13.6 Machine Modes
A machine mode describes a size of data object and the representation used
for it. In the C code, machine modes are represented by an enumeration
type, machine_mode
, defined in machmode.def. Each RTL
expression has room for a machine mode and so do certain kinds of tree
expressions (declarations and types, to be precise).
In debugging dumps and machine descriptions, the machine mode of an RTL
expression is written after the expression code with a colon to separate
them. The letters ‘mode’ which appear at the end of each machine mode
name are omitted. For example, (reg:SI 38)
is a reg
expression with machine mode SImode
. If the mode is
VOIDmode
, it is not written at all.
Here is a table of machine modes. The term “byte” below refers to an
object of BITS_PER_UNIT
bits (see Storage Layout).
BImode
- “Bit” mode represents a single bit, for predicate registers.
QImode
- “Quarter-Integer” mode represents a single byte treated as an integer.
HImode
- “Half-Integer” mode represents a two-byte integer.
PSImode
- “Partial Single Integer” mode represents an integer which occupies
four bytes but which doesn't really use all four. On some machines,
this is the right mode to use for pointers.
SImode
- “Single Integer” mode represents a four-byte integer.
PDImode
- “Partial Double Integer” mode represents an integer which occupies
eight bytes but which doesn't really use all eight. On some machines,
this is the right mode to use for certain pointers.
DImode
- “Double Integer” mode represents an eight-byte integer.
TImode
- “Tetra Integer” (?) mode represents a sixteen-byte integer.
OImode
- “Octa Integer” (?) mode represents a thirty-two-byte integer.
XImode
- “Hexadeca Integer” (?) mode represents a sixty-four-byte integer.
QFmode
- “Quarter-Floating” mode represents a quarter-precision (single byte)
floating point number.
HFmode
- “Half-Floating” mode represents a half-precision (two byte) floating
point number.
TQFmode
- “Three-Quarter-Floating” (?) mode represents a three-quarter-precision
(three byte) floating point number.
SFmode
- “Single Floating” mode represents a four byte floating point number.
In the common case, of a processor with IEEE arithmetic and 8-bit bytes,
this is a single-precision IEEE floating point number; it can also be
used for double-precision (on processors with 16-bit bytes) and
single-precision VAX and IBM types.
DFmode
- “Double Floating” mode represents an eight byte floating point number.
In the common case, of a processor with IEEE arithmetic and 8-bit bytes,
this is a double-precision IEEE floating point number.
XFmode
- “Extended Floating” mode represents an IEEE extended floating point
number. This mode only has 80 meaningful bits (ten bytes). Some
processors require such numbers to be padded to twelve bytes, others
to sixteen; this mode is used for either.
SDmode
- “Single Decimal Floating” mode represents a four byte decimal
floating point number (as distinct from conventional binary floating
point).
DDmode
- “Double Decimal Floating” mode represents an eight byte decimal
floating point number.
TDmode
- “Tetra Decimal Floating” mode represents a sixteen byte decimal
floating point number all 128 of whose bits are meaningful.
TFmode
- “Tetra Floating” mode represents a sixteen byte floating point number
all 128 of whose bits are meaningful. One common use is the
IEEE quad-precision format.
QQmode
- “Quarter-Fractional” mode represents a single byte treated as a signed
fractional number. The default format is “s.7”.
HQmode
- “Half-Fractional” mode represents a two-byte signed fractional number.
The default format is “s.15”.
SQmode
- “Single Fractional” mode represents a four-byte signed fractional number.
The default format is “s.31”.
DQmode
- “Double Fractional” mode represents an eight-byte signed fractional number.
The default format is “s.63”.
TQmode
- “Tetra Fractional” mode represents a sixteen-byte signed fractional number.
The default format is “s.127”.
UQQmode
- “Unsigned Quarter-Fractional” mode represents a single byte treated as an
unsigned fractional number. The default format is “.8”.
UHQmode
- “Unsigned Half-Fractional” mode represents a two-byte unsigned fractional
number. The default format is “.16”.
USQmode
- “Unsigned Single Fractional” mode represents a four-byte unsigned fractional
number. The default format is “.32”.
UDQmode
- “Unsigned Double Fractional” mode represents an eight-byte unsigned
fractional number. The default format is “.64”.
