263-2810-00L  Advanced Compiler Design

SemesterAutumn Semester 2017
LecturersR. Eigenmann, T. Gross
Periodicityyearly recurring course
Language of instructionEnglish


AbstractThis course covers advanced topics in compiler design: SSA intermediate representation and its use in optimization, just-in-time compilation, profile-based compilation, exception handling in modern programming languages.
ObjectiveUnderstand translation of object-oriented programs, opportunities and difficulties in optimizing programs using state-of-the-art techniques (profile-based compilation, just-in-time compilation, runtime system interaction)
ContentThis course builds conceptually on Compiler Design (a basic class for advanced undergraduates), but this class is not a prerequisite. Students should however have a solid understanding of basic compiler technology.

The focus is on handling the key features of modern object-oriented programs. We review implementations of single and multiple inheritance (incl. object layout, method dispatch) and optimization opportunities.

Specific topics: intermediate representations (IR) for optimizing compilers, static single assignment (SSA) representation, constant folding, partial redundancy optimizations, profiling, profile-guided code generation. Special topics as time permits: debugging optimized code, multi-threading, data races, object races, memory consistency models, programming language design. Review of single inheritance, multiple inheritance, object layout, method dispatch, type analysis, type propagation and related topics.

This course provides another opportunity to explore software design in a medium-scale software project.
LiteratureAho/Lam/Sethi/Ullmann, Compilers - Principles, Techniques, and Tools (2nd Edition). In addition, papers as provided in the class.
Prerequisites / NoticeA basic course on compiler design is helpful but not mandatory. Student should have programming skills/experience to implement an optimizer (or significant parts of an optimizer) for a simple object-oriented language. The programming project is implemented using Java.