[erlang-questions] HiPE on powerpc

[Kostis Sagonas]

Sergei Golovan wrote:
> Hi!
> 
> When building Erlang/OTP (R11B-5) with HiPE enabled on powerpc64
> machine (but compiler generated 32-bit code) there is the following
> error:
> 
> beam/erl_bif_info.c: In function 'system_info_1':
> beam/erl_bif_info.c:1221: error: 'am_powerpc' undeclared (first use in
> this function)


Once upon a time (more than 2.5 years now, when G5s were coming out) we 
had a plan to develop a compiler back-end for powerpc64 and started the 
preparation for its development.  Then the following things happened:

   1. We had no powerpc64 machine available to test the port

   2. The financial support for the HiPE project run out

   3. Apple announced that its Macs would use Intel processors in the
      future

Their combination had a disastrous effect to our powerpc64 plans :-(

> Shouldn't HiPE architecture be adjusted in this case? Is the following
> patch correct?
> 
> -----------------
> --- erlang.orig/erts/configure.in
> +++ erlang/erts/configure.in
> @@ -372,6 +372,10 @@
>  	AC_MSG_RESULT(yes: adjusting ARCH=sparc64 to ARCH=ultrasparc)
>  	ARCH=ultrasparc
>  	;;
> +ppc64-4)
> +	AC_MSG_RESULT(yes: adjusting ARCH=ppc64 to ARCH=ppc)
> +	ARCH=ppc
> +	;;
>  *)
>  	AC_MSG_RESULT(no)
>  	;;
> -----------------

Most probably yes, but we have no way of testing this -- consequently, 
we cannot possibly guarantee anything.  If the machine truly runs in 
32-bit mode, then it will most probably work, but this is just an 
(educated) guess.

Cheers,
Kostis (for the HiPE group)