Check

Table of contents

Overview

Check takes the parse tree and generates a semantic intermediate representation, or SemIR. This will look closer to a series of instructions, in preparation for transformation to LLVM IR. Semantic analysis and type checking occurs during the production of SemIR. It also does any validation that requires context.

Postorder processing

The checking step is oriented on postorder processing on the Parse::Tree to iterate through the Parse::NodeImpl vectorized storage once, in order, as much as possible. This is primarily for performance, but also relies on the information accumulation principle: that is, when that principle applies, we should be able to generate IR immediately because we can rely on the principle that when a line is processed, the information necessary to semantically check that line is already available.

Indirectly, what this really means is that we should be able to go from a Parse::Tree (which cannot be used for name lookups) to a SemIR with name lookups completed in a single pass. The SemIR should not need to be re-processed to add more information outside of templates. By doing this, we avoid an additional processing pass with associated storage needs.

This single-pass approach also means that the checking step does not make use of the tree structure of the Parse::Tree. In cases where the actions performed for a parse tree node depend on the context in which that node appears, a node that is visited earlier in the postorder traversal, such as a bracketing node, needs to establish the necessary context. In this respect, the sequence of Parse::Nodes can be thought of as a byte code input that the check step interprets to build the SemIR.

Key IR concepts

A SemIR::Inst is the basic building block that represents a simple instruction, such as an operator or declaring a literal. For each kind of instruction, a typedef for that specific kind of instruction is provided in the SemIR namespace. For example, SemIR::Assign represents an assignment instruction, and SemIR::PointerType represents a pointer type instruction.

Each instruction class has up to four public data members describing the instruction, as described in sem_ir/typed_insts.h (also see adding features for Check):

  • A Parse::Node parse_node; member that tracks its location is present on almost all instructions, except instructions like SemIR::Builtin that don’t have an associated location.

  • A SemIR::TypeId type_id; member that describes the type of the instruction is present on all instructions that produce a value. This includes namespace instructions, which are modeled as producing a value of “namespace” type, even though they can’t be used as a first-class value in Carbon expressions.

  • Up to two additional, kind-specific members. For example SemIR::Assign has members InstId lhs_id and InstId rhs_id.

Instructions are stored as type-erased SemIR::Inst objects, which store the instruction kind and the (up to) four fields described above. This balances the size of SemIR::Inst against the overhead of indirection.

A SemIR::InstBlock can represent a code block. However, it can also be created when a series of instructions needs to be closely associated, such as a parameter list.

A SemIR::Builtin represents a language built-in, such as the unconstrained facet type type. We will also have built-in functions which would need to form the implementation of some library types, such as i32. Built-ins are in a stable index across SemIR instances.

Parameters and arguments

Parameters and arguments will be stored as two SemIR::InstBlocks each. The first will contain the full IR, while the second will contain references to the last instruction for each parameter or argument. The references block will have a size equal to the number of parameters or arguments, allowing for quick size comparisons and indexed access.

SemIR textual format

There are two textual ways to view SemIR.

Raw form

The raw form of SemIR shows the details of the representation, such as numeric instruction and block IDs. The representation is intended to very closely match the SemIR::File and SemIR::Inst representations. This can be useful when debugging low-level issues with the SemIR representation.

The driver will print this when passed --dump-raw-sem-ir.

Formatted IR

In addition to the raw form, there is a higher-level formatted IR that aims to be human readable. This is used in most check tests to validate the output, and also expected to be used regularly by toolchain developers to inspect the result of checking the parse tree.

The driver will print this when passed --dump-sem-ir.

Unlike the raw form, certain representational choices in the SemIR data may not be visible in this form. However, it is intended to be possible to parse the SemIR output and form an equivalent – but not necessarily identical – SemIR representation, although no such parser currently exists.

As an example, given the program:

fn Cond() -> bool;
fn Run() -> i32 { return if Cond() then 1 else 2; }

The formatted IR is currently:

constants {
  %.1: i32 = int_literal 1 [template]
  %.2: i32 = int_literal 2 [template]
}

file {
  package: <namespace> = namespace [template] {
    .Cond = %Cond
    .Run = %Run
  }
  %Cond: <function> = fn_decl @Cond [template] {
    %return.var.loc1: ref bool = var <return slot>
  }
  %Run: <function> = fn_decl @Run [template] {
    %return.var.loc2: ref i32 = var <return slot>
  }
}

fn @Cond() -> bool;

fn @Run() -> i32 {
!entry:
  %Cond.ref: <function> = name_ref Cond, file.%Cond [template = file.%Cond]
  %.loc2_33.1: init bool = call %Cond.ref()
  %.loc2_26.1: bool = value_of_initializer %.loc2_33.1
  %.loc2_33.2: bool = converted %.loc2_33.1, %.loc2_26.1
  if %.loc2_33.2 br !if.expr.then else br !if.expr.else

