Last week we posted on our developer site a pre-release version of the x86 Open64 Compiler Suite.  Targeted at high performance and parallel computing workloads, this suite is derived from the Open64 suite of compiler development tools. The compiler is a valuable new open source alternative for C, C++, and FORTRAN developers.

Calling All Developers! 

Open64 currently supports the IA64, x86, CUDA and MIPS architectures.  AMD has extended and productized Open64 with optimizations designed for x86 multi-core processor advancements and multi-threaded code development. With this Open64 suite, AMD is introducing a quality code generation tool designed for high-performance parallel computing workloads so that developers can use this tool to bring additional levels of optimization to their code and take full advantage of AMD’s Open64 architecture.

The x86 Open64 Compiler Suite also extends AMD’s active participation in key open source software projects like Linux, Xen, X.org, KVM and GNU Compiler Collection GCC.  This compliments AMD’s contributions and efforts with GCC, PathScale, PGI, Sun Studio, and other compilers in providing developers a variety of options for software development on the Linux operating system.

So why does AMD optimize our own Open64 complier as opposed to just increasing our efforts with GCC?

AMD’s support of the Open64 compiler project is intended to provide users with the choice of an open source compiler that has optimizations that specifically target AMD64 technology and both of Intel’s 64-bit architectures. The reality is that the x86 Open64 environment represents more of a system-specific compiler for building and optimizing C, C++, and Fortran applications that target 32-bit and 64-bit Linux platforms. We have always strongly supported and actively contributed to the GCC community, and we view the GCC as the default compiler for Linux systems both in the near term and the foreseeable future.

People ask:  Is there a Windows® version of the Open64 compiler? At this time the Open64 compiler does not offer support for Windows. However, we work closely with Microsoft to drive optimizations into the Microsoft Visual Studio developer toolkit, which is used by the majority of Windows developers and with tools vendors like PGI and Absoft who offer Fortran-based compilers for Windows developers.

Source code, documentation and support information for the x86 Open64 Compiler Suite can be found at AMD Developer Central.

Happy coding!

Nigel Dessau is senior vice president and chief marketing officer at AMD. His postings are his own opinions and may not represent AMD’s positions, strategies or opinions. Links to third party sites are provided for convenience and unless explicitly stated, AMD is not responsible for the contents of such links sites and no endorsement is implied.