path: root/doc/il.txt

                ===========================
                 QBE Intermediate Language
                ===========================



- Table of Contents
-------------------

  1. <@ Basic Concepts >
      * <@ Input Files >
      * <@ BNF Notation >
      * <@ Sigils >
  2. <@ Types >
      * <@ Simple Types >
      * <@ Subtyping >
  3. <@ Constants >
  4. <@ Definitions >
      * <@ Aggregate Types >
      * <@ Data >
      * <@ Functions >
  5. <@ Control >
      * <@ Blocks >
      * <@ Jumps >
  6. <@ Instructions >
      * <@ Arithmetic and Bits >
      * <@ Memory >
      * <@ Comparisons >
      * <@ Conversions >
      * <@ Cast >
      * <@ Call >
      * <@ Phi >

- 1. Basic Concepts
-------------------

The intermediate language (IL) is a higher-level language
than the machine's assembly language.  It smoothes most
of the irregularities of the underlying hardware and
allows an infinite number of temporaries to be used.
This higher abstraction level allows frontend programmers
to focus on language design issues.

~ Input Files
~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The intermediate language is provided to QBE as text files.
Usually, one file is generated per each compilation unit of
the frontend input language.  An IL file is a sequence of
<@ Definitions > for data, functions, and types.  Once
processed by QBE, the resulting file can be assembled and
linked using a standard toolchain (e.g. GNU binutils).

Here is a complete "Hello World" IL file, it defines a
function that prints to the screen.  Since the string is
not a first class object (only the pointer is) it is
defined outside the function's body.

    # Define the string constant.
    data $str = { b "hello world", b 0 }

    function w $main() {
    @start
            # Call the puts function with $str as argument.
            %r =w call $puts(l $str)
            ret 0
    }

If you have read the LLVM language reference, you might
recognize the above example.  In comparison, QBE makes a
much lighter use of types and the syntax is terser.

~ BNF Notation
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The language syntax is vaporously described in the sections
below using BNF syntax.  The different BNF constructs used
are listed below.

  * Keywords are enclosed between quotes;
  * `... | ...` expresses disjunctions;
  * `[ ... ]` marks some syntax as optional;
  * `( ... ),` designates a comma-separated list of the
    enclosed syntax;
  * `...*` and `...+` are used for arbitrary and
    at-least-once repetition.

~ Sigils
~~~~~~~~

The intermediate language makes heavy use of sigils, all
user-defined names are prefixed with a sigil.  This is
to avoid keyword conflicts, and also to quickly spot the
scope and kind of an identifier.

 * `:` is for user-defined <@ Aggregate Types>
 * `$` is for globals (represented by a pointer)
 * `%` is for function-scope temporaries
 * `@` is for block labels

In BNF syntax, we use `?IDENT` to designate an identifier
starting with the sigil `?`.

- 2. Types
----------

~ Simple Types
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

    `bnf
    BASETY := 'w' | 'l' | 's' | 'd'  # Base types
    EXTTY  := BASETY    | 'h' | 'b'  # Extended types

The IL makes very minimal use of types.  By design, the types
used are restricted to what is necessary for unambiguous
compilation to machine code and C interfacing.  Unlike LLVM,
QBE is not using types as a means to safety; they are only
here for semantic purposes.

The four base types are `w` (word), `l` (long), `s` (single),
and `d` (double), they stand respectively for 32-bit and
64-bit integers, and 32-bit and 64-bit floating-point numbers.
There are no pointer types available; pointers are typed
by an integer type sufficiently wide to represent all memory
addresses (e.g. `l` on x64).  Temporaries in the IL can only
have a basic type.

Extended types contain base types and add `h` (half word)
and `b` (byte), respectively for 16 bits and 8 bits integers.
They are used in <@ Aggregate Types> and <@ Data> definitions.

For C interfacing, the IL also provides user-defined aggregate
types.  The syntax used to designate them is `:foo`.  Details
about their definition are given in the <@ Aggregate Types >
section.

~ Subtyping
~~~~~~~~~~~

The IL has a minimal subtyping feature for integer types.
Any value of type `l` can be used in a `w` context.  In that
case, only the 32 least significant bits of the word value
are used.

