llvm dev - Mar 2007 - [LLVMdev] LLVM with Microsoft Visual Studio

Can Microsoft Visual Studio be a good tool for making a backend for an
architecture?

Thanks,
Seung

---- Original message ----
>Date: Mon, 12 Mar 2007 12:44:48 -0700
>From: Jeff Cohen <jeffc at jolt-lang.org>  
>Subject: Re: [LLVMdev] LLVM with Microsoft Visual Studio  
>To: LLVM Developers Mailing List <llvmdev at cs.uiuc.edu>
>
>Andreas Fredriksson wrote:
>> On 3/12/07, Jeff Cohen <jeffc at jolt-lang.org> wrote:
>>
>>> That's what we do.  We define it in
llvm/lib/System/Win32/Win32.h, which
>>> in included by every file that uses the Win32 API.  There is no
reason
>>> for you to redefine it.  Changing it to an earlier version will
cause
>>> build failures, changing it to a later version will have no effect,
>>> other than to permit the use of more recent Win32 APIs that will
prevent
>>> LLVM from running on versions as old as Windows 2000.
>>
>> Yes; my point was merely that in some build environments it's
>> convenient to just define it to , say, Windows XP all across the
>> solution with a property sheet (as we had done).
>
>But why modify our solution to make this change?  How is it convenient 
>to change something that worked, and in the process create a problem 
>you'd like us to fix?  And, of course, when you pull the 2.0 tarball, 
>you'll have to make the change all over again :)
>>
>> // A
>>
>
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It would be, if not for one small problem:  there are no front ends 
available to feed code to your new backend, unless you plan on writing 
one yourself.  llvm-gcc cannot be built with VC++ and cannot be linked 
to an llvm that is.  The best you can do is to use bytecodes produced by 
an llvm-gcc built elsewhere, but be aware they will have dependencies on 
the gcc runtime for that elsewhere.  But you can't beat its debugger :)

Seung Jae Lee wrote:
> Can Microsoft Visual Studio be a good tool for making a backend for an
architecture?
>
> Thanks,
> Seung
>
>