LLVM Has Documented the PDB Format, Complete with PDB to YAML Conversion
LLVM can now generate PDB files, allowing the use of Windows debugging tools. In addition, they have documented the format and created tooling for analyzing with and generating PDB files from YAML.
Azul Systems Launches Falcon, a New Just-in-Time Compiler for Java, Based on LLVM
Azul Systems has today announced the immediate availability of Zing 17.03, with full support for Azul’s new Falcon just-in-time (JIT) compiler based on LLVM and designed to replace the C2 compiler used in prior versions of Zing, as well as in Oracle HotSpot and OpenJDK. Falcon is the first new production JIT compiler available for Java SE since C2 was introduced at JavaOne in 1997.
LLD, LLVM’s New Linker, Coming to LLVM 4
LLD, which touts great performance improvements over GCC ld, will be included in LLVM 4 rc1 and enabled by default. Although the new linker is already able to build a running FreeBSD/amd64 base system, its inclusion in LLVM is still experimental and could be set back in rc2 if it causes problems.
MIT Extended LLVM IR to Enable Better Optimization of Parallel Programs
Researchers at MIT have been working on a fork of LLVM to explore a new approach to optimizing parallel code by embedding fork-join parallelism directly into the compiler’s intermediate representation (IR). This, the researchers maintain, makes it possible to leverage most of the IR-level serial optimizations for parallel programs.
Checked C - A Safer C/C++ from Microsoft
Microsoft has open sourced Checked C, a research project meant to add bounds checking to C and C++.
LLVM 3.8 Discontinues Old Windows Versions, Deprecates Autoconf, Improves Clang
The LLVM team has announced the release of LLVM, which includes a few major deprecations, new C API headers, and Clang 3.8.
WebAssembly: A Universal Binary and Text Format for the Web
Mozilla, Google, Microsoft and Apple have decided to develop a binary format for the web. Called WebAssembly, this format could be a compilation target for any programming language, enabling applications to run in the browser or other agents.
Cling Aims to Provide a High-performance C++ REPL
Cling is an interactive C++ interpreter that is built on top of LLVM and Clang and promises to provide a leap in productivity by going beyond the usual code-compile-run-debug C++ workflow.
GCC 5.1 is Out
The GNU Project has announced the release of GCC 5.1. The first major release of GCC 5 comes with many new features and improvements, including improved support for C++11/14, a new libstdc++ ABI, and a machine-code JIT embeddable library.
Swift Might Not Be As Fast As Apple Claims It To Be: First Benchmarks
Performance is one of the benefits that Apple claims its new Swift programming language should bring to OS X and iOS developers, and being in beta hasn't prevented independent developers from running benchmarks and reporting their findings. Perhaps unsurprisingly these show that in some cases Swift performance is not yet satisfactory.
Apple Releases Swift, a High-performance High-level Language for iOS and OSX
Today at WWDC 2014, Apple announced the beta availability of a new programming language, swift, which is set to ship with iOS 8 and OSX Yosemite later this year. Swift is a high-level programming language that will be familiar to JavaScript developers, but is compiled using LLVM to produce highly performant executable code for both OSX and iOS platforms.
Apple Speeds Up WebKit’s JS Engine with LLVM JIT
Apple has improved the speed of Nitro with 35% – Safari’s JavaScript engine – by converting JavaScript into LLVM IR code which is then subject to heavy optimization.
Android++ with Zero Hardware Restrictions, MSBuild, LLVM, GCC, Integrated GDB Debugging
The recently released Android++ in closed beta enables you to build Android apps using Visual Studio with support for zero hardware restrictions, MSBuild, LLVM, GCC in addition to integrated GDB debugging.
FreeBSD 10 Alpha Built With clang
FreeBSD 10 has had its first alpha release, bringing with it a long planned for change to switch to the Clang compiler instead of GCC on platforms where it is available. It is also the first FreeBSD release to run on the Raspberry Pi. Read on to find out more about the decision to switch compilers, and what it means for users.
LLVM 3.3 Achieves Full C++11 Compliance
The latest release of the multiplatform LLVM compiler project adds new hardware targets, and increases compiler optimizations providing benefits for most users.