!if.expr.then:
  %.loc2_41: i32 = int_literal 1 [template = constants.%.1]
  br !if.expr.result(%.loc2_41)

!if.expr.else:
  %.loc2_48: i32 = int_literal 2 [template = constants.%.2]
  br !if.expr.result(%.loc2_48)

!if.expr.result:
  %.loc2_26.2: i32 = block_arg !if.expr.result
  return %.loc2_26.2
}

There are three kinds of names in formatted IR, which are distinguished by their leading sigils:

  • %name denotes a value produced by an instruction. These names are introduced by a line of the form %name: <category> <type> = <instruction>, and are scoped to the enclosing top-level entity. <category> describes the expression category, which is init for an initializing expression, ref for a reference expression, or omitted for a value expression. Typically, values can only be referenced by instructions that their introduction dominates, but some kinds of instruction might have other rules. Names in the file block can be referenced as file.%<name>.

  • !name denotes a label, and !name: appears as a prefix of each InstBlock in a Function. These names are scoped to their enclosing function, and can be referenced anywhere in that function, but not outside.

  • @name denotes a top-level entity, such as a function, class, or interface. The SemIR view of these entities is flattened, so member functions are treated as top-level entities.

Names in formatted IR are all invented by the formatter, and generally are of the form <base_name>[.loc<line>[_<col>[.<counter>]]] where <line> and <col> describe the location of the instruction, and <counter> is used as a disambiguator if multiple instructions appear at the same location. Trailing name components are only included if they are necessary to disambiguate the name. <base_name> is a guessed good name for the instruction, often derived from source-level identifiers, and is empty if no guess was made.

Instructions

There is usually one line in a InstBlock for each Inst. You can find the documentation for the different kinds of instructions in toolchain/sem_ir/typed_insts.h. For example, given a formatted SemIR line like:

%N: i32 = assoc_const_decl N [template]

you would look for a struct definition that uses "assoc_const_decl" as its ir_name. In this case, this is the AssociatedConstantDecl instruction:

// An associated constant declaration in an interface, such as `let T:! type;`.
struct AssociatedConstantDecl {
  static constexpr auto Kind =
      InstKind::AssociatedConstantDecl.Define<Parse::NodeId>(
          {.ir_name = "assoc_const_decl", .is_lowered = false});

  TypeId type_id;
  NameId name_id;
};

Since this instruction produces a value, it has a TypeId type_id field, which corresponds to the type written between the : and the =. In the example above, that type is i32. The other arguments to the instruction are written after the ir_name – in this example the name_id is N. From this we find that the instruction corresponds to an associated constant declaration in an interface like let N:! i32;.

Instructions producing a constant value, like assoc_const_decl above, are followed by their phase, either [symbolic] or [template], and then = the value if it is the value of a different instruction.

Instructions that do not produce a value, such as the br and return instructions above, omit the leading %name: ... = prefix, as they cannot be named by other instructions. These instructions do not have a TypeId type_id field, like the AdaptDecl instruction:

// An adapted type declaration in a class, of the form `adapt T;`.
struct AdaptDecl {
  static constexpr auto Kind = InstKind::AdaptDecl.Define<Parse::AdaptDeclId>(
      {.ir_name = "adapt_decl", .is_lowered = false});

  // No type_id; this is not a value.
  TypeId adapted_type_id;
};

An adapt SomeClass; declaration would have the corresponding SemIR formatted as:

adapt_decl %SomeClass

Some instructions have special argument handling. For example, some invalid arguments will be omitted. Or an InstBlockId argument will be rendered inline, commonly enclosed in braces {…} or parens (…). In other cases, the formatter will combine instructions together to make the IR more readable:

  • A terminator sequence in a block, comprising a sequence of BranchIf instructions followed by a Branch or BranchWithArg instruction, is collapsed into a single if %cond br !label1 else if ... else br !labelN(%arg) line.
  • A struct type, formed by a sequence of StructTypeField instructions followed by a StructType instruction, is collapsed into a single struct_type{.field1: %value1, ..., .fieldN: %valueN} line.

These exceptions may be found in toolchain/sem_ir/formatter.cpp.

Top-level entities

Question: Are these too in flux to document at this time?

