Available: Portable C & Pascal compilers for micro's

[Ed Keizer]

                    ANNOUNCING THE AMSTERDAM COMPILER KIT


     The Amsterdam Compiler Kit is an  integrated  set  of  tools  for  making
(cross)  compilers and assemblers, especially for microcomputers.  It has been
developed in the Dept. of  Mathematics  and  Computer  Science  at  the  Vrije
Universiteit  by  and  for university computer scientists.  The package, which
runs on the UNIX operating system, contains the complete SOURCES  of  all  the
programs,  plus documentation describing how to modify the tool kit, for exam-
ple to add new programming languages or new target machines.   Since  all  the
sources  and  documentation are supplied, the kit is ideal not only to use "as
is" but also as an aid to your teaching and research activities in  the  areas
of programming languages, compilers, and microcomputers.

     A description of the Amsterdam Compiler Kit can be  found  in  Communica-
tions  of the ACM, vol. 26, pp. 654-660, (Sept. 1983).  The basic idea is that
programs called "front ends" translate the input program into a  standard  in-
termediate  code  called  "EM."  A program in EM can be optimized and then fed
into a "back end" for  translation  into  the  assembly  code  of  the  target
machine.   The  back  end  is table driven, and uses a clever heuristic search
process to generate high quality object code, as described in the  CACM  arti-
cle.   The  resulting assembly code is then fed into a table-driven assembler-
linker for translation into an executable binary  file.   The  assemblers  can
also be used to assemble and link hand-written assembly code programs.


     The current distribution contains the following items:

  Front ends:  Pascal, C
  Optimizer:   Peephole
  Back ends:   68000, 8086, VAX, PDP-11
  Assemblers:  8080, 8086, 6800, 6809, 68000, Z80, Z0000, PDP-11, 6502
  Misc:        test programs, EM interpreters and assembler, libraries

Various other items are in preparation, including a Basic  front  end,  global
optimizer,  back end tables for the 6502, Z8000 and other machines, and an as-
sembler for the NS 16032.  These items are NOT included in the  current  pack-
age, but may be released for an additional fee in the future.

     The tool kit itself is known to run on the following systems:

   PDP-11/44 with V7 UNIX
   VAX-11/750 with 4.1BSD UNIX
   Bleasdale, Philips, and Altos 68000 systems with System III UNIX

Since the complete sources are included in the package, the user has the  pos-
sibility of installing the package on other UNIX systems.

     The  Amsterdam Compiler Kit  is available to universities for $500.   For
commercial users a license for internal use is $10,000.  Both licenses include
all the sources.   To obtain the license form, send your real-mail address to:
   decvax!mcvax!vu44!edg
Technical queries can be directed to Andy Tanenbaum at:
   decvax!mcvax!vu44!ast