Make note that it is the inverse of the usual subtyping on
integers (in C, we can safely use an `int` where a `long`
is expected).  A long value cannot be used in word context.
The rationale is that a word can be signed or unsigned, so
extending it to a long can be done in two ways, either
by zero-extension, or by sign-extension.

- 3. Constants
--------------

    `bnf
    CONST :=
        ['-'] NUMBER  # Decimal integer
      | 's_' FP       # Single-precision float
      | 'd_' FP       # Double-precision float
      | $IDENT        # Global symbol

Throughout the IL, constants are specified with a unified
syntax and semantics.  Constants are immediates, meaning
that they can be used directly in instructions; there is
no need for a "load constant" instruction.

The representation of integers is two's complement.
Floating-point numbers are represented using the
single-precision and double-precision formats of the
IEEE 754 standard.

Constants specify a sequence of bits and are untyped.
They are always parsed as 64-bit blobs.  Depending on
the context surrounding a constant, only some of its
bits are used.  For example, in the program below, the
two variables defined have the same value since the first
operand of the substraction is a word (32 bits) context.

    %x =w sub -1, 0
    %y =w sub 4294967295, 0

Because specifying floating-point constants by their bits
makes the code less readable, syntactic sugar is provided
to express them.  Standard scientific notation is used with
a prefix of `s_` for single and `d_` for double-precision
numbers.  Once again, the following example defines twice
the same double-precision constant.

    %x =d add d_0, d_-1
    %y =d add d_0, -4616189618054758400

Global symbols can also be used directly as constants;
they will be resolved and turned into actual numeric
constants by the linker.

- 4. Definitions
----------------

Definitions are the essential components of an IL file.
They can define three types of objects: Aggregate types,
data, and functions.  Aggregate types are never exported
and do not compile to any code.  Data and function
definitions have file scope and are mutually recursive
(even across IL files).  Their visibility can be controlled
using the `export` keyword.

~ Aggregate Types
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

    `bnf
    TYPEDEF :=
        # Regular type
        'type' :IDENT '=' [ 'align' NUMBER ]
        '{'
            ( EXTTY [ NUMBER ] ),
        '}'
      | # Opaque type
        'type' :IDENT '=' 'align' NUMBER '{' NUMBER '}'

Aggregate type definitions start with the `type` keyword.
They have file scope, but types must be defined before their
first use.  The inner structure of a type is expressed by a
comma-separated list of <@ Simple Types> enclosed in curly
braces.

    type :fourfloats = { s, s, d, d }

For ease of generation, a trailing comma is tolerated by
the parser.  In case many items of the same type are
sequenced (like in a C array), the shorter array syntax
can be used.

    type :abyteandmanywords = { b, w 100 }

By default, the alignment of an aggregate type is the
maximum alignment of its members.  The alignment can be
explicitly specified by the programmer.

    type :cryptovector = align 16 { w 4 }

Opaque types are used when the inner structure of an
aggregate cannot be specified; the alignment for opaque
types is mandatory.  They are defined by simply enclosing
their size between curly braces.