UTQmode
- “Unsigned Tetra Fractional” mode represents a sixteen-byte unsigned
fractional number. The default format is “.128”.
HAmode
- “Half-Accumulator” mode represents a two-byte signed accumulator.
The default format is “s8.7”.
SAmode
- “Single Accumulator” mode represents a four-byte signed accumulator.
The default format is “s16.15”.
DAmode
- “Double Accumulator” mode represents an eight-byte signed accumulator.
The default format is “s32.31”.
TAmode
- “Tetra Accumulator” mode represents a sixteen-byte signed accumulator.
The default format is “s64.63”.
UHAmode
- “Unsigned Half-Accumulator” mode represents a two-byte unsigned accumulator.
The default format is “8.8”.
USAmode
- “Unsigned Single Accumulator” mode represents a four-byte unsigned
accumulator. The default format is “16.16”.
UDAmode
- “Unsigned Double Accumulator” mode represents an eight-byte unsigned
accumulator. The default format is “32.32”.
UTAmode
- “Unsigned Tetra Accumulator” mode represents a sixteen-byte unsigned
accumulator. The default format is “64.64”.
CCmode
- “Condition Code” mode represents the value of a condition code, which
is a machine-specific set of bits used to represent the result of a
comparison operation. Other machine-specific modes may also be used for
the condition code. These modes are not used on machines that use
cc0
(see Condition Code).
BLKmode
- “Block” mode represents values that are aggregates to which none of
the other modes apply. In RTL, only memory references can have this mode,
and only if they appear in string-move or vector instructions. On machines
which have no such instructions,
BLKmode
will not appear in RTL.
VOIDmode
- Void mode means the absence of a mode or an unspecified mode.
For example, RTL expressions of code
const_int
have mode
VOIDmode
because they can be taken to have whatever mode the context
requires. In debugging dumps of RTL, VOIDmode
is expressed by
the absence of any mode.
QCmode, HCmode, SCmode, DCmode, XCmode, TCmode
- These modes stand for a complex number represented as a pair of floating
point values. The floating point values are in
QFmode
,
HFmode
, SFmode
, DFmode
, XFmode
, and
TFmode
, respectively.
CQImode, CHImode, CSImode, CDImode, CTImode, COImode
- These modes stand for a complex number represented as a pair of integer
values. The integer values are in
QImode
, HImode
,
SImode
, DImode
, TImode
, and OImode
,
respectively.
BND32mode BND64mode
- These modes stand for bounds for pointer of 32 and 64 bit size respectively.
Mode size is double pointer mode size.
The machine description defines Pmode
as a C macro which expands
into the machine mode used for addresses. Normally this is the mode
whose size is BITS_PER_WORD
, SImode
on 32-bit machines.
The only modes which a machine description must support are
QImode
, and the modes corresponding to BITS_PER_WORD
,
FLOAT_TYPE_SIZE
and DOUBLE_TYPE_SIZE
.
The compiler will attempt to use DImode
for 8-byte structures and
unions, but this can be prevented by overriding the definition of
MAX_FIXED_MODE_SIZE
. Alternatively, you can have the compiler
use TImode
for 16-byte structures and unions. Likewise, you can
arrange for the C type short int
to avoid using HImode
.
Very few explicit references to machine modes remain in the compiler and
these few references will soon be removed. Instead, the machine modes
are divided into mode classes. These are represented by the enumeration
type enum mode_class
defined in machmode.h. The possible
mode classes are:
MODE_INT
- Integer modes. By default these are
BImode
, QImode
,
HImode
, SImode
, DImode
, TImode
, and
OImode
.
MODE_PARTIAL_INT
- The “partial integer” modes,
PQImode
, PHImode
,
PSImode
and PDImode
.
MODE_FLOAT
- Floating point modes. By default these are
QFmode
,
HFmode
, TQFmode
, SFmode
, DFmode
,
XFmode
and TFmode
.
MODE_DECIMAL_FLOAT
- Decimal floating point modes. By default these are
SDmode
,
DDmode
and TDmode
.
MODE_FRACT
- Signed fractional modes. By default these are
QQmode
, HQmode
,
SQmode
, DQmode
and TQmode
.
