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1=======================================================
2Kaleidoscope: Extending the Language: Mutable Variables
3=======================================================
4
5.. contents::
6   :local:
7
8Chapter 7 Introduction
9======================
10
11Welcome to Chapter 7 of the "`Implementing a language with
12LLVM <index.html>`_" tutorial. In chapters 1 through 6, we've built a
13very respectable, albeit simple, `functional programming
14language <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Functional_programming>`_. In our
15journey, we learned some parsing techniques, how to build and represent
16an AST, how to build LLVM IR, and how to optimize the resultant code as
17well as JIT compile it.
18
19While Kaleidoscope is interesting as a functional language, the fact
20that it is functional makes it "too easy" to generate LLVM IR for it. In
21particular, a functional language makes it very easy to build LLVM IR
22directly in `SSA
23form <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Static_single_assignment_form>`_.
24Since LLVM requires that the input code be in SSA form, this is a very
25nice property and it is often unclear to newcomers how to generate code
26for an imperative language with mutable variables.
27
28The short (and happy) summary of this chapter is that there is no need
29for your front-end to build SSA form: LLVM provides highly tuned and
30well tested support for this, though the way it works is a bit
31unexpected for some.
32
33Why is this a hard problem?
34===========================
35
36To understand why mutable variables cause complexities in SSA
37construction, consider this extremely simple C example:
38
39.. code-block:: c
40
41    int G, H;
42    int test(_Bool Condition) {
43      int X;
44      if (Condition)
45        X = G;
46      else
47        X = H;
48      return X;
49    }
50
51In this case, we have the variable "X", whose value depends on the path
52executed in the program. Because there are two different possible values
53for X before the return instruction, a PHI node is inserted to merge the
54two values. The LLVM IR that we want for this example looks like this:
55
56.. code-block:: llvm
57
58    @G = weak global i32 0   ; type of @G is i32*
59    @H = weak global i32 0   ; type of @H is i32*
60
61    define i32 @test(i1 %Condition) {
62    entry:
63      br i1 %Condition, label %cond_true, label %cond_false
64
65    cond_true:
66      %X.0 = load i32* @G
67      br label %cond_next
68
69    cond_false:
70      %X.1 = load i32* @H
71      br label %cond_next
72
73    cond_next:
74      %X.2 = phi i32 [ %X.1, %cond_false ], [ %X.0, %cond_true ]
75      ret i32 %X.2
76    }
77
78In this example, the loads from the G and H global variables are
79explicit in the LLVM IR, and they live in the then/else branches of the
80if statement (cond\_true/cond\_false). In order to merge the incoming
81values, the X.2 phi node in the cond\_next block selects the right value
82to use based on where control flow is coming from: if control flow comes
83from the cond\_false block, X.2 gets the value of X.1. Alternatively, if
84control flow comes from cond\_true, it gets the value of X.0. The intent
85of this chapter is not to explain the details of SSA form. For more
86information, see one of the many `online
87references <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Static_single_assignment_form>`_.
88
89The question for this article is "who places the phi nodes when lowering
90assignments to mutable variables?". The issue here is that LLVM
91*requires* that its IR be in SSA form: there is no "non-ssa" mode for
92it. However, SSA construction requires non-trivial algorithms and data
93structures, so it is inconvenient and wasteful for every front-end to
94have to reproduce this logic.
95
96Memory in LLVM
97==============
98
99The 'trick' here is that while LLVM does require all register values to
100be in SSA form, it does not require (or permit) memory objects to be in
101SSA form. In the example above, note that the loads from G and H are
102direct accesses to G and H: they are not renamed or versioned. This
103differs from some other compiler systems, which do try to version memory
104objects. In LLVM, instead of encoding dataflow analysis of memory into
105the LLVM IR, it is handled with `Analysis
106Passes <../WritingAnLLVMPass.html>`_ which are computed on demand.
107
108With this in mind, the high-level idea is that we want to make a stack
109variable (which lives in memory, because it is on the stack) for each
110mutable object in a function. To take advantage of this trick, we need
111to talk about how LLVM represents stack variables.
