Re: [Tinycc-devel] Porting TCC to RTLinux

[Calin A. Culianu]

On Thu, 23 Nov 2006, Basile STARYNKEVITCH wrote:

> For a kernel stuff, I tend to think that user interaction should be
> done thru a helper application. Hence !i still believe that something
> like lightning or libjit is the best approach. This helper application
> could statically check the high-level code input by the user (so you
> might write a type inference system for this) and translate it to
> something else (a low level representation) that the kernel would use
> to generate machine code.

That's true.  But that would require designing a language, writing a 
parser, and basically a lot of work.  I agree it's a more elegant, 
correct, and ideal approach.  Right now I don't think anyone would notice 
if I just got C working -- I am about 95% there, and really this is just a 
small part of a much larger problem we are trying to solve.

> And BTX tinycc generate machine code which is not better than what
> you'll get with lightning, and which could be worse that what you get
> with libjit.

Ok, point well taken.

> Kernel code have severe constraints - you mentioned the 4k stack . So
> you probably should put entirely a full compiler in it. And as you
> mentioned, C is already too low level for you.

Yes.  *Sigh*.  Yes, I know this approach of using tcc is hackish as best. 
I'll cope with it.  Ideally I wish I had more time to work on this and to 
do it correctly.

-Calin