Semantic attributes and improvement of generated code

Abstract

Once the general principles of compilation by semantic attributes have been exposed, it is then demonstrated, with the help of a simple example, how such an approach leads naturally to an amelioration of the generated code without resorting to any special optimization treatment. Also included is the determination of basic blocks of a program, the fundamental elements in code optimization, by the method of attributes. This offers the possibility of formalizing semantically the principal optimization algorithms. To our knowledge this is the very first attempt undertaken to describe optimizing compilers methodically.