112
113In LLVM, all memory accesses are explicit with load/store instructions,
114and it is carefully designed not to have (or need) an "address-of"
115operator. Notice how the type of the @G/@H global variables is actually
116"i32\*" even though the variable is defined as "i32". What this means is
117that @G defines *space* for an i32 in the global data area, but its
118*name* actually refers to the address for that space. Stack variables
119work the same way, except that instead of being declared with global
120variable definitions, they are declared with the `LLVM alloca
121instruction <../LangRef.html#alloca-instruction>`_:
122
123.. code-block:: llvm
124
125    define i32 @example() {
126    entry:
127      %X = alloca i32           ; type of %X is i32*.
128      ...
129      %tmp = load i32* %X       ; load the stack value %X from the stack.
130      %tmp2 = add i32 %tmp, 1   ; increment it
131      store i32 %tmp2, i32* %X  ; store it back
132      ...
133
134This code shows an example of how you can declare and manipulate a stack
135variable in the LLVM IR. Stack memory allocated with the alloca
136instruction is fully general: you can pass the address of the stack slot
137to functions, you can store it in other variables, etc. In our example
138above, we could rewrite the example to use the alloca technique to avoid
139using a PHI node:
140
141.. code-block:: llvm
142
143    @G = weak global i32 0   ; type of @G is i32*
144    @H = weak global i32 0   ; type of @H is i32*
145
146    define i32 @test(i1 %Condition) {
147    entry:
148      %X = alloca i32           ; type of %X is i32*.
149      br i1 %Condition, label %cond_true, label %cond_false
150
151    cond_true:
152      %X.0 = load i32* @G
153      store i32 %X.0, i32* %X   ; Update X
154      br label %cond_next
155
156    cond_false:
157      %X.1 = load i32* @H
158      store i32 %X.1, i32* %X   ; Update X
159      br label %cond_next
160
161    cond_next:
162      %X.2 = load i32* %X       ; Read X
163      ret i32 %X.2
164    }
165
166With this, we have discovered a way to handle arbitrary mutable
167variables without the need to create Phi nodes at all:
168
169#. Each mutable variable becomes a stack allocation.
170#. Each read of the variable becomes a load from the stack.
171#. Each update of the variable becomes a store to the stack.
172#. Taking the address of a variable just uses the stack address
173   directly.
174
175While this solution has solved our immediate problem, it introduced
176another one: we have now apparently introduced a lot of stack traffic
177for very simple and common operations, a major performance problem.
178Fortunately for us, the LLVM optimizer has a highly-tuned optimization
179pass named "mem2reg" that handles this case, promoting allocas like this
180into SSA registers, inserting Phi nodes as appropriate. If you run this
181example through the pass, for example, you'll get:
182
183.. code-block:: bash
184
185    $ llvm-as < example.ll | opt -mem2reg | llvm-dis
186    @G = weak global i32 0
187    @H = weak global i32 0
188
189    define i32 @test(i1 %Condition) {
190    entry:
191      br i1 %Condition, label %cond_true, label %cond_false
192
193    cond_true:
194      %X.0 = load i32* @G
195      br label %cond_next
196
197    cond_false:
198      %X.1 = load i32* @H
199      br label %cond_next
200
201    cond_next:
202      %X.01 = phi i32 [ %X.1, %cond_false ], [ %X.0, %cond_true ]
203      ret i32 %X.01
204    }
205
206The mem2reg pass implements the standard "iterated dominance frontier"
207algorithm for constructing SSA form and has a number of optimizations
208that speed up (very common) degenerate cases. The mem2reg optimization
209pass is the answer to dealing with mutable variables, and we highly
210recommend that you depend on it. Note that mem2reg only works on
211variables in certain circumstances:
212
213#. mem2reg is alloca-driven: it looks for allocas and if it can handle
214   them, it promotes them. It does not apply to global variables or heap
215   allocations.
