Re: Add a configure option for NATIVE_FULL_AOT?

[Andrea Corallo]

Eli Zaretskii <eliz@gnu.org> writes:

>> From: Stefan Monnier <monnier@iro.umontreal.ca>
>> Cc: Eli Zaretskii <eliz@gnu.org>,  tomas@tuxteam.de,  emacs-devel@gnu.org
>> Date: Wed, 18 Aug 2021 21:19:13 -0400
>> 
>> Fundamentally, .eln files are generated from .elc files (tho
>> currently, the code works a bit differently, which is arguably a bug,
>> which may(will?) bump into the above problem with .el files).
>
> Currently, AFAIU native compilation is a side effect of byte
> compilation, in the sense that byte compilation _drives_ the
> native-compiler passes which produce the intermediate-language
> representation of the Lisp being compiled, to be submitted to the
> libgccjit library for producing the native code.  So I'm not sure
> describing this as "from .elc fils" is close enough to the reality to
> be helpful for understanding the process of native-compilation.
> Andrea will correct me, but I don't see how one can switch to using
> the .elc files as input for the native-compiler, as some information
> about the program structure is probably missing from there.

I think we could try to disassemble the bytecode and use it as input,
but as you suggests some information about the program structure might
be lost.  My mind now goes to declarations but there might be others.

In general it's a complex problem and I think one could prove it can
work or not only after having attempted an implementation.

BR

  Andrea