = undef; for (split(/\n/, <>)) { s:^ *///? ?::; print " <p>\n" if ! <a name="print-cfg-only">Print CFG of function to 'dot' file (with no function bodies)</a> </div> <div class="doc_text"> - <p>Yet to be written.</p> + <p> + This pass, only available in <code>opt</code>, prints the control flow graph + into a <code>.dot</code> graph, omitting the function bodies. This graph can + then be processed with the "dot" tool to convert it to postscript or some + other suitable format. + </p> </div> <!-------------------------------------------------------------------------- --> @@ -575,7 +609,9 @@ perl -e '$/ = undef; for (split(/\n/, <>)) { s:^ *///? ?::; print " <p>\n" if ! <a name="printm">Print module to stderr</a> </div> <div class="doc_text"> - <p>Yet to be written.</p> + <p> + This pass simply prints out the entire module when it is executed. + </p> </div> <!-------------------------------------------------------------------------- --> @@ -583,7 +619,10 @@ perl -e '$/ = undef; for (split(/\n/, <>)) { s:^ *///? ?::; print " <p>\n" if ! <a name="printusedtypes">Find Used Types</a> </div> <div class="doc_text"> - <p>Yet to be written.</p> + <p> + This pass is used to seek out all of the types in use by the program. Note + that this analysis explicitly does not include types only used by the symbol + table. </div> <!-------------------------------------------------------------------------- --> @@ -591,7 +630,10 @@ perl -e '$/ = undef; for (split(/\n/, <>)) { s:^ *///? ?::; print " <p>\n" if ! <a name="profile-loader">Load profile information from llvmprof.out</a> </div> <div class="doc_text"> - <p>Yet to be written.</p> + <p> + A concrete implementation of profiling information that loads the information + from a profile dump file. + </p> </div> <!-------------------------------------------------------------------------- --> @@ -599,7 +641,18 @@ perl -e '$/ = undef; for (split(/\n/, <>)) { s:^ *///? ?::; print " <p>\n" if ! <a name="scalar-evolution">Scalar Evolution Analysis</a> </div> <div class="doc_text"> - <p>Yet to be written.</p> + <p> + The <code>ScalarEvolution</code> analysis can be used to analyze and + catagorize scalar expressions in loops. It specializes in recognizing general + induction variables, representing them with the abstract and opaque + <code>SCEV</code> class. Given this analysis, trip counts of loops and other + important properties can be obtained. + </p> + + <p> + This analysis is primarily useful for induction variable substitution and + strength reduction. + </p> </div> <!-------------------------------------------------------------------------- --> @@ -607,7 +660,8 @@ perl -e '$/ = undef; for (split(/\n/, <>)) { s:^ *///? ?::; print " <p>\n" if ! <a name="targetdata">Target Data Layout</a> </div> <div class="doc_text"> - <p>Yet to be written.</p> + <p>Provides other passes access to information on how the size and alignment + required by the the target ABI for various data types.</p> </div> <!-- ======================================================================= --> @@ -632,7 +686,30 @@ perl -e '$/ = undef; for (split(/\n/, <>)) { s:^ *///? ?::; print " <p>\n" if ! <a name="argpromotion">Promote 'by reference' arguments to scalars</a> </div> <div class="doc_text"> - <p>Yet to be written.</p> + <p> + This pass promotes "by reference" arguments to be "by value" arguments. In + practice, this means looking for internal functions that have pointer + arguments. If it can prove, through the use of alias analysis, that an + argument is *only* loaded, then it can pass the value into the function + instead of the address of the value. This can cause recursive simplification + of code and lead to the elimination of allocas (especially in C++ template + code like the STL). + </p> + + <p> + This pass also handles aggregate arguments that are passed into a function, + scalarizing them if the elements of the aggregate are only loaded. Note that + it refuses to scalarize aggregates which would require passing in more than + three operands to the function, because passing thousands of operands for a + large array or structure is unprofitable! + </p> + + <p> + Note that this transformation could also be done for arguments that are only + stored to (returning the value instead), but does not currently. This case + would be best handled when and if LLVM starts supporting multiple return + values from functions. + </p> </div> <!