216#. mem2reg only looks for alloca instructions in the entry block of the
217   function. Being in the entry block guarantees that the alloca is only
218   executed once, which makes analysis simpler.
219#. mem2reg only promotes allocas whose uses are direct loads and stores.
220   If the address of the stack object is passed to a function, or if any
221   funny pointer arithmetic is involved, the alloca will not be
222   promoted.
223#. mem2reg only works on allocas of `first
224   class <../LangRef.html#first-class-types>`_ values (such as pointers,
225   scalars and vectors), and only if the array size of the allocation is
226   1 (or missing in the .ll file). mem2reg is not capable of promoting
227   structs or arrays to registers. Note that the "sroa" pass is
228   more powerful and can promote structs, "unions", and arrays in many
229   cases.
230
231All of these properties are easy to satisfy for most imperative
232languages, and we'll illustrate it below with Kaleidoscope. The final
233question you may be asking is: should I bother with this nonsense for my
234front-end? Wouldn't it be better if I just did SSA construction
235directly, avoiding use of the mem2reg optimization pass? In short, we
236strongly recommend that you use this technique for building SSA form,
237unless there is an extremely good reason not to. Using this technique
238is:
239
240-  Proven and well tested: clang uses this technique
241   for local mutable variables. As such, the most common clients of LLVM
242   are using this to handle a bulk of their variables. You can be sure
243   that bugs are found fast and fixed early.
244-  Extremely Fast: mem2reg has a number of special cases that make it
245   fast in common cases as well as fully general. For example, it has
246   fast-paths for variables that are only used in a single block,
247   variables that only have one assignment point, good heuristics to
248   avoid insertion of unneeded phi nodes, etc.
249-  Needed for debug info generation: `Debug information in
250   LLVM <../SourceLevelDebugging.html>`_ relies on having the address of
251   the variable exposed so that debug info can be attached to it. This
252   technique dovetails very naturally with this style of debug info.
253
254If nothing else, this makes it much easier to get your front-end up and
255running, and is very simple to implement. Let's extend Kaleidoscope with
256mutable variables now!
257
258Mutable Variables in Kaleidoscope
259=================================
260
261Now that we know the sort of problem we want to tackle, let's see what
262this looks like in the context of our little Kaleidoscope language.
263We're going to add two features:
264
265#. The ability to mutate variables with the '=' operator.
266#. The ability to define new variables.
267
268While the first item is really what this is about, we only have
269variables for incoming arguments as well as for induction variables, and
270redefining those only goes so far :). Also, the ability to define new
271variables is a useful thing regardless of whether you will be mutating
272them. Here's a motivating example that shows how we could use these:
273
274::
275
276    # Define ':' for sequencing: as a low-precedence operator that ignores operands
277    # and just returns the RHS.
278    def binary : 1 (x y) y;
279
280    # Recursive fib, we could do this before.
281    def fib(x)
282      if (x < 3) then
283        1
284      else
285        fib(x-1)+fib(x-2);
286
287    # Iterative fib.
288    def fibi(x)
289      var a = 1, b = 1, c in
290      (for i = 3, i < x in
291         c = a + b :
292         a = b :
293         b = c) :
294      b;
295
296    # Call it.
297    fibi(10);
298
299In order to mutate variables, we have to change our existing variables
300to use the "alloca trick". Once we have that, we'll add our new
301operator, then extend Kaleidoscope to support new variable definitions.
302
303Adjusting Existing Variables for Mutation
304=========================================
305
306The symbol table in Kaleidoscope is managed at code generation time by
307the '``NamedValues``' map. This map currently keeps track of the LLVM
308"Value\*" that holds the double value for the named variable. In order
309to support mutation, we need to change this slightly, so that
310``NamedValues`` holds the *memory location* of the variable in question.
311Note that this change is a refactoring: it changes the structure of the
312code, but does not (by itself) change the behavior of the compiler. All
313of these changes are isolated in the Kaleidoscope code generator.
