Runtime feedback in a meta-tracing JIT for efficient dynamic languages

ABSTRACT

Meta-tracing JIT compilers can be applied to a variety of different languages without explicitly encoding language semantics into the compiler. So far, they lacked a way to give the language implementor control over runtime feedback. This restricted their performance. In this paper we describe the mechanisms in PyPy's meta-tracing JIT that can be used to control runtime feedback in language-specific ways. These mechanisms are flexible enough to express classical VM techniques such as maps and runtime type feedback.

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Index Terms

• Software and its engineering

  • Software notations and tools

    • Compilers

      • Incremental compilers

      • Interpreters

      • Runtime environments

      • Source code generation