MODE_UFRACT
- Unsigned fractional modes. By default these are
UQQmode
, UHQmode
,
USQmode
, UDQmode
and UTQmode
.
MODE_ACCUM
- Signed accumulator modes. By default these are
HAmode
,
SAmode
, DAmode
and TAmode
.
MODE_UACCUM
- Unsigned accumulator modes. By default these are
UHAmode
,
USAmode
, UDAmode
and UTAmode
.
MODE_COMPLEX_INT
- Complex integer modes. (These are not currently implemented).
MODE_COMPLEX_FLOAT
- Complex floating point modes. By default these are
QCmode
,
HCmode
, SCmode
, DCmode
, XCmode
, and
TCmode
.
MODE_FUNCTION
- Algol or Pascal function variables including a static chain.
(These are not currently implemented).
MODE_CC
- Modes representing condition code values. These are
CCmode
plus
any CC_MODE
modes listed in the machine-modes.def.
See Jump Patterns,
also see Condition Code.
MODE_POINTER_BOUNDS
- Pointer bounds modes. Used to represent values of pointer bounds type.
Operations in these modes may be executed as NOPs depending on hardware
features and environment setup.
MODE_RANDOM
- This is a catchall mode class for modes which don't fit into the above
classes. Currently
VOIDmode
and BLKmode
are in
MODE_RANDOM
.
Here are some C macros that relate to machine modes:
GET_MODE (
x)
- Returns the machine mode of the RTX x.
PUT_MODE (
x,
newmode)
- Alters the machine mode of the RTX x to be newmode.
NUM_MACHINE_MODES
- Stands for the number of machine modes available on the target
machine. This is one greater than the largest numeric value of any
machine mode.
GET_MODE_NAME (
m)
- Returns the name of mode m as a string.
GET_MODE_CLASS (
m)
- Returns the mode class of mode m.
GET_MODE_WIDER_MODE (
m)
- Returns the next wider natural mode. For example, the expression
GET_MODE_WIDER_MODE (QImode)
returns HImode
.
GET_MODE_SIZE (
m)
- Returns the size in bytes of a datum of mode m.
GET_MODE_BITSIZE (
m)
- Returns the size in bits of a datum of mode m.
GET_MODE_IBIT (
m)
- Returns the number of integral bits of a datum of fixed-point mode m.
GET_MODE_FBIT (
m)
- Returns the number of fractional bits of a datum of fixed-point mode m.
GET_MODE_MASK (
m)
- Returns a bitmask containing 1 for all bits in a word that fit within
mode m. This macro can only be used for modes whose bitsize is
less than or equal to
HOST_BITS_PER_INT
.
GET_MODE_ALIGNMENT (
m)
- Return the required alignment, in bits, for an object of mode m.
GET_MODE_UNIT_SIZE (
m)
- Returns the size in bytes of the subunits of a datum of mode m.
This is the same as
GET_MODE_SIZE
except in the case of complex
modes. For them, the unit size is the size of the real or imaginary
part.
GET_MODE_NUNITS (
m)
- Returns the number of units contained in a mode, i.e.,
GET_MODE_SIZE
divided by GET_MODE_UNIT_SIZE
.
GET_CLASS_NARROWEST_MODE (
c)
- Returns the narrowest mode in mode class c.
The following 3 variables are defined on every target. They can be
used to allocate buffers that are guaranteed to be large enough to
hold any value that can be represented on the target. The first two
can be overridden by defining them in the target's mode.def file,
however, the value must be a constant that can determined very early
in the compilation process. The third symbol cannot be overridden.
BITS_PER_UNIT
- The number of bits in an addressable storage unit (byte). If you do
not define this, the default is 8.
MAX_BITSIZE_MODE_ANY_INT
- The maximum bitsize of any mode that is used in integer math. This
should be overridden by the target if it uses large integers as
containers for larger vectors but otherwise never uses the contents to
compute integer values.
MAX_BITSIZE_MODE_ANY_MODE
- The bitsize of the largest mode on the target.
The global variables byte_mode
and word_mode
contain modes
whose classes are MODE_INT
and whose bitsizes are either
BITS_PER_UNIT
or BITS_PER_WORD
, respectively. On 32-bit
machines, these are QImode
and SImode
, respectively.