314
315At this point in Kaleidoscope's development, it only supports variables
316for two things: incoming arguments to functions and the induction
317variable of 'for' loops. For consistency, we'll allow mutation of these
318variables in addition to other user-defined variables. This means that
319these will both need memory locations.
320
321To start our transformation of Kaleidoscope, we'll change the
322NamedValues map so that it maps to AllocaInst\* instead of Value\*. Once
323we do this, the C++ compiler will tell us what parts of the code we need
324to update:
325
326.. code-block:: c++
327
328    static std::map<std::string, AllocaInst*> NamedValues;
329
330Also, since we will need to create these alloca's, we'll use a helper
331function that ensures that the allocas are created in the entry block of
332the function:
333
334.. code-block:: c++
335
336    /// CreateEntryBlockAlloca - Create an alloca instruction in the entry block of
337    /// the function.  This is used for mutable variables etc.
338    static AllocaInst *CreateEntryBlockAlloca(Function *TheFunction,
339                                              const std::string &VarName) {
340      IRBuilder<> TmpB(&TheFunction->getEntryBlock(),
341                     TheFunction->getEntryBlock().begin());
342      return TmpB.CreateAlloca(Type::getDoubleTy(LLVMContext), 0,
343                               VarName.c_str());
344    }
345
346This funny looking code creates an IRBuilder object that is pointing at
347the first instruction (.begin()) of the entry block. It then creates an
348alloca with the expected name and returns it. Because all values in
349Kaleidoscope are doubles, there is no need to pass in a type to use.
350
351With this in place, the first functionality change we want to make is to
352variable references. In our new scheme, variables live on the stack, so
353code generating a reference to them actually needs to produce a load
354from the stack slot:
355
356.. code-block:: c++
357
358    Value *VariableExprAST::codegen() {
359      // Look this variable up in the function.
360      Value *V = NamedValues[Name];
361      if (!V)
362        return LogErrorV("Unknown variable name");
363
364      // Load the value.
365      return Builder.CreateLoad(V, Name.c_str());
366    }
367
368As you can see, this is pretty straightforward. Now we need to update
369the things that define the variables to set up the alloca. We'll start
370with ``ForExprAST::codegen()`` (see the `full code listing <#id1>`_ for
371the unabridged code):
372
373.. code-block:: c++
374
375      Function *TheFunction = Builder.GetInsertBlock()->getParent();
376
377      // Create an alloca for the variable in the entry block.
378      AllocaInst *Alloca = CreateEntryBlockAlloca(TheFunction, VarName);
379
380        // Emit the start code first, without 'variable' in scope.
381      Value *StartVal = Start->codegen();
382      if (!StartVal)
383        return nullptr;
384
385      // Store the value into the alloca.
386      Builder.CreateStore(StartVal, Alloca);
387      ...
388
389      // Compute the end condition.
390      Value *EndCond = End->codegen();
391      if (!EndCond)
392        return nullptr;
393
394      // Reload, increment, and restore the alloca.  This handles the case where
395      // the body of the loop mutates the variable.
396      Value *CurVar = Builder.CreateLoad(Alloca);
397      Value *NextVar = Builder.CreateFAdd(CurVar, StepVal, "nextvar");
398      Builder.CreateStore(NextVar, Alloca);
399      ...
400
401This code is virtually identical to the code `before we allowed mutable
402variables <LangImpl5.html#code-generation-for-the-for-loop>`_. The big difference is that we
403no longer have to construct a PHI node, and we use load/store to access
404the variable as needed.
405
406To support mutable argument variables, we need to also make allocas for
407them. The code for this is also pretty simple:
408
409.. code-block:: c++
410
411    /// CreateArgumentAllocas - Create an alloca for each argument and register the
412    /// argument in the symbol table so that references to it will succeed.
413    void PrototypeAST::CreateArgumentAllocas(Function *F) {
414      Function::arg_iterator AI = F->arg_begin();
415      for (unsigned Idx = 0, e = Args.size(); Idx != e; ++Idx, ++AI) {
416        // Create an alloca for this variable.
