NAME 
Parrot - running
VERSION
$Revision$
OVERVIEW
This document describes parrot's command line options.
SYNOPSIS
parrot [-options] <file> [arguments ...]
ENVIRONMENT
- PARROT_RUNTIME
- If this environment variable is set, parrot will use this path as runtime prefix instead of the compiled in path.
- PARROT_GC_DEBUG
- Turn on the --gc-debug flag.
OPTIONS
Assembler options
- -a, --pasm
- Assume PASM input on stdin.
- -c, --pbc
- Assume PBC file on stdin, run it.
- -d, --debug [hexbits]
- The -d switch takes an optional argument which is considered to hold a hex value of debug bits. Without a value, debug is set to 1.
- The individual bits are:
- These can be listed on the command line by use of the --help-debug switch.
- To produce really huge output on stderr run "imcc -d 0ffff ...". Note: if the argument is separated by whitespace from the -d switch, it has to start with a number.
- -h, --help
- Print commandline option summary.
- --help-debug
- Print debugging and tracing flag bits summary.
- -o outputfile, --output=outputfile
- Act like an assembler. Don't run code, unless -r is given too. If the outputfile ends with .pbc, a PBC file is written. If it ends with .pasm, a PASM output is generated, even from PASM input. This can be handy to check various optimizations, including -Op.
- --output-pbc
- Act like an assembler, but always output bytecode, even if the output file does not end in .pbc
- -r, --run-pbc
- Only useful after -o or --output-pbc. Run the program from the compiled in-memory image. If two -r options are given, the .pbc file is read from disc and run. This is mainly needed for tests.
- -v, --verbose
- One -v shows which files are worked on and prints a summary over register usage and optimization stats per compilation unit. With two -v switches, IMCC prints a line per individual processing step too.
- -y, --yydebug
- Turn on yydebug in yacc/bison.
- -V, --version
- -Ox
- Optimize
- See docs/imcc/operation.pod for more information on the optimizer. NB. Optimization is currently experimental and these options are likely to change.
- -E, --pre-process-only
- Preprocess source file (i.e. expand macros) and print result to stdout. E.g.
DEBUG_PARROT 0001
DEBUG_LEXER 0002
DEBUG_PARSER 0004
DEBUG_IMC 0008
DEBUG_CFG 0010
DEBUG_OPT1 0020
DEBUG_OPT2 0040
DEBUG_PBC 1000
DEBUG_PBC_CONST 2000
DEBUG_PBC_FIXUP 4000
-O0 no optimization (default)
-O1 optimizations without life info (e.g. branches)
-O same
-O2 optimizations with life info
-Op rewrite I and N PASM registers most used first
-Ot select fastest run core (default with -O1 and -O2)
-Oc turns on the optional/experimental tail call optimizations
$ parrot -E t/op/macro_10.pasm
$ parrot -E t/op/macro_10.pasm | parrot -- -
Run Core Options
- -R, --runcore CORE
- Select the runcore. The following cores are available:
- -b, --bounds-checks, --slow-core
- Select the bounds-checking slow core (default).
- -C, --CGP-core
- Select the CGP (CGoto Predereferenced) core (if available).
- -f, --fast-core
- Select the fast (or function) core.
- -g, --computed-goto-core
- Select the CGoto core (if available).
- -j, --jit-core
- Run with the JIT subsystem (if available).
- -p, --profile
- Run with the slow core and print an execution profile.
- -S, --switched-core
- TODO: This needs to be documented briefly here and also in glossary.pod.
- -t, --trace
- Run with the slow core and print trace information to stderr. See 'parrot --help-debug' for available flag bits.
slow, bounds bounds checking core (default)
fast fast core (no bounds checking, profiling, or tracing)
switch switch core
cgp computed goto-predereferenced core
cgoto computed goto core
jit JIT core
cgp-jit computed goto-predereferenced core with JIT
switch-jit switch core with JIT
exec exec core (uses JIT at compile time to generate native code)
trace bounds checking core w/ trace info (see 'parrot --help-debug')
gcdebug performs a full GC run before every op dispatch (good for
debugging GC problems)
VM Options
- -w, --warnings
- Turn on warnings. See 'parrot --help-debug' for available flag bits.
- -D, --parrot-debug
- Turn on interpreter debug flag. See 'parrot --help-debug' for available flag bits.
- --gc-debug
- Turn on GC (Garbage Collection) debugging. This imposes some stress on the GC subsystem and can slow down execution considerably.
- -G, --no-gc
- This turns off DOD (Dead Object Detection) and GC. This may be useful to find GC related bugs. Don't use this option for longer running programs: as memory is no longer recycled, it may quickly become exhausted.
- --leak-test, --destroy-at-end
- Free all memory of the last interpreter, so that leak checkers can be run.
- -., --wait
- Read a keystroke before starting.
- --runtime-prefix
- Print the runtime prefix path and exit.
<file>
If the file ends in .pbc it will be interpreted immediately.
If the file ends in .pasm, then it is parsed as PASM code. Otherwise, it is parsed as PIR code. In both cases, it will then be run, unless the -o flag was given.
If the file is a single dash, input from stdin is read.
Generated files
If debugging is enabled these files are generated:
file.stabs.s ... stabsfile for the program
file.o ... object file with debug information
EVAL_n ... source of B<compile> op number I<n>
EVAL_n.stabs.s ... stabsfile for this block
EVAL_n.o ... object file with debug information
[arguments ...]
Optional arguments passed to the running program as ARGV. The program is assumed to know what to do with these.
Operation table
Command line Action Output
---------------------------------------------
parrot x.pir run
parrot x.pasm run
parrot x.pbc run
-o x.pasm x.pir ass x.pasm
-o x.pasm y.pasm ass x.pasm
-o x.pbc x.pir ass x.pbc
-o x.pbc x.pasm ass x.pbc
-o x.pbc -r x.pasm ass/run pasm x.pbc
-o x.pbc -r -r x.pasm ass/run pbc x.pbc
-o x.o x.pbc obj
Actions above are:
run ... yes, run the program
ass ... assemble sourcefile
obj .. produce native (ELF) object file for the EXEC subsystem
BUGS
Yes.
FILES
main.c
AUTHOR
Leopold Toetsch lt@toetsch.at
