[Ecls-list] Announce: A new C++ based implementation of Common Lisp based on the ECL CL code

[Anton Vodonosov]

17.03.2013, 02:08, "Juan Jose Garcia-Ripoll" <juanjose.garciaripoll at gmail.com>:
> On Sat, Mar 16, 2013 at 3:29 PM, Anton Vodonosov <avodonosov at yandex.ru> wrote:
>> As ECL can compiles List to C, a C compiler generating LLVM code may be used
>> (llvm-gcc or clang).
>
> What Christian is doing is more what I thought should be done: automatically generating LLVM bytecode and loading it with LLVM, so that it is natively compiled. Using clang is not really winning anything: one may just as well use any other C ocmpiler

There is a potential win: LLVM may be compiled not only to native code. 

My primary interest is javascript, see here: https://github.com/kripken/emscripten
I dream about full CL in browser :)

>> Juan Jose, Christian, how can you compare Lisp -> C -> LLVM with Lisp -> LLVM
>> solution to ECL?
>> My understantind (pure theoretical, I haven't tried any of that):
>> if ECL can generate LLVM directly, it is a simplification to user, less tools to chain.
>> But Lisp to LLVM required efforts to implement and will also take mainenance efforts.
>> Christian, have you compared these options, or you were just guided by interest
>> to learn/try your own Lisp -> LLVM implementation?
>
> ECL's current compiler generates C, but this is done on a second pass that may be abstracted out to use a different backend. This is what I was trying with the new compiler, but I found I do not have enough time for doing the compiler as well as the backend -- at least not in the near future. However, if Christian's tools for the generation of LLVM code are readable enough, I believe they could be used with ECL as well, coexisting with the C backend.
>

Aha, OK (I hope I understood what you mean).