Re: [Tinycc-devel] (no subject)

[Dave Dodge]

On Fri, Sep 08, 2006 at 03:00:50PM +0200, Johannes Klarenbeek wrote:
> that depends on how you look at the way you write code... just to
> expect that a compiler does a better way optimizing stuff than a good
> programmer would, is a wrong assumption.

You have to take into account how forgiving the target architecture is
to the instruction ordering.  If the system is able to reorder and
reschedule work internally, then clean code with a non-optimizing
compiler can probably get fast results.

On the other hand you have platforms like IA-64, where in theory a
good compiler can get much better results than a bad compiler no
matter how good the incoming code is.  This sort of architecture
requires the compiler to explicitly reorder, bundle, group, and
schedule instructions ahead of time to hit the functional units on the
chip in the best way.  I think compiler design for IA-64 is an active
research area at several universities.

                                                  -Dave Dodge