417        AllocaInst *Alloca = CreateEntryBlockAlloca(F, Args[Idx]);
418
419        // Store the initial value into the alloca.
420        Builder.CreateStore(AI, Alloca);
421
422        // Add arguments to variable symbol table.
423        NamedValues[Args[Idx]] = Alloca;
424      }
425    }
426
427For each argument, we make an alloca, store the input value to the
428function into the alloca, and register the alloca as the memory location
429for the argument. This method gets invoked by ``FunctionAST::codegen()``
430right after it sets up the entry block for the function.
431
432The final missing piece is adding the mem2reg pass, which allows us to
433get good codegen once again:
434
435.. code-block:: c++
436
437        // Set up the optimizer pipeline.  Start with registering info about how the
438        // target lays out data structures.
439        OurFPM.add(new DataLayout(*TheExecutionEngine->getDataLayout()));
440        // Promote allocas to registers.
441        OurFPM.add(createPromoteMemoryToRegisterPass());
442        // Do simple "peephole" optimizations and bit-twiddling optzns.
443        OurFPM.add(createInstructionCombiningPass());
444        // Reassociate expressions.
445        OurFPM.add(createReassociatePass());
446
447It is interesting to see what the code looks like before and after the
448mem2reg optimization runs. For example, this is the before/after code
449for our recursive fib function. Before the optimization:
450
451.. code-block:: llvm
452
453    define double @fib(double %x) {
454    entry:
455      %x1 = alloca double
456      store double %x, double* %x1
457      %x2 = load double* %x1
458      %cmptmp = fcmp ult double %x2, 3.000000e+00
459      %booltmp = uitofp i1 %cmptmp to double
460      %ifcond = fcmp one double %booltmp, 0.000000e+00
461      br i1 %ifcond, label %then, label %else
462
463    then:       ; preds = %entry
464      br label %ifcont
465
466    else:       ; preds = %entry
467      %x3 = load double* %x1
468      %subtmp = fsub double %x3, 1.000000e+00
469      %calltmp = call double @fib(double %subtmp)
470      %x4 = load double* %x1
471      %subtmp5 = fsub double %x4, 2.000000e+00
472      %calltmp6 = call double @fib(double %subtmp5)
473      %addtmp = fadd double %calltmp, %calltmp6
474      br label %ifcont
475
476    ifcont:     ; preds = %else, %then
477      %iftmp = phi double [ 1.000000e+00, %then ], [ %addtmp, %else ]
478      ret double %iftmp
479    }
480
481Here there is only one variable (x, the input argument) but you can
482still see the extremely simple-minded code generation strategy we are
483using. In the entry block, an alloca is created, and the initial input
484value is stored into it. Each reference to the variable does a reload
485from the stack. Also, note that we didn't modify the if/then/else
486expression, so it still inserts a PHI node. While we could make an
487alloca for it, it is actually easier to create a PHI node for it, so we
488still just make the PHI.
489
490Here is the code after the mem2reg pass runs:
491
492.. code-block:: llvm
493
494    define double @fib(double %x) {
495    entry:
496      %cmptmp = fcmp ult double %x, 3.000000e+00
497      %booltmp = uitofp i1 %cmptmp to double
498      %ifcond = fcmp one double %booltmp, 0.000000e+00
499      br i1 %ifcond, label %then, label %else
500
501    then:
502      br label %ifcont
503
504    else:
505      %subtmp = fsub double %x, 1.000000e+00
506      %calltmp = call double @fib(double %subtmp)
507      %subtmp5 = fsub double %x, 2.000000e+00
508      %calltmp6 = call double @fib(double %subtmp5)
509      %addtmp = fadd double %calltmp, %calltmp6
510      br label %ifcont
511
512    ifcont:     ; preds = %else, %then
513      %iftmp = phi double [ 1.000000e+00, %then ], [ %addtmp, %else ]
514      ret double %iftmp
515    }
516
517This is a trivial case for mem2reg, since there are no redefinitions of
518the variable. The point of showing this is to calm your tension about
519inserting such blatent inefficiencies :).
