baskett@decwrl.UUCP (02/06/84)
From: baskett (Forest Baskett)
The Western Research Laboratory of Digital Equipment Corporation is pleased
to announce the availability of a new, experimental Modula-2 compiler for
the VAX and UNIX for university use. We are licensing interested colleges
and universities to receive and use this compiler for internal, noncommercial
use for a fee of $100 to cover our distribution costs.
The compiler was designed and built by Michael L. Powell and it appears to
be one of the best compilers for the VAX in terms of the efficiency of the
generated code. The error messages are slightly better than those from the
Unix C compiler and the compile time is slightly worse. Below is a table
of execution times on a set of ten benchmarks that John Hennessy at Stanford
has assembled. All the times are in CPU seconds on a VAX 11/780 with FPA.
All compilers were asked to generate the best code they could and all
optional run time checks were turned off. All versions of the programs
were as syntatically and semantically similar as possible.
Program Cambridge Berkeley Unix DEC DEC DEC VAXElan Stanford DEC
Name Modula-2 Pascal C Pascal C Bliss32 Pascal Pascal Modula-2
===============================================================================
Perm 4.9 2.7 2.6 2.5 2.5 2.5 2.5 2.2 2.0
Towers 6.1 2.8 2.6 2.6 2.7 2.5 2.6 2.1 1.9
Queens 2.8 1.6 1.0 1.1 0.7 0.7 0.9 1.5 0.9
Intmm 4.9 2.2 1.7 1.1 0.8 1.4 0.8 0.7 0.8
Mm 5.0 2.7 2.2 1.1 1.3 1.4 0.8 0.7 0.9
Puzzle 24.6 12.9 12.4 6.2 4.9 5.8 6.5 4.9 4.1
Quick 2.8 1.7 1.2 1.2 0.8 0.8 0.8 1.0 0.8
Bubble 5.5 3.0 1.7 1.3 1.0 1.1 0.9 1.4 1.0
Tree 6.7 6.4 6.2 4.1 3.4 3.2 3.8 1.9 1.9
FFT 9.7 4.8 4.1 2.5 2.6 1.5 1.2 1.8 1.6
Int Comp 9.9 5.5 4.8 3.5 3.1 3.1 3.1 2.6 2.3
Real Com 14.2 7.7 6.7 4.6 4.3 3.9 3.7 3.4 3.1
Doing benchmarks is always tricky and is especially difficult on a VAX 11/780
because of the peculiar interactions between the instruction prefetch buffer
and instruction alignment on word boundaries. Variations on the order of 10%
because of changes in alignment are not unusual. The integer and real
composite numbers in the last two lines are Hennessy's weighted averages
of the previous lines -- his attempt to summarize the results. The above
performance information is provided for guidance only. Your mileage may vary.
If you are a college or university and are interested in this compiler,
we can send you a paper or electronic version of the license agreement
that you should have signed by the appropriate licensing office of your
institution. We can then send you a tar tape that you should be able to
install and run with no more than the usual amount of associated grief
on Berkeley Unix 4.x BSD. There is no Unix material on the distribution
so we don't need to see your Unix license. The distribution also includes
a program that does most of the translation of Pascal programs into Modula-2.
We can also send you preprints of some papers by Powell on the language,
the compiler, and the test programs and procedures. Specify whether you
want the license agreement or just the preprints and send your cards and
letters to
{...decvax|...ucbvax}!decwrl!powell
or
powell@Berkeley
or
Michael L. Powell
Western Research Laboratory
Digital Equipment Corporation
4410 El Camino Real
Los Altos, CA 94022
This compiler has a number of internal users and we feel it is quite
reliable. However, new users often find new bugs so we expect to hear
from some of those who try it and we expect to be distributing bug
fixes in a moderately prompt fashion for a while. We may also have
some additional extensions to distribute as we gain more experience
with the language and hear from other users.
Please be fully aware that this experimental compiler is not a DEC product
and is not for sale. Our aim in distributing this compiler is a public
service one. The license agreement does, however, protect DEC's option
to make this compiler into a product someday.baskett@decwrl.UUCP (Forest Baskett) (02/06/84)
The Western Research Laboratory of Digital Equipment Corporation is pleased
to announce the availability of a new, experimental Modula-2 compiler for
the VAX and UNIX for university use. We are licensing interested colleges
and universities to receive and use this compiler for internal, noncommercial
use for a fee of $100 to cover our distribution costs.
The compiler was designed and built by Michael L. Powell and it appears to
be one of the best compilers for the VAX in terms of the efficiency of the
generated code. The error messages are slightly better than those from the
Unix C compiler and the compile time is slightly worse. Below is a table
of execution times on a set of ten benchmarks that John Hennessy at Stanford
has assembled. All the times are in CPU seconds on a VAX 11/780 with FPA.
All compilers were asked to generate the best code they could and all
optional run time checks were turned off. All versions of the programs
were as syntatically and semantically similar as possible.
Program Cambridge Berkeley Unix DEC DEC DEC VAXElan Stanford DEC
Name Modula-2 Pascal C Pascal C Bliss32 Pascal Pascal Modula-2
===============================================================================
Perm 4.9 2.7 2.6 2.5 2.5 2.5 2.5 2.2 2.0
Towers 6.1 2.8 2.6 2.6 2.7 2.5 2.6 2.1 1.9
Queens 2.8 1.6 1.0 1.1 0.7 0.7 0.9 1.5 0.9
Intmm 4.9 2.2 1.7 1.1 0.8 1.4 0.8 0.7 0.8
Mm 5.0 2.7 2.2 1.1 1.3 1.4 0.8 0.7 0.9
Puzzle 24.6 12.9 12.4 6.2 4.9 5.8 6.5 4.9 4.1
Quick 2.8 1.7 1.2 1.2 0.8 0.8 0.8 1.0 0.8
Bubble 5.5 3.0 1.7 1.3 1.0 1.1 0.9 1.4 1.0
Tree 6.7 6.4 6.2 4.1 3.4 3.2 3.8 1.9 1.9
FFT 9.7 4.8 4.1 2.5 2.6 1.5 1.2 1.8 1.6
Int Comp 9.9 5.5 4.8 3.5 3.1 3.1 3.1 2.6 2.3
Real Com 14.2 7.7 6.7 4.6 4.3 3.9 3.7 3.4 3.1
Doing benchmarks is always tricky and is especially difficult on a VAX 11/780
because of the peculiar interactions between the instruction prefetch buffer
and instruction alignment on word boundaries. Variations on the order of 10%
because of changes in alignment are not unusual. The integer and real
composite numbers in the last two lines are Hennessy's weighted averages
of the previous lines -- his attempt to summarize the results. The above
performance information is provided for guidance only. Your mileage may vary.
If you are a college or university and are interested in this compiler,
we can send you a paper or electronic version of the license agreement
that you should have signed by the appropriate licensing office of your
institution. We can then send you a tar tape that you should be able to
install and run with no more than the usual amount of associated grief
on Berkeley Unix 4.x BSD. There is no Unix material on the distribution
so we don't need to see your Unix license. The distribution also includes
a program that does most of the translation of Pascal programs into Modula-2.
We can also send you preprints of some papers by Powell on the language,
the compiler, and the test programs and procedures. Specify whether you
want the license agreement or just the preprints and send your cards and
letters to
{...decvax|...ucbvax}!decwrl!powell
or
powell@Berkeley
or
Michael L. Powell
Western Research Laboratory
Digital Equipment Corporation
4410 El Camino Real
Los Altos, CA 94022
This compiler has a number of internal users and we feel it is quite
reliable. However, new users often find new bugs so we expect to hear
from some of those who try it and we expect to be distributing bug
fixes in a moderately prompt fashion for a while. We may also have
some additional extensions to distribute as we gain more experience
with the language and hear from other users.
Please be fully aware that this experimental compiler is not a DEC product
and is not for sale. Our aim in distributing this compiler is a public
service one. The license agreement does, however, protect DEC's option
to make this compiler into a product someday.