Type-preserving compilation for large-scale optimizing object-oriented compilers

Chen, Juan; Hawblitzel, Chris; Perry, Frances; Emmi, Mike; Condit, Jeremy; Coetzee, Derrick; Pratikaki, Polyvios

doi:10.1145/1375581.1375604

Cited by 11 publications

(12 citation statements)

References 20 publications

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“…According to the benchmarks tested, programs compiled by Bartok are 0.94 to 4.13 times faster than the CLR versions, with a geometric mean of 1.66. Throughout this evaluation we compare against our previous work [4] in which we built a traditional certifying compiler, also based on Bartok, by making every compilation phase preserve types.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Most type systems for object-oriented typed assembly languages use type variables to distinguish between safe method invocations and unsafe code [3,4,10]. LILC [3], for example, describes p1's type and p2's type by existentially quantifying over a class variable α: both p1 and p2 have type ∃α≪Point.…”

Section: Language Italmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In our previous work, we modified about 19,000 lines of a 200,000-line compiler to implement type preservation [4]. Even a 10% modification may pose an obstacle to developers trying to retrofit large legacy compilers with type preservation, especially when these modifications require developers to interact with the complex type systems that are typical in typed compiler intermediate languages [4,10,[14][15][16]. As a result, programmers currently face a trade-off: use a popular existing compiler that does not certify the safety of its output, or use one of the few available experimental type-preserving compilers, which are less optimizing, less documented, and less supported.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Inferable object-oriented typed assembly language

2010

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A certifying compiler preserves type information through compilation to assembly language programs, producing typed assembly language (TAL) programs that can be verified for safety independently so that the compiler does not need to be trusted. There are two challenges for adopting certifying compilation in practice. First, requiring every compiler transformation and optimization to preserve types is a large burden on compilers, especially when adopting certifying compilation into existing optimizing non-certifying compilers. Second, type annotations significantly increase the size of assembly language programs. This paper proposes an alternative to traditional certifying compilers. It presents iTalX, the first inferable TAL type system that supports existential types, arrays, interfaces, and stacks. We have proved our inference algorithm is complete, meaning if an assembly language program is typeable with iTalX then our algorithm will infer an iTalX typing for that program. Furthermore, our algorithm is guaranteed to terminate even if the assembly language program is untypeable. We demonstrate that it is practical to infer such an expressive TAL by showing a prototype implementation of type inference for code compiled by Bartok, an optimizing C# compiler. Our prototype implementation infers complete type annotations for 98% of functions in a suite of realistic C# benchmarks. The typeinference time is about 8% of the compilation time. We needed to change only 2.5% of the compiler code, mostly adding new code for defining types and for writing types to object files. Most transformations are untouched. Type-annotation size is only 17% of the size of pure code and data, reducing type annotations in our previous certifying compiler [4] by 60%. The compiler needs to preserve only essential type information such as method signatures, object-layout information, and types for static data and external labels. Even non-certifying compilers have most of this information available.

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Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Language Italmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Inferable object-oriented typed assembly language

2010

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“…We must implement the dispatch as a binary comparison tree. 7 At the GCminor level, the function signatures that appear in app expressions and in the global descriptor array are represented by distinct integer encodings s, which can be cheaply compared for equality at runtime. These integers can be easily assigned by a global traversal of the program during translation.…”

Section: Case Study: Haskell To Dminor To Gcminormentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Hawblitzel and Petrank [14] apply this approach to realistic collectors for the Bartok C# compiler, using an automated theorem prover to verify the collectors. The root and record descriptor information needed by the collectormutator interface is verified using a typed assembly language [7]. The final allocator interface of our work, given in Fig.…”

Section: Related Workmentioning

confidence: 99%

A certified framework for compiling and executing garbage-collected languages

McCreight

Chevalier

Tolmach

2010

Proceedings of the 15th ACM SIGPLAN International Conference on Functional Programming

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We describe the design, implementation, and use of a machinecertified framework for correct compilation and execution of programs in garbage-collected languages. Our framework extends Leroy's Coq-certified Compcert compiler and Cminor intermediate language. We add: (i) a new intermediate language, GCminor, that includes primitives for allocating memory in a garbage-collected heap and for specifying GC roots; (ii) a precise, low-level specification for a Cminor library for garbage collection; and (iii) a proven semantics-preserving translation from GCminor to Cminor plus the GC library. GCminor neatly encapsulates the interface between mutator and collector code, while remaining simple and flexible enough to be used with a wide variety of source languages and collector styles. Front ends targeting GCminor can be implemented using any compiler technology and any desired degree of verification, including full semantics preservation, type preservation, or informal trust.As an example application of our framework, we describe a compiler for Haskell that translates the Glasgow Haskell Compiler's Core intermediate language to GCminor. To support a simple but useful memory safety argument for this compiler, the front end uses a novel combination of type preservation and runtime checks, which is of independent interest.

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