520
521After the rest of the optimizers run, we get:
522
523.. code-block:: llvm
524
525    define double @fib(double %x) {
526    entry:
527      %cmptmp = fcmp ult double %x, 3.000000e+00
528      %booltmp = uitofp i1 %cmptmp to double
529      %ifcond = fcmp ueq double %booltmp, 0.000000e+00
530      br i1 %ifcond, label %else, label %ifcont
531
532    else:
533      %subtmp = fsub double %x, 1.000000e+00
534      %calltmp = call double @fib(double %subtmp)
535      %subtmp5 = fsub double %x, 2.000000e+00
536      %calltmp6 = call double @fib(double %subtmp5)
537      %addtmp = fadd double %calltmp, %calltmp6
538      ret double %addtmp
539
540    ifcont:
541      ret double 1.000000e+00
542    }
543
544Here we see that the simplifycfg pass decided to clone the return
545instruction into the end of the 'else' block. This allowed it to
546eliminate some branches and the PHI node.
547
548Now that all symbol table references are updated to use stack variables,
549we'll add the assignment operator.
550
551New Assignment Operator
552=======================
553
554With our current framework, adding a new assignment operator is really
555simple. We will parse it just like any other binary operator, but handle
556it internally (instead of allowing the user to define it). The first
557step is to set a precedence:
558
559.. code-block:: c++
560
561     int main() {
562       // Install standard binary operators.
563       // 1 is lowest precedence.
564       BinopPrecedence['='] = 2;
565       BinopPrecedence['<'] = 10;
566       BinopPrecedence['+'] = 20;
567       BinopPrecedence['-'] = 20;
568
569Now that the parser knows the precedence of the binary operator, it
570takes care of all the parsing and AST generation. We just need to
571implement codegen for the assignment operator. This looks like:
572
573.. code-block:: c++
574
575    Value *BinaryExprAST::codegen() {
576      // Special case '=' because we don't want to emit the LHS as an expression.
577      if (Op == '=') {
578        // Assignment requires the LHS to be an identifier.
579        VariableExprAST *LHSE = dynamic_cast<VariableExprAST*>(LHS.get());
580        if (!LHSE)
581          return LogErrorV("destination of '=' must be a variable");
582
583Unlike the rest of the binary operators, our assignment operator doesn't
584follow the "emit LHS, emit RHS, do computation" model. As such, it is
585handled as a special case before the other binary operators are handled.
586The other strange thing is that it requires the LHS to be a variable. It
587is invalid to have "(x+1) = expr" - only things like "x = expr" are
588allowed.
589
590.. code-block:: c++
591
592        // Codegen the RHS.
593        Value *Val = RHS->codegen();
594        if (!Val)
595          return nullptr;
596
597        // Look up the name.
598        Value *Variable = NamedValues[LHSE->getName()];
599        if (!Variable)
600          return LogErrorV("Unknown variable name");
601
602        Builder.CreateStore(Val, Variable);
603        return Val;
604      }
605      ...
606
607Once we have the variable, codegen'ing the assignment is
608straightforward: we emit the RHS of the assignment, create a store, and
609return the computed value. Returning a value allows for chained
610assignments like "X = (Y = Z)".
611
612Now that we have an assignment operator, we can mutate loop variables
613and arguments. For example, we can now run code like this:
614
615::
616
617    # Function to print a double.
618    extern printd(x);
619
620    # Define ':' for sequencing: as a low-precedence operator that ignores operands
621    # and just returns the RHS.
622    def binary : 1 (x y) y;
623
624    def test(x)
625      printd(x) :
626      x = 4 :
627      printd(x);
628
629    test(123);
630
631When run, this example prints "123" and then "4", showing that we did
632actually mutate the value! Okay, we have now officially implemented our
633goal: getting this to work requires SSA construction in the general
634case. However, to be really useful, we want the ability to define our
635own local variables, let's add this next!