-------------------------------------------------------------------------- --> @@ -640,22 +717,11 @@ perl -e '$/ = undef; for (split(/\n/, <>)) { s:^ *///? ?::; print " <p>\n" if ! <a name="block-placement">Profile Guided Basic Block Placement</a> </div> <div class="doc_text"> - <p>This pass implements a very simple profile guided basic block placement - algorithm. The idea is to put frequently executed blocks together at the - start of the function, and hopefully increase the number of fall-through - conditional branches. If there is no profile information for a particular - function, this pass basically orders blocks in depth-first order.</p> - <p>The algorithm implemented here is basically "Algo1" from "Profile Guided - Code Positioning" by Pettis and Hansen, except that it uses basic block - counts instead of edge counts. This could be improved in many ways, but is - very simple for now.</p> - - <p>Basically we "place" the entry block, then loop over all successors in a - DFO, placing the most frequently executed successor until we run out of - blocks. Did we mention that this was <b>extremely</b> simplistic? This is - also much slower than it could be. When it becomes important, this pass - will be rewritten to use a better algorithm, and then we can worry about - efficiency.</p> + <p>This pass is a very simple profile guided basic block placement algorithm. + The idea is to put frequently executed blocks together at the start of the + function and hopefully increase the number of fall-through conditional + branches. If there is no profile information for a particular function, this + pass basically orders blocks in depth-first order.</p> </div> <!-------------------------------------------------------------------------- --> @@ -663,7 +729,12 @@ perl -e '$/ = undef; for (split(/\n/, <>)) { s:^ *///? ?::; print " <p>\n" if ! <a name="break-crit-edges">Break critical edges in CFG</a> </div> <div class="doc_text"> - <p>Yet to be written.</p> + <p> + Break all of the critical edges in the CFG by inserting a dummy basic block. + It may be "required" by passes that cannot deal with critical edges. This + transformation obviously invalidates the CFG, but can update forward dominator + (set, immediate dominators, tree, and frontier) information. + </p> </div> <!-------------------------------------------------------------------------- --> @@ -705,7 +776,12 @@ if (i == j) <a name="constmerge">Merge Duplicate Global Constants</a> </div> <div class="doc_text"> - <p>Yet to be written.</p> + <p> + Merges duplicate global constants together into a single constant that is + shared. This is useful because some passes (ie TraceValues) insert a lot of + string constants into the program, regardless of whether or not an existing + string is available. + </p> </div> <!-------------------------------------------------------------------------- --> @@ -729,7 +805,11 @@ if (i == j) <a name="dce">Dead Code Elimination</a> </div> <div class="doc_text"> - <p>Yet to be written.</p> + <p> + Dead code elimination is similar to <a href="#die">dead instruction + elimination</a>, but it rechecks instructions that were used by removed + instructions to see if they are newly dead. + </p> </div> <!-------------------------------------------------------------------------- --> @@ -737,7 +817,17 @@ if (i == j) <a name="deadargelim">Dead Argument Elimination</a> </div> <div class="doc_text"> - <p>Yet to be written.</p> + <p> + This pass deletes dead arguments from internal functions. Dead argument + elimination removes arguments which are directly dead, as well as arguments + only passed into function calls as dead arguments of other functions. This + pass also deletes dead arguments in a similar way. + </p> + + <p> + This pass is often useful as a cleanup pass to run after aggressive + interprocedural passes, which add possibly-dead arguments. + </p> </div> <!-------------------------------------------------------------------------- --> @@ -745,7 +835,11 @@ if (i == j) <a name="deadtypeelim">Dead Type Elimination</a> </div> <div class="doc_text"> - <p>Yet to be written.</p> + <p> + This pass is used to cleanup the output of GCC. It eliminate names for types + that are unused in the entire translation unit, using the <a + href="#findusedtypes">find used types</a> pass. + </p> </div> <!-------------------------------------------------------------------------- --> @@ -753,7 +847,10 @@ if (i == j) <a name="die">Dead Instruction Elimination</a> </div> <div class="doc_text"> - <p>Yet to be written.</p> + <p> + Dead instruction elimination performs a single pass over the function, + removing instructions that are obviously dead. + </p> </div> <!-------------------------------------------------------------------------- --> @@ -761,7 +858,10 @@ if (i == j) <a name="dse">Dead Store Elimination</a> </div> <div class="doc_text"> - <p>Yet to be written.