I want clang to compile my C/C++
code to LLVM
bytecode rather than binary executable. How can I achieve that? And if I get the LLVM
bytecode, how can I take it to further compile it to binary executable.
Basically I want to add some of my own code to the LLVM
bytecode before compiling to binary executable.
Did you read clang
documentation ? You're probably looking for -emit-llvm
.
Use
clang -emit-llvm -o foo.bc -c foo.c
clang -o foo foo.bc
If you have multiple source files, you probably actually want to use link-time-optimization to output one bitcode file for the entire program. The other answers given will cause you to end up with a bitcode file for every source file.
Instead, you want to compile with link-time-optimization
clang -flto -c program1.c -o program1.o
clang -flto -c program2.c -o program2.o
and for the final linking step, add the argument -Wl,-plugin-opt=also-emit-llvm
clang -flto -Wl,-plugin-opt=also-emit-llvm program1.o program2.o -o program
This gives you both a compiled program and the bitcode corresponding to it (program.bc). You can then modify program.bc in any way you like, and recompile the modified program at any time by doing
clang program.bc -o program
although be aware that you need to include any necessary linker flags (for external libraries, etc) at this step again.
Note that you need to be using the gold linker for this to work. If you want to force clang to use a specific linker, create a symlink to that linker named "ld" in a special directory called "fakebin" somewhere on your computer, and add the option
-B/home/jeremy/fakebin
to any linking steps above.
If you have multiple files and you don't want to have to type each file, I would recommend that you follow these simple steps (I am using clang-3.8
but you can use any other version):
generate all .ll
files
clang-3.8 -S -emit-llvm *.c
link them into a single one
llvm-link-3.8 -S -v -o single.ll *.ll
(Optional) Optimise your code (maybe some alias analysis)
opt-3.8 -S -O3 -aa -basicaaa -tbaa -licm single.ll -o optimised.ll
Generate assembly (generates a optimised.s
file)
llc-3.8 optimised.ll
Create executable (named a.out
)
clang-3.8 optimised.s
Source: Stackoverflow.com