  • constants: TODO
  • imports: TODO
  • file: TODO
  • entities
    • TODO: may be preceded by extern.
    • TODO: may be preceded by generic.
      • These may have an optional !definition: section containing the generic’s definition_block_id.
    • fn: TODO; followed by = "…" for builtins
    • class: TODO
    • interface: TODO
    • impl: TODO
  • specific: TODO
    • body in braces {…} has a bunch of `` => ` assignment lines
    • The first lines of the body describe the declaration
    • If there is a valid definition, there are additional definition assignments after a !definition: line.

Core loop

The core loop is Check::CheckParseTree. This loops through the Parse::Tree and calls a Handle… function corresponding to the NodeKind of each node. Communication between these functions for different nodes working together is through the Context object defined in check/context.h, which stores things in a collection of stacks. The common pattern is that the children of a node are processed first. They produce information that is then consumed when processing the parent node.

One example of this pattern is expressions. Each subexpression outputs SemIR instructions to compute the value of that subexpression to the current instruction block, added to the top of the InstBlockStack stored in the Context object. It leaves an instruction id on the top of the node stack pointing to the instruction that produces the value of that subexpression. Those are consumed by parent operations, like an RPN calculator. For example, the expression 1 * 2 + 3 corresponds to this parse tree:

    {kind: 'IntegerLiteral', text: '1'},
    {kind: 'IntegerLiteral', text: '2'},
  {kind: 'InfixOperator', text: '*', subtree_size: 3},
  {kind: 'IntegerLiteral', text: '3'},
{kind: 'InfixOperator', text: '+', subtree_size: 5},

This parse tree is processed by one call to a Handle function per node:

  • The first node is an integer literal, so the core loop calls HandleIntegerLiteral.

    • It calls context::AddInstAndPush to output a SemIR::IntegerLiteral instruction to the current instruction block, and pushes the parse node along with the instruction id to the node stack.

  • The second node is also an integer literal, which outputs a second instruction and pushes another entry onto the node stack.

  • HandleInfixOperator pops the two entries off of the node stack, outputs any conversion instructions that are needed, and uses context::AddInstAndPush to create and push the instruction id representing the output of a multiplication instruction. That multiplication instruction takes the instruction ids it popped off the stack at the beginning as arguments.

  • Another integer literal instruction is created for 3 and pushed onto the stack.

  • HandleInfixOperator is called again. It pops the two instruction ids off the stack to use as the arguments to the multiplication instruction it creates and pushes.

In this way, the handle functions coordinate producing their output using the instruction block stack and node block stack from the context.

A similar pattern uses bracketing nodes to support parent nodes that can have a variable number of children. For example, a return statement can produce parse trees following a few different patterns:

  • return;

      {kind: 'ReturnStatementStart', text: 'return'},
{kind: 'ReturnStatement', text: ';', subtree_size: 2},

  • return x;

      {kind: 'ReturnStatementStart', text: 'return'},
  {kind: 'NameExpr', text: 'x'},
{kind: 'ReturnStatement', text: ';', subtree_size: 3},

  • return var;

      {kind: 'ReturnStatementStart', text: 'return'},
  {kind: 'ReturnVarModifier', text: 'var'},
{kind: 'ReturnStatement', text: ';', subtree_size: 3},

In all three cases, the introducer node ReturnStatementStart pushes an entry on the node stack with just the parse node and no id, called a solo parse node. The handler for the parent ReturnStatement node can pop and process entries from the node stack until it finds that solo parse node from ReturnStatementStart that indicates it is done.

Another pattern that arises is state is set up by an introducer node, updated by its siblings, and then consumed by the bracketing parent node. TODO: example

Node stack

The node stack, defined in check/node_stack.h, stores pairs of a Parse::Node and an id. The type of the id is determined by the NodeKind of the parse node. It is the default, general-purpose stack used by Handle… functions in the check stage. Using a single stack is beneficial since it improves locality of reference and reduces allocations. However, additional stacks are used to ensure we never need to search through the stack to find data – we always want to be operating on the top of the stack (or a fixed offset).

The node stack contains any state pushed by siblings of the current Parse::Node at the top, and state pushed by siblings of ancestors below. The boundaries between what is a sibling of the current Parse::Node versus what is a sibling of an ancestor are not explicitly determined. Instead, the handler for the parent node knows how many nodes it must pop from the stack based either on knowing the fixed number of children for that node kind or popping nodes until it reaches a bracketing node. The arity or bracketing node kind for each parent node is documented in parse/node_kind.def.

When each Parse::Node is