Comment by trott
1 year ago
> Terra programs use the same LLVM backend that Apple uses for its C compilers.
Can it use anything else (as an option), e.g. Lua? That would be useful during development/debugging thanks to faster iteration and memory safety.
LLVM would not be easily replaced, https://chriscummins.cc/2019/llvm-cost/
> 1.2k developers have produced a 6.9M line code base with an estimated price tag of $530M.
Although it's true that replacing LLVM like-for-like would indeed be expensive, I feel like you missed GP's point. To make the easier to debug, what you want is to replace LLVM with something simple, like a plain interpreter. And writing one (or adapting one) would be nothing like this cost.
Any precedent example for an LLVM-hosted language? There are benefits from being on the same toolchain as popular languages.
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that's a fallacy that was ignored when starting llvm and looking at the already existing gcc.