Amity School of Engineering &
Technology
Code Optimization
Amity School of Engineering &
Technology
• Code optimization:
– A transformation to a program to make it
run faster and/or take up less space
– Optimization should be safe, preserve the
meaning of a program.
– Code optimization is an important
component in a compiler
– Example: peephole optimization.
• Peephole: a small moving window in the
instruction sequence
• Technique: examine a short sequence of target
instructions (peephole) and try to replace it with
a faster or shorter sequence
Amity School of Engineering &
Technology
• Peephole optimization:
• Redundant instruction elimination
• Flow of control optimization
• Algebraic simplifications
• Instruction selection
• Examples:
– Redundant loads and stores
MOV R0, a
MOV a, R0
– Unreachable code
If debug = 1 goto L1
Goto L2
L1: print debugging info
L2:
Amity School of Engineering &
Technology
– Examples:
• Flow of control optimization:
goto L1 goto L2
… …
L1: goto L2 L1: goto L2
if a < b goto L1 if a<b goto L2
… …
L1: goto L2 L1: goto L2
goto L1 if a < b goto L2
… goto L3
L1: if a < b goto L2 …
L1:
L3:
Amity School of Engineering &
Technology
• Algebraic simplification:
x : = x+0
x := x*1 == nop
• Reduction in strength
X^2 x * x
X * 4 x << 2
• Instruction selection
Sometimes some hardware instructions can
implement certain operation efficiently.
Amity School of Engineering &
• Code optimization can either be high Technology
level or low level:
– High level code optimizations:
• Loop unrolling, loop fusion, procedure inlining
– Low level code optimizations:
• Instruction selection, register allocation
– Some optimization can be done in both
levels:
• Common subexpression elimination, strength
reduction, etc.
– Flow graph is a common intermediate
representation for code optimization.
Amity School of Engineering &
Technology
• Basic block: a sequence of consecutive statements
with exactly 1 entry and 1 exit.
• Flow graph: a directed graph where the nodes are
basic blocks and block B1 block B2 if and only if B2
can be executed immediately after B1:
• Algorithm to construct flow graph:
– Finding leaders of the basic blocks:
• The first statement is a leader
• Any statement that is the target of a conditional or
unconditional goto is a leader
• Any statement that immediately follows a goto or
conditional goto statement is a leader
– For each leader, its basic block consists all
statements up to the next leader.
– B1B2 if and only if B2 can be executed
immediately after B1.
Amity School of Engineering &
Technology
• Example:
100: sum = 0
101: j=0
102: goto 107
103: t1 = j << 2
104: t2 = addr(a)
105: t3 = t2[t1]
106: sum = sum + t3
107: if j < n goto 103
Amity School of Engineering &
Technology
• Optimizations within a basic block is called local optimization.
• Optimizations across basic blocks is called global optimization.
• Some common optimizations:
– Instruction selection
– Register allocation
– Common subexpression elimination
– Code motion
– Strength reduction
– Induction variable elimination
– Dead code elimination
– Branch chaining
– Jump elimination
– Instruction scheduling
– Procedure inlining
– Loop unrolling
– Loop fusing
– Code hoisting
Amity School of Engineering &
Technology
• Instruction selection:
– Using a more efficient instruction to replace a sequence of
instructions (space and speed).
– Example:
Mov R2, (R3)
Add R2, #1, R2
Mov (R3), R2 Add (R3), 1, (R3)
Amity School of Engineering &
Technology
• Register allocation: allocate variables to registers
(speed)
• Example:
M[R13+sum] = 0 R2 = 0
M[R13+j] = 0 R1 = 0
GOTO L18 GOTO L18
L19: L19:
R0 = M[R13+j] * 4 R0 = R1 * 4
M[R13+sum] = M[R13+sum] R2 = R2+M[R0+_a]
+M[R0+_a] R1 = R1+1
M[R13+j] = M[R13+j]+1 L18:
L18: NZ = R1 - M[_n]
NZ = M[R13+j] - M[_n] if NZ < 0 goto L19
if NZ < 0 goto L19
Amity School of Engineering &
Technology
• Code motion: move a loop invariant computation
before the loop
• Example:
R2 = 0 R2 = 0
R1 = 0 R1 = 0
GOTO L18 R4 = M[_n]
L19: GOTO L18
R0 = R1 * 4 L19:
R2 = R2+M[R0+_a] R0 = R1 * 4
R1 = R1+1 R2 = R2+M[R0+_a]
L18: R1 = R1+1
R4 = M[_n] L18:
NZ = R1 – R4 NZ = R1 – R4
if NZ < 0 goto L19 if NZ < 0 goto L19
Amity School of Engineering &
Technology
• Strength reduction: replace expensive operation by
equivalent cheaper operations
• Example:
R2 = 0 R2 = 0
R1 = 0 R1 = 0
R4 = M[_n] R4 = M[_n]
GOTO L18 R3 = _a
L19: GOTO L18
R0 = R1 * 4 L19:
R2 = R2+M[R0+_a] R2 = R2+M[R3]
R1 = R1+1 R3 = R3 + 4
L18: R1 = R1+1
NZ = R1 – R4 L18:
if NZ < 0 goto L19 NZ = R1 – R4
if NZ < 0 goto L19
Amity School of Engineering &
Technology
• Induction variable elimination: can induce value from
another variable.
• Example:
R2 = 0 R2 = 0
R1 = 0 R4 = M[_n] << 2
R4 = M[_n] R3 = _a
R3 = _a GOTO L18
GOTO L18 L19:
L19: R2 = R2+M[R3]
R2 = R2+M[R3] R3 = R3 + 4
R3 = R3 + 4 L18:
R1 = R1+1 NZ = R3 – R4
L18: if NZ < 0 goto L19
NZ = R1 – R4
if NZ < 0 goto L19
Amity School of Engineering &
Technology
• Common subexpression elimination:an expression
was previously calculated and the variables in the
expression have not changed. Can avoid
recomputing the expression.
• Example:
R1 = M[R13+I] << 2 R1=M[R13+I] << 2
R1 = M[R1+_b] R1 = M[R1+_b]
R2 = M[R13+I] << 2; R2 = R1
R2 = M[R2+_b]
