Re: Doubts about GCC project advancement (Demangler).

[Krishna Narayanan <krishnanarayanan132002@gmail.com>]

Respected Sir,
Thanks for your reply.
I will build the trunk version of gcc right away.
I have had interest in the C/C++/Java since sometime and working on it
seems great.
Demangler is a term which I am not familiar with but function
overloading,constructors, polymorphism are those which I am used to.After
googling things out I now have a basic idea of Demangler/mangler terms.
I went through some material of extern C and implicit stacks which has(
LIFO).But I don't know the in depth mechanism that happens within the
compiler regarding stacks where can I read more about it?
I went through the C memory management which states about dss,stack,heap
which gave me a brief idea about the domain,I read the demangling
chapter:28 of gcc docs,which states about the actual code(program) but not
familiar with ABI,abi.h so I have to go through it once.The project idea
demands a explicit stacks where the number of stack,stack frame are not
sure,so there is going to be heap memory mismanagement.So how do I proceed
to work on this!?
What are basic terminologies(code base) and concepts which I should be
familiar with to work on this project?
Can I work on this project ?
Hoping for your reply soon.
Thanks and regards,
Krishna Narayanan.




On Mon, Jan 24, 2022, 3:53 PM Martin Jambor <mjambor@suse.cz> wrote:

> Hello,
>
> I am delighted you found contributing to GCC interesting.  Sorry for the
> delay in replying.
>
> I am adding the GCC mailing list in case other GCC developers have
> something to add to my reply.  It is usually a good idea to email the
> list and not an individual, if only because most of the community is
> better at timely replies than I am.
>
> On Wed, Jan 19 2022, Krishna wrote:
> > Respected Sir,
> >
> > Hello,I am Krishna Narayanan ,an undergraduate pursuing electronics and
> > telecommunications,I am a beginner and new to this community.I kicked
> > off by building the gcc from source and I have successfully build the
> > gcc 10.1 on my linux which had a default of gcc-9.3.0.
>
> If you want to contribute new features (as opposed to fixing old bugs),
> you should really check-out the current development version (master) from
> our git and build that.  If you managed to build gcc 10 from the
> sources, you should find it easy.  But in order to study the sources to
> plan your project, it is important to look at the current version.
>
> Although git master is a moving target, usually that is generally not a
> problem and until approximately April we are now in bug-fixing stage
> only, so it really should not be a concern.  Later, if there are any big
> changes in an area related to your GSoC project, your mentor will help
> you overcome it.
>
> > I was surfing for
> > projects but GCC caught my attention as I was familiar with the
> > technologies and eager to learn more in depth about the compiler.
> >
> > I am not familiar with many terms but trying to cope up with it.
>
> This might not be easy but perhaps there is still time to learn the
> important basics, depending on the area in which you'd like to work.
>
> In most cases, you would need at least to know what an Intermediate
> Language (IR) is and have a general understanding of the relevant one in
> GCC - which is probably Gimple or the representation used by the
> front-end (such as Fortran or Rust) if you decide to contribute to one.
>
> The "Make cp-demangle non-recursive" project requires "just" good
> working knowledge of C and how to implement a recursion driven by an
> explicit stack.
>
> > I went
> > through last year projects read about their definitions what they meant
> > and what was modified/changed for a better enhancement but I did'nt get
> > a grasp over it as I have just started. Can you suggest me some good
> > first issues,
>
> No unfortunately I cannot.  Perhaps someone else might.  But I am afraid
> there are not very many open easy issues in GCC.  Easy issues get fixed
> quickly.
>
> But if you have a specific question abut any particular term or problem,
> feel free to ask on the mailing list.  It might even help us to phrase
> it better on our wiki.
>
> > I have read the simple projects given on the webpage  about
> > debugging of test suites but I did not get a clear idea about that,can
> > you suggest me a tutprial or manual which I can follow debugging
>
> Perhaps https://dmalcolm.fedorapeople.org/gcc/newbies-guide/index.html
> and especially
> https://dmalcolm.fedorapeople.org/gcc/newbies-guide/debugging.html
>
> >I read
> > about project topics but have a doubt regarding their implementation for
> > example I understood static analysis pass but how do I implement it in
> > gcc,!?
>
> GCC already has static analyzer, it just needs to be extended (see files
> in subdirectory src/gcc/analyzer after you have checked out our master).
> Figuring out how to extend it - with the help of the community(!) - is
> part of the game.  So again, if you have any specific question about it,
> feel free to ask.
>
> Hope this helps at least a little,
>
> Martin
>