</p> + <p> + A trivial dead store elimination that only considers basic-block local + redundant stores. + </p> </div> <!-------------------------------------------------------------------------- --> @@ -769,7 +869,12 @@ if (i == j) <a name="gcse">Global Common Subexpression Elimination</a> </div> <div class="doc_text"> - <p>Yet to be written.</p> + <p> + This pass is designed to be a very quick global transformation that + eliminates global common subexpressions from a function. It does this by + using an existing value numbering implementation to identify the common + subexpressions, eliminating them when possible. + </p> </div> <!-------------------------------------------------------------------------- --> @@ -777,7 +882,13 @@ if (i == j) <a name="globaldce">Dead Global Elimination</a> </div> <div class="doc_text"> - <p>Yet to be written.</p> + <p> + This transform is designed to eliminate unreachable internal globals from the + program. It uses an aggressive algorithm, searching out globals that are + known to be alive. After it finds all of the globals which are needed, it + deletes whatever is left over. This allows it to delete recursive chunks of + the program which are unreachable. + </p> </div> <!-------------------------------------------------------------------------- --> @@ -785,7 +896,11 @@ if (i == j) <a name="globalopt">Global Variable Optimizer</a> </div> <div class="doc_text"> - <p>Yet to be written.</p> + <p> + This pass transforms simple global variables that never have their address + taken. If obviously true, it marks read/write globals as constant, deletes + variables only stored to, etc. + </p> </div> <!-------------------------------------------------------------------------- --> @@ -821,7 +936,16 @@ if (i == j) <a name="indmemrem">Indirect Malloc and Free Removal</a> </div> <div class="doc_text"> - <p>Yet to be written.</p> + <p> + This pass finds places where memory allocation functions may escape into + indirect land. Some transforms are much easier (aka possible) only if free + or malloc are not called indirectly. + </p> + + <p> + Thus find places where the address of memory functions are taken and construct + bounce functions with direct calls of those functions. + </p> </div> <!-------------------------------------------------------------------------- --> @@ -829,7 +953,50 @@ if (i == j) <a name="indvars">Canonicalize Induction Variables</a> </div> <div class="doc_text"> - <p>Yet to be written.</p> + <p> + This transformation analyzes and transforms the induction variables (and + computations derived from them) into simpler forms suitable for subsequent + analysis and transformation. + </p> + + <p> + This transformation makes the following changes to each loop with an + identifiable induction variable: + </p> + + <ol> + <li>All loops are transformed to have a <em>single</em> canonical + induction variable which starts at zero and steps by one.</li> + <li>The canonical induction variable is guaranteed to be the first PHI node + in the loop header block.</li> + <li>Any pointer arithmetic recurrences are raised to use array + subscripts.</li> + </ol> + + <p> + If the trip count of a loop is computable, this pass also makes the following + changes: + </p> + + <ol> + <li>The exit condition for the loop is canonicalized to compare the + induction value against the exit value. This turns loops like: + <blockquote><pre>for (i = 7; i*i < 1000; ++i)</pre></blockquote> + into + <blockquote><pre>for (i = 0; i != 25; ++i)</pre></blockquote></li> + <li>Any use outside of the loop of an expression derived from the indvar + is changed to compute the derived value outside of the loop, eliminating + the dependence on the exit value of the induction variable. If the only + purpose of the loop is to compute the exit value of some derived + expression, this transformation will make the loop dead.</li> + </p> + + <p> + This transformation should be followed by strength reduction after all of the + desired loop transformations have been performed. Additionally, on targets + where it is profitable, the loop could be transformed to count down to zero + (the "do loop" optimization). + </p> </div> <!-------------------------------------------------------------------------- --> @@ -837,7 +1004,9 @@ if (i == j) <a name="inline">Function Integration/Inlining</a> </div> <div class="doc_text"> - <p>Yet to be written.</p> + <p> + Bottom-up inlining of functions into callees. + </p> </div> <!-------------------------------------------------------------------------- --> @@ -845,7 +1014,18 @@ if (i == j) <a name="insert-block-profiling">Insert instrumentation for block profiling</a> </div> <div class="doc_text"> - <p>Yet to be written.