    type :opaque = align 16 { 32 }

~ Data
~~~~~~

    `bnf
    DATADEF :=
        ['export'] 'data' $IDENT '='
        '{'
            ( EXTTY DATAITEM+
            | 'z'   NUMBER ),
        '}'

    DATAITEM :=
        $IDENT [ '+' NUMBER ]  # Symbol and offset
      |  '"' ... '"'           # String
      |  CONST                 # Constant

Data definitions define objects that will be emitted in the
compiled file.  They can be local to the file or exported
with global visibility to the whole program.

They define a global identifier (starting with the sigil
`$`), that will contain a pointer to the object specified
by the definition.

Objects are described by a sequence of fields that start with
a type letter.  This letter can either be an extended type,
or the `z` letter.  If the letter used is an extended type,
the data item following specifies the bits to be stored in
the field.  When several data items follow a letter, they
initialize multiple fields of the same size.

The members of a struct will be packed.  This means that
padding has to be emitted by the frontend when necessary.
Alignment of the whole data objects can be manually specified,
and when no alignment is provided, the maximum alignment of
the platform is used.

When the `z` letter is used the number following indicates
the size of the field, the contents of the field are zero
initialized.  It can be used to add padding between fields
or zero-initialize big arrays.

Here are various examples of data definitions.

    # Three 32 bits values 1, 2, and 3
    # followed by a 0 byte.
    data $a = { w 1 2 3, b 0 }

    # A thousand bytes 0 initialized.
    data $b = { z 1000 }

    # An object containing two 64 bits
    # fields, one with all bits sets and the
    # other containing a pointer to the
    # object itself.
    data $c = { l -1, l $c }

~ Functions
~~~~~~~~~~~

    `bnf
    FUNCDEF :=
        ['export'] 'function' [BASETY | :IDENT] $IDENT PARAMS
        '{'
           BLOCK+
        '}'

    PARAMS := '(' ( (BASETY | :IDENT) %IDENT ), ')'

Function definitions contain the actual code to emit in
the compiled file.  They define a global symbol that
contains a pointer to the function code.  This pointer
can be used in call instructions or stored in memory.

The type given right before the function name is the
return type of the function.  All return values of this
function must have the return type.  If the return
type is missing, the function cannot return any value.

The parameter list is a comma separated list of
temporary names prefixed by types.  The types are used
to correctly implement C compatibility.  When an argument
has an aggregate type, is is set on entry of the
function to a pointer to the aggregate passed by the
caller.  In the example below, we have to use a load
instruction to get the value of the first (and only)
member of the struct.

    type :one = { w }

    function w $getone(:one %p) {
    @start
            %val =w loadw %p
            ret %val
    }

Since global symbols are defined mutually recursive,
there is no need for function declarations: A function
can be referenced before its definition.
Similarly, functions from other modules can be used
without previous declarations.  All the type information
is provided in the call instructions.

The syntax and semantics for the body of functions
are described in the <@ Control > section.

- 5. Control
------------

The IL represents programs as textual transcriptions of
control flow graphs.  The control flow is serialized as
a sequence of blocks of straight-line code and connected
using jump instructions.

~ Blocks
~~~~~~~~

    `bnf
    BLOCK :=
        @IDENT    # Block label
        PHI*      # Phi instructions
        INST*     # Regular instructions
        JUMP      # Jump or return

All blocks have a name that is specified by a label at
their beginning.  Then follows a sequence of instructions
that have "fall-through" flow.  Finally one jump terminates
the block.  The jump can either transfer control to another
block of the same function or return, they are described
further below.

The first block in a function must not be the target of
any jump in the program.  If this need is encountered,
the frontend can always insert an empty prelude block
at the beginning of the function.

When one block jumps to the next block in the IL file,
it is not necessary to give the jump instruction, it
will be automatically added by the parser.  For example
the start block in the example below jumps directly
to the loop block.

    function $loop() {
    @start
    @loop
            %x =w phi @start 100, @loop %x1
            %x1 =w sub %x, 1
            jnz %x1, @loop, @end
    @end
            ret
    }

~ Jumps
~~~~~~~

    `bnf
    JUMP :=
        'jmp' @IDENT               # Unconditional
      | 'jnz' VAL, @IDENT, @IDENT  # Conditional
      | 'ret' [ VAL ]              # Return

A jump instruction ends every block and transfers the
control to another program location.  The target of
a jump must never be the first block in a function.
The three kinds of jumps available are described in
the following list.

 1. Unconditional jump.

    Simply jumps to another block of the same function.

 2. Conditional jump.

    When its word argument is non-zero, it jumps to its
    first label argument; otherwise it jumps to the other
    label.  The argument must be of word type, because of
    subtyping a long argument can be passed, but only its
    least significant 32 bits will be compared to 0.