636
637User-defined Local Variables
638============================
639
640Adding var/in is just like any other extension we made to
641Kaleidoscope: we extend the lexer, the parser, the AST and the code
642generator. The first step for adding our new 'var/in' construct is to
643extend the lexer. As before, this is pretty trivial, the code looks like
644this:
645
646.. code-block:: c++
647
648    enum Token {
649      ...
650      // var definition
651      tok_var = -13
652    ...
653    }
654    ...
655    static int gettok() {
656    ...
657        if (IdentifierStr == "in")
658          return tok_in;
659        if (IdentifierStr == "binary")
660          return tok_binary;
661        if (IdentifierStr == "unary")
662          return tok_unary;
663        if (IdentifierStr == "var")
664          return tok_var;
665        return tok_identifier;
666    ...
667
668The next step is to define the AST node that we will construct. For
669var/in, it looks like this:
670
671.. code-block:: c++
672
673    /// VarExprAST - Expression class for var/in
674    class VarExprAST : public ExprAST {
675      std::vector<std::pair<std::string, std::unique_ptr<ExprAST>>> VarNames;
676      std::unique_ptr<ExprAST> Body;
677
678    public:
679      VarExprAST(std::vector<std::pair<std::string, std::unique_ptr<ExprAST>>> VarNames,
680                 std::unique_ptr<ExprAST> body)
681      : VarNames(std::move(VarNames)), Body(std::move(Body)) {}
682
683      virtual Value *codegen();
684    };
685
686var/in allows a list of names to be defined all at once, and each name
687can optionally have an initializer value. As such, we capture this
688information in the VarNames vector. Also, var/in has a body, this body
689is allowed to access the variables defined by the var/in.
690
691With this in place, we can define the parser pieces. The first thing we
692do is add it as a primary expression:
693
694.. code-block:: c++
695
696    /// primary
697    ///   ::= identifierexpr
698    ///   ::= numberexpr
699    ///   ::= parenexpr
700    ///   ::= ifexpr
701    ///   ::= forexpr
702    ///   ::= varexpr
703    static std::unique_ptr<ExprAST> ParsePrimary() {
704      switch (CurTok) {
705      default:
706        return LogError("unknown token when expecting an expression");
707      case tok_identifier:
708        return ParseIdentifierExpr();
709      case tok_number:
710        return ParseNumberExpr();
711      case '(':
712        return ParseParenExpr();
713      case tok_if:
714        return ParseIfExpr();
715      case tok_for:
716        return ParseForExpr();
717      case tok_var:
718        return ParseVarExpr();
719      }
720    }
721
722Next we define ParseVarExpr:
723
724.. code-block:: c++
725
726    /// varexpr ::= 'var' identifier ('=' expression)?
727    //                    (',' identifier ('=' expression)?)* 'in' expression
728    static std::unique_ptr<ExprAST> ParseVarExpr() {
729      getNextToken();  // eat the var.
730
731      std::vector<std::pair<std::string, std::unique_ptr<ExprAST>>> VarNames;
732
733      // At least one variable name is required.
734      if (CurTok != tok_identifier)
735        return LogError("expected identifier after var");
736
737The first part of this code parses the list of identifier/expr pairs
738into the local ``VarNames`` vector.
739
740.. code-block:: c++
741
742      while (1) {
743        std::string Name = IdentifierStr;
744        getNextToken();  // eat identifier.
745
746        // Read the optional initializer.
747        std::unique_ptr<ExprAST> Init;
748        if (CurTok == '=') {
749          getNextToken(); // eat the '='.
750
751          Init = ParseExpression();
752          if (!Init) return nullptr;
753        }
754
755        VarNames.push_back(std::make_pair(Name, std::move(Init)));
756
757        // End of var list, exit loop.
758        if (CurTok != ',') break;
759        getNextToken(); // eat the ','.
