3 ms·

Kind of surprised to see an article about TableGen hit #1 on HN. TableGen is pretty arcane. I had some dealings with it in about 2016 while creating a backend

Kind of surprised to see an article about TableGen hit #1 on HN. TableGen is pretty arcane. I had some dealings with it in about 2016 while creating a backend for compiler targeting a new processor architecture. It was very poorly documented then - mostly you looked at what other people had done with other architectures and tried to fit that into what was needed for your new architecture. Anyway, I guess I'd be surprised if even 1,000 people in the world needed to actually do much with TableGen.

matt_d 3y ago
FWIW, its use has grown over time, with new applications most significantly including MLIR (Multi-Level IR compiler framework, which allows you to define your own intermediate representations as well as compiler passes operating on them), https://mlir.llvm.org/docs/DefiningDialects/Operations/ https://mlir.llvm.org/docs/DefiningDialects/Operations/ The docs have been improving, https://llvm.org/docs/TableGen/ https://llvm.org/docs/TableGen/ I also like these resources: Lessons in TableGen FOSDEM 2019; Nicolai Hähnle https://fosdem.org/2019/schedule/event/llvm_tablegen/ https://fosdem.org/2019/schedule/event/llvm_tablegen/ - What has TableGen ever done for us?, http://nhaehnle.blogspot.com/2018/02/tablegen-1-what-has-tablegen-ever-done.html http://nhaehnle.blogspot.com/2018/02/tablegen-1-what-has-tab... - Functional Programming, http://nhaehnle.blogspot.com/2018/02/tablegen-2-functional-programming.html http://nhaehnle.blogspot.com/2018/02/tablegen-2-functional-p... - Bits, http://nhaehnle.blogspot.com/2018/02/tablegen-3-bits.html http://nhaehnle.blogspot.com/2018/02/tablegen-3-bits.html - Resolving variables, http://nhaehnle.blogspot.com/2018/03/tablegen-4-resolving-variables.html http://nhaehnle.blogspot.com/2018/03/tablegen-4-resolving-va... - DAGs, http://nhaehnle.blogspot.com/2018/03/tablegen-5-dags.html http://nhaehnle.blogspot.com/2018/03/tablegen-5-dags.html

matt_d 3y ago

FWIW, its use has grown over time, with new applications most significantly including MLIR (Multi-Level IR compiler framework, which allows you to define your own intermediate representations as well as compiler passes operating on them), https://mlir.llvm.org/docs/DefiningDialects/Operations/ https://mlir.llvm.org/docs/DefiningDialects/Operations/ The docs have been improving, https://llvm.org/docs/TableGen/ https://llvm.org/docs/TableGen/ I also like these resources: Lessons in TableGen FOSDEM 2019; Nicolai Hähnle https://fosdem.org/2019/schedule/event/llvm_tablegen/ https://fosdem.org/2019/schedule/event/llvm_tablegen/ - What has TableGen ever done for us?, http://nhaehnle.blogspot.com/2018/02/tablegen-1-what-has-tablegen-ever-done.html http://nhaehnle.blogspot.com/2018/02/tablegen-1-what-has-tab... - Functional Programming, http://nhaehnle.blogspot.com/2018/02/tablegen-2-functional-programming.html http://nhaehnle.blogspot.com/2018/02/tablegen-2-functional-p... - Bits, http://nhaehnle.blogspot.com/2018/02/tablegen-3-bits.html http://nhaehnle.blogspot.com/2018/02/tablegen-3-bits.html - Resolving variables, http://nhaehnle.blogspot.com/2018/03/tablegen-4-resolving-variables.html http://nhaehnle.blogspot.com/2018/03/tablegen-4-resolving-va... - DAGs, http://nhaehnle.blogspot.com/2018/03/tablegen-5-dags.html http://nhaehnle.blogspot.com/2018/03/tablegen-5-dags.html