 3. Function return.

    Terminates the execution of the current function,
    optionally returning a value to the caller.  The value
    returned must have the type given in the function
    prototype.  If the function prototype does not specify
    a return type, no return value can be used.

- 6. Instructions
-------------------------

Instructions are the smallest piece of code in the IL, they
form the body of <@ Blocks >.  The IL uses a three-address
code, which means that one instruction computes an operation
between two operands and assigns the result to a third one.

An instruction has both a name and a return type, this
return type is a base type that defines the size of the
instruction's result.  The type of the arguments can be
unambiguously inferred using the instruction name and the
return type.  For example, for all arithmetic instructions,
the type of the arguments is the same as the return type.
The two additions below are valid if `%y` is a word or a long
(because of <@ Subtyping >).

    %x =w add 0, %y
    %z =w add %x, %x

Some instructions, like comparisons and memory loads
have operand types that differ from their return types.
For instance, two floating points can be compared to give a
word result (0 if the comparison succeeds, 1 if it fails).

    %c =w cgts %a, %b

In the example above, both operands have to have single type.
This is made explicit by the instruction suffix.

The types of instructions are described below using a short
type string.  A type string specifies all the valid return
types an instruction can have, its arity, and the type of
its arguments in function of its return type.

Type strings begin with acceptable return types, then
follows, in parentheses, the possible types for the arguments.
If the n-th return type of the type string is used for an
instruction, the arguments must use the n-th type listed for
them in the type string.  When an instruction does not have a
return type, the type string only contains the types of the
arguments.

The following abbreviations are used.

  * `T` stands for `wlsd`
  * `I` stands for `wl`
  * `F` stands for `sd`
  * `m` stands for the type of pointers on the target, on
    x64 it is the same as `l`

For example, consider the type string `wl(F)`, it mentions
that the instruction has only one argument and that if the
return type used is long, the argument must be of type double.

~ Arithmetic and Bits
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

  * `add`, `sub`, `div`, `mul` -- `T(T,T)`
  * `udiv`, `rem`, `urem` -- `I(I,I)`
  * `or`, `xor`, `and` -- `I(I,I)`
  * `sar`, `shr`, `shl` -- `I(I,ww)`

The base arithmetic instructions in the first bullet are
available for all types, integers and floating points.

When `div` is used with word or long return type, the
arguments are treated as signed.  The unsigned integral
division is available as `udiv` instruction.  When the
result of a division is not an integer, it is truncated
towards zero.

The signed and unsigned remainder operations are available
as `rem` and `urem`.  The sign of the remainder is the same
as the one of the dividend.  Its magnitude is smaller than
the divisor's.  These two instructions and `udiv` are only
available with integer arguments and result.

Bitwise OR, AND, and XOR operations are available for both
integer types.  Logical operations of typical programming
languages can be implemented using <@ Comparisons > and
<@ Jumps >.

Shift instructions `sar`, `shr`, and `shl` shift right or
left their first operand by the amount in the second
operand.  The shifting amount is taken modulo the size of
the result type.  Shifting right can either preserve the
sign of the value (using `sar`), or fill the newly freed
bits with zeroes (using `shr`).  Shifting left always
fills the freed bits with zeroes.

Remark that an arithmetic shift right (`sar`) is only
equivalent to a division by a power of two for non-negative
numbers.  This is because the shift right "truncates"
towards minus infinity, while the division truncates
towards zero.