760
761        if (CurTok != tok_identifier)
762          return LogError("expected identifier list after var");
763      }
764
765Once all the variables are parsed, we then parse the body and create the
766AST node:
767
768.. code-block:: c++
769
770      // At this point, we have to have 'in'.
771      if (CurTok != tok_in)
772        return LogError("expected 'in' keyword after 'var'");
773      getNextToken();  // eat 'in'.
774
775      auto Body = ParseExpression();
776      if (!Body)
777        return nullptr;
778
779      return llvm::make_unique<VarExprAST>(std::move(VarNames),
780                                           std::move(Body));
781    }
782
783Now that we can parse and represent the code, we need to support
784emission of LLVM IR for it. This code starts out with:
785
786.. code-block:: c++
787
788    Value *VarExprAST::codegen() {
789      std::vector<AllocaInst *> OldBindings;
790
791      Function *TheFunction = Builder.GetInsertBlock()->getParent();
792
793      // Register all variables and emit their initializer.
794      for (unsigned i = 0, e = VarNames.size(); i != e; ++i) {
795        const std::string &VarName = VarNames[i].first;
796        ExprAST *Init = VarNames[i].second.get();
797
798Basically it loops over all the variables, installing them one at a
799time. For each variable we put into the symbol table, we remember the
800previous value that we replace in OldBindings.
801
802.. code-block:: c++
803
804        // Emit the initializer before adding the variable to scope, this prevents
805        // the initializer from referencing the variable itself, and permits stuff
806        // like this:
807        //  var a = 1 in
808        //    var a = a in ...   # refers to outer 'a'.
809        Value *InitVal;
810        if (Init) {
811          InitVal = Init->codegen();
812          if (!InitVal)
813            return nullptr;
814        } else { // If not specified, use 0.0.
815          InitVal = ConstantFP::get(LLVMContext, APFloat(0.0));
816        }
817
818        AllocaInst *Alloca = CreateEntryBlockAlloca(TheFunction, VarName);
819        Builder.CreateStore(InitVal, Alloca);
820
821        // Remember the old variable binding so that we can restore the binding when
822        // we unrecurse.
823        OldBindings.push_back(NamedValues[VarName]);
824
825        // Remember this binding.
826        NamedValues[VarName] = Alloca;
827      }
828
829There are more comments here than code. The basic idea is that we emit
830the initializer, create the alloca, then update the symbol table to
831point to it. Once all the variables are installed in the symbol table,
832we evaluate the body of the var/in expression:
833
834.. code-block:: c++
835
836      // Codegen the body, now that all vars are in scope.
837      Value *BodyVal = Body->codegen();
838      if (!BodyVal)
839        return nullptr;
840
841Finally, before returning, we restore the previous variable bindings:
842
843.. code-block:: c++
844
845      // Pop all our variables from scope.
846      for (unsigned i = 0, e = VarNames.size(); i != e; ++i)
847        NamedValues[VarNames[i].first] = OldBindings[i];
848
849      // Return the body computation.
850      return BodyVal;
851    }
852
853The end result of all of this is that we get properly scoped variable
854definitions, and we even (trivially) allow mutation of them :).
855
856With this, we completed what we set out to do. Our nice iterative fib
857example from the intro compiles and runs just fine. The mem2reg pass
858optimizes all of our stack variables into SSA registers, inserting PHI
859nodes where needed, and our front-end remains simple: no "iterated
860dominance frontier" computation anywhere in sight.
861
862Full Code Listing
863=================
864
865Here is the complete code listing for our running example, enhanced with
866mutable variables and var/in support. To build this example, use:
867
868.. code-block:: bash
869
870    # Compile
871    clang++ -g toy.cpp `llvm-config --cxxflags --ldflags --system-libs --libs core mcjit native` -O3 -o toy
872    # Run
873    ./toy
874
875Here is the code:
876
877.. literalinclude:: ../../examples/Kaleidoscope/Chapter7/toy.cpp
878   :language: c++
879
880`Next: Compiling to Object Code <LangImpl08.html>`_
881
882