</p> + <p> + This pass instruments the specified program with counters for basic block + profiling, which counts the number of times each basic block executes. This + is the most basic form of profiling, which can tell which blocks are hot, but + cannot reliably detect hot paths through the CFG. + </p> + + <p> + Note that this implementation is very naïve. Control equivalent regions of + the CFG should not require duplicate counters, but it does put duplicate + counters in. + </p> </div> <!-------------------------------------------------------------------------- --> @@ -853,7 +1033,17 @@ if (i == j) <a name="insert-edge-profiling">Insert instrumentation for edge profiling</a> </div> <div class="doc_text"> - <p>Yet to be written.</p> + <p> + This pass instruments the specified program with counters for edge profiling. + Edge profiling can give a reasonable approximation of the hot paths through a + program, and is used for a wide variety of program transformations. + </p> + + <p> + Note that this implementation is very naïve. It inserts a counter for + <em>every</em> edge in the program, instead of using control flow information + to prune the number of counters inserted. + </p> </div> <!-------------------------------------------------------------------------- --> @@ -861,7 +1051,10 @@ if (i == j) <a name="insert-function-profiling">Insert instrumentation for function profiling</a> </div> <div class="doc_text"> - <p>Yet to be written.</p> + <p> + This pass instruments the specified program with counters for function + profiling, which counts the number of times each function is called. + </p> </div> <!-------------------------------------------------------------------------- --> @@ -869,7 +1062,11 @@ if (i == j) <a name="insert-null-profiling-rs">Measure profiling framework overhead</a> </div> <div class="doc_text"> - <p>Yet to be written.</p> + <p> + The basic profiler that does nothing. It is the default profiler and thus + terminates <code>RSProfiler</code> chains. It is useful for measuring + framework overhead. + </p> </div> <!-------------------------------------------------------------------------- --> @@ -877,7 +1074,20 @@ if (i == j) <a name="insert-rs-profiling-framework">Insert random sampling instrumentation framework</a> </div> <div class="doc_text"> - <p>Yet to be written.</p> + <p> + The second stage of the random-sampling instrumentation framework, duplicates + all instructions in a function, ignoring the profiling code, then connects the + two versions together at the entry and at backedges. At each connection point + a choice is made as to whether to jump to the profiled code (take a sample) or + execute the unprofiled code. + </p> + + <p> + After this pass, it is highly recommended to run<a href="#mem2reg">mem2reg</a> + and <a href="#adce">adce</a>. <a href="#instcombine">instcombine</a>, + <a href="#load-vn">load-vn</a>, <a href="#gdce">gdce</a>, and + <a href="#dse">dse</a> also are good to run afterwards. + </p> </div> <!-------------------------------------------------------------------------- --> @@ -885,7 +1095,53 @@ if (i == j) <a name="instcombine">Combine redundant instructions</a> </div> <div class="doc_text"> - <p>Yet to be written.</p> + <p> + Combine instructions to form fewer, simple + instructions. This pass does not modify the CFG This pass is where algebraic + simplification happens. + </p> + + <p> + This pass combines things like: + </p> + +<blockquote><pre +>%Y = add i32 %X, 1 +%Z = add i32 %Y, 1</pre></blockquote> + + <p> + into: + </p> + +<blockquote><pre +>%Z = add i32 %X, 2</pre></blockquote> + + <p> + This is a simple worklist driven algorithm. + </p> + + <p> + This pass guarantees that the following canonicalizations are performed on + the program: + </p> + + <ul> + <li>If a binary operator has a constant operand, it is moved to the right- + hand side.</li> + <li>Bitwise operators with constant operands are always grouped so that + shifts are performed first, then <code>or</code>s, then + <code>and</code>s, then <code>xor</code>s.</li> + <li>Compare instructions are converted from <code><</code>, + <code>></code>, <code>≤</code>, or <code>≥</code> to + <code>=</code> or <code>≠</code> if possible.</li> + <li>All <code>cmp</code> instructions on boolean values are replaced with + logical operations.</li> + <li><code>add <var>X</var>, <var>X</var></code> is represented as + <code>mul <var>X</var>, 2</code> ⇒ <code>shl <var>X</var>, 1</code></li> + <li>Multiplies with a constant power-of-two argument are transformed into + shifts.</li> + <li>… etc.</li> + </ul> </div> <!-------------------------------------------------------------------------- --> |