~ Memory
~~~~~~~~

  * Store instructions.

      * `stored` -- `(d,m)`
      * `stores` -- `(s,m)`
      * `storel` -- `(l,m)`
      * `storew` -- `(w,m)`
      * `storeh` -- `(w,m)`
      * `storeb` -- `(w,m)`

    Store instructions exist to store a value of any base type
    and any extended type.  Since halfwords and bytes are not
    first class in the IL, `storeh` and `storeb` take a word
    as argument.  Only the first 16 or 8 bits of this word will
    be stored in memory at the address specified in the second
    argument.

  * Load instructions.

      * `loadd` -- `d(m)`
      * `loads` -- `s(m)`
      * `loadl` -- `l(m)`
      * `loadsw`, `loadzw` -- `I(mm)`
      * `loadsh`, `loadzh` -- `I(mm)`
      * `loadsb`, `loadzb` -- `I(mm)`

    For types smaller than long, two variants of the load
    instruction is available: one will sign extend the value
    loaded, while the other will zero extend it.  Remark that
    all loads smaller than long can load to either a long or
    a word.

    The two instructions `loadsw` and `loadzw` have the same
    effect when they are used to define a word temporary.
    A `loadw` instruction is provided as syntactic sugar for
    `loadsw` to make explicit that the extension mechanism
    used is irrelevant.

  * Stack allocation.

      * `alloc4` -- `m(l)`
      * `alloc8` -- `m(l)`
      * `alloc16` -- `m(l)`

    These instructions allocate a chunk of memory on the
    stack.  The number ending the instruction name is the
    alignment required for the allocated slot.  QBE will
    make sure that the returned address is a multiple of
    that alignment value.

    Stack allocation instructions are used, for example,
    when compiling the C local variables, because their
    address can be taken.  When compiling Fortran,
    temporaries can be used directly instead, because
    it is illegal to take the address of a variable.

The following example makes use some of the memory
instructions.  Pointers are stored in long temporaries.

    %A0 =l alloc4 8      # stack allocate an array A of 2 words
    %A1 =l add %A0, 4
    storew 43,  %A0      # A[0] <- 43
    storew 255, %A1      # A[1] <- 255
    %v1 =w loadw  %A0    # %v1 <- A[0] as word
    %v2 =w loadsb %A1    # %v2 <- A[1] as signed byte
    %v3 =w add %v1, %v2  # %v3 is 42 here

~ Comparisons
~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Comparison instructions return an integer value (either a word
or a long), and compare values of arbitrary types.  The value
returned is 1 if the two operands satisfy the comparison
relation, and 0 otherwise.  The names of comparisons respect
a standard naming scheme in three parts.

 1. All comparisons start with the letter `c`.

 2. Then comes a comparison type.  The following
    types are available for integer comparisons:

      * `eq` for equality
      * `ne` for inequality
      * `sle` for signed lower or equal
      * `slt` for signed lower
      * `sge` for signed greater or equal
      * `sgt` for signed greater
      * `ule` for unsigned lower or equal
      * `ult` for unsigned lower
      * `uge` for unsigned greater or equal
      * `ugt` for unsigned greater

    Floating point comparisons use one of these types:

      * `eq` for equality
      * `ne` for inequality
      * `le` for lower or equal
      * `lt` for lower
      * `ge` for greater or equal
      * `gt` for greater
      * `o` for ordered (no operand is a NaN)
      * `uo` for unordered (at least one operand is a NaN)

    Because floating point types always have a sign bit,
    all the comparisons available are signed.

 3. Finally, the instruction name is terminated with a
    basic type suffix precising the type of the operands
    to be compared.

For example, `cod` (`I(dd,dd)`) compares two double-precision
floating point numbers and returns 1 if the two floating points
are not NaNs, and 0 otherwise.  The `csltw` (`I(ww,ww)`)
instruction compares two words representing signed numbers and
returns 1 when the first argument is smaller than the second one.

~ Conversions
~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Conversion operations allow to change the representation of
a value, possibly modifying it if the target type cannot hold
the value of the source type.  Conversions can extend the
precision of a temporary (e.g. from signed 8 bits to 32 bits),
or convert a floating point into an integer and vice versa.

  * `extsw`, `extzw` -- `l(w)`
  * `extsh`, `extzh` -- `I(ww)`
  * `extsb`, `extzb` -- `I(ww)`
  * `exts` -- `d(s)`
  * `truncd` -- `s(d)`
  * `ftosi` -- `I(F)`
  * `sitof` -- `F(I)`

Extending the precision of a temporary is done using the
`ext` family of instructions.  Because QBE types do not
precise the signedness (like in LLVM), extension instructions
exist to sign-extend and zero-extend a value.  For example,
`extsb` takes a word argument and sign-extend the 8
least-significant bits to a full word or long, depending on
the return type.

The instructions `exts` and `truncd` are provided to change
the precision of a floating point value.  When the double
argument of `truncd` cannot be represented as a
single-precision floating point, it is truncated towards
zero.

Converting between signed integers and floating points is
done using `ftosi` (float to signed integer) and `sitof`
(signed integer to float).  Note that the bit width of the
argument depends on the return type.  A double floatint
point number can only be converted directly to a long
integer.

Because of <@ Subtyping >, there is no need to have an
instruction to lower the precision of an integer temporary.

~ Cast
~~~~~~

The `cast` instruction reinterprets the bits of a value of
a given type into another type of the same width.

  * `cast` -- `wlsd(sdwl)`

It can be used to make bitwise operations on the
representation of floating point numbers.  For example
the following program will compute the opposite of the
single-precision floating point number `%f` into `%rs`.

    %b0 =w cast %f
    %b1 =w xor 2147483648, %b0  # flip the msb
    %rs =s cast %b1

~ Call
~~~~~~

    `bnf
    CALL := %IDENT '=' ( BASETY | :IDENT ) 'call' VAL PARAMS

    PARAMS := '(' ( (BASETY | :IDENT) %IDENT ), ')'

The call instruction is special in many ways.  It is not
a three-address instruction and requires the type of all
its arguments to be given.  Also, the return type can be
either a base type or an aggregate type.  These specificities
are required to compile calls with C compatibility (i.e.
to respect the ABI).

When an aggregate type is used as argument type or return
type, the value repectively passed or returned needs to be
a pointer to a memory location holding the value.  This is
because aggregate types are not first-class citizens of
the IL.

Call instructions are currently required to define a return
temporary, even for functions returning no values.  The
temporary can very well be ignored (not used) when necessary.

~ Phi
~~~~~

    `bnf
    PHI := %IDENT '=' BASETY 'phi' ( @IDENT VAL ),

First and foremost, phi instructions are NOT necessary when
writing a frontend to QBE.  One solution to avoid having to
deal with SSA form is to use stack allocated variables for
all source program variables and perform assignments and
lookups using <@ Memory > operations.  This is what LLVM
users typically do.

Another solution is to simply emit code that is not in SSA
form!  Contrary to LLVM, QBE is able to fixup programs not
in SSA form without requiring the boilerplate of loading
and storing in memory.  For example, the following program
will be correctly compiled by QBE.

    @start
            %x =w copy 100
            %s =w copy 0
    @loop
            %s =w add %s, %x
            %x =w sub %x, 1
            jnz %x, @loop, @end
    @end
            ret %s

Now, if you want to know what a phi instruction is and how
to use them in QBE, you can read the following.

Phi instructions are specific to SSA form.  In SSA form
values can only be assigned once, without phi instructions,
this requirement is too strong to represent many programs.
For example consider the following C program.

    int f(int x) {
            int y;
            if (x)
                    y = 1;
            else
                    y = 2;
            return y;
    }

The variable `y` is assigned twice, the solution to
translate it in SSA form is to insert a phi instruction.

    @ifstmt
            jnz %x, @ift, @iff
    @ift
            jmp @retstmt
    @iff
            jmp @retstmt
    @retstmt
            %y =w phi @ift 1, @iff 2
            ret %y

The phi in the example expresses a choice depending on
which block the control came from.  When the `@ift` block
is taken, the phi instruction defining `%y` selects 1;
if `@iff` is taken, 2 is selected.

An important remark about phi instructions is that QBE
assumes that if a variable is defined by a phi it respects
all the SSA invariants.  So it is critical to not use phi
instructions unless you know exactly what you are doing.