Review of “C Compiler Design for a Network Processor”

This review describes the approach and results from the paper by Wagner and Leupers [1]. The methods they have developed for compilers for application specific instruction set processors (ASIPs) and specifically network processors (NPs) with bit-packet addressing are mainly concentrated to extensions to the traditional register allocation by graph coloring. ASIPs are used in areas where general-purpose processors do not provide enough performance and application specific integrated circuits (ASICs) do not provide enough flexibility. The most successful area so far has been digital signal processors (DSPs). ASIPs have an instruction set that is specifically targeted at a group of applications and normally also a nonhomogeneous register file. This complicates the task for the compiler. Since traditional code selection and register allocation algorithms cannot be used. Often the special instructions are not easily described in the C language, which forces us to extend the source language. This may however not be the case for all special instructions.