Subject: Re: Compiler timings on varous MVII NetBSDs etc.
To: None <tls@rek.tjls.com, port-vax@netbsd.org, tech-perform@netbsd.org>
From: Matt Thomas <matt@3am-software.com>
List: port-vax
Date: 01/23/2001 10:48:18
At 01:32 PM 1/23/2001 -0500, Thor Lancelot Simon wrote:
>pcc is a *terrible* compiler.  If we shipped pcc instead of gcc (not that
>we can, due to licensing; SCO owns the code) you'd be complaining about
>how slowly everything *else* on your system ran, instead of how slowly
>the compiler ran.  Your system may be slow now, but if you rebuilt the
>world with pcc, it would be a LOT WORSE.

pcc does sucks pond water.  Compilation time should not be what we are
comparing, but execution time.

>Gcc is not a very good compiler.  On the other hand, it's by far the best
>compiler available for the VAX.  It could probably be tweaked to be better,
>but I don't know how _much_ better.

I can answer that.  I've been working on GCC's code generation for VAX as
part of the ELF work.  I've been reducing the number of instruction by
about 4-8% and the code size by the same.  I've been adding optimizations
and peepholes to speedup and reduce code size.  In -current, I've tweaked
vax/include/macros.h to make many of the inlines more efficient.



--
Matt Thomas               Internet:   matt@3am-software.com
3am Software Foundry      WWW URL:    http://www.3am-software.com/bio/matt/
Cupertino, CA             Disclaimer: I avow all knowledge of this message