> It utilizes a range of Modern Fortran features, including extensive use of optional variables, function pointer passing, and a randomized test driver, among others. Successfully compiling PRIMA requires a compiler with a robust and mature backend, as well as well-developed intermediate passes and a capable parser.
I am not getting a full picture here. What's challenging about PRIMA code base? Does it use some advanced features that are difficult for a compiler to support? Are the mentioned features in the 2008 standard?
What's actually impressive is that LFortran in alpha stage is only 2x slower than GFortran, which goes back decades.
Modern Fortran is no longer the FORTRAN from punch cards, having this compiler push maybe will help folks to write directly blazing performance Fortran code, instead of numerical code in Python.
I am fully aware of it, however most recent revisions tend not to be adopted by all compilers, and honestly the large majority only cares about keeping existing code running.
A bit like C23 and C++23 are here, and the large majority is a mix of C89, C99, C++11, and C++17, as what folks in the trenches care about.
How many different platforms out there run Fortran code these days? I’m aware of it being very important in scientific computing (and compiling existing code is critical) but I don’t know many other use cases and different platforms requiring different compilers.
For PRIMA, see
https://github.com/libprima/prima
https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que...
> It utilizes a range of Modern Fortran features, including extensive use of optional variables, function pointer passing, and a randomized test driver, among others. Successfully compiling PRIMA requires a compiler with a robust and mature backend, as well as well-developed intermediate passes and a capable parser.
I am not getting a full picture here. What's challenging about PRIMA code base? Does it use some advanced features that are difficult for a compiler to support? Are the mentioned features in the 2008 standard?
What's actually impressive is that LFortran in alpha stage is only 2x slower than GFortran, which goes back decades.
For more information about LFortran, see
- Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LFortran
- Homepage: https://lfortran.org
- GitHub: https://github.com/lfortran/lfortran
If you like to play with it, see
- LFortran in web browsers using WebAssembly: https://dev.lfortran.org
- LFortran in Compiler Explorer: https://godbolt.org/z/EfWvsY6Kh
Nice milestone.
Modern Fortran is no longer the FORTRAN from punch cards, having this compiler push maybe will help folks to write directly blazing performance Fortran code, instead of numerical code in Python.
The lang is still under development, the most current in in Fortran 2023: https://global.oup.com/academic/product/modern-fortran-expla...
I am fully aware of it, however most recent revisions tend not to be adopted by all compilers, and honestly the large majority only cares about keeping existing code running.
A bit like C23 and C++23 are here, and the large majority is a mix of C89, C99, C++11, and C++17, as what folks in the trenches care about.
Or Java 8 versus Java 24, and so on.
Fortran is in a similar position.
How many different platforms out there run Fortran code these days? I’m aware of it being very important in scientific computing (and compiling existing code is critical) but I don’t know many other use cases and different platforms requiring different compilers.
In many HPC cases you are using the platform tools, not gfortran.
Also we have one use case that is responsible for OpenCL losing mindshare for scientific community, running Fortran on GPU.
Thus I bet at least Intel, NVidia, AMD, Cray, IBM, being relevant ones.
Yes, some of them are planning to eventually adopt LFortran to replace their own, like they did with clang, or at least are using LLVM nowadays.
Everyone using numpy.
What compilers are used to build it might be relevant.
Typically gfortran and intel fortran.
It may not be that simple on Windows : https://labs.quansight.org/blog/building-scipy-with-flang
I was given to believe that a lot of numerical code in python is fortran with a little bit of wrapper?
Depends on the library, it is a mix of C, C++, Fortran, and using Python as JIT DSLs.
Discussions on the Fortran Discourse:
https://fortran-lang.discourse.group/t/lfortran-compiles-pri...
Congrats to Ondřej Čertík and the team working on LFortran, this is a big milestone!
LFortran is an alpha-stage modern, interactive LLVM-based Fortran compiler.
thanks you've saved me looking it up myself
In case you appreciate LFortran and would like to sponsor its development, see
- Become a sponsor to LFortran: https://github.com/sponsors/lfortran
- Open Collective: https://opencollective.com/lfortran
- NumFOCUS: https://numfocus.org/donate-to-lfortran
See
https://labs.quansight.org/blog/building-scipy-with-flang
which was once discussed on HN at
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38196412
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