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From: jbuck@galileo.berkeley.edu (Joe Buck)
Newsgroups: comp.dsp
Subject: Re: C compilers for DSPs
Keywords: C compiler TMS320C31 request
Message-ID: <39410@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU>
Date: 6 Nov 90 19:32:15 GMT
References: <1990Nov5.230918.17597@sono.uucp>
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Reply-To: jbuck@galileo.berkeley.edu (Joe Buck)
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In article <1990Nov5.230918.17597@sono.uucp>, sifakis@sono.uucp (George Sifakis) writes:
> I'm looking for information on C development tools (compilers,
> debuggers) for DSPs specifically the TMS320C31, such as who
> has them, their quality and any experiences using them.
> Any help will be greatly appreciated.

Texas Instruments supplies a C compiler; I used it extensively.
As of version 2.10, the code quality was very poor.  Because of
the close resemblance of the register sets and addressing modes
of the TMS320C30 family to the Motorola 68000 family, TI could
have done far better by starting with a good 68000 compiler and
porting it, or with any other C compiler, since whoever wrote
it made no attempt at any kind of optimization at all.

It is possible to use the compiler for some purposes by heavy
use of register variable declarations and inline assembly code.
But many of the excuses given for poor DSP C compilers simply
don't apply in the case of the C30; it is close enough to a
general purpose CPU that a good optimizing C compiler could be
written for it.

If TI has improved the compiler I'd like to hear about it;
however, version 2.10 is nothing to be proud of.


--
Joe Buck
jbuck@galileo.berkeley.edu	 {uunet,ucbvax}!galileo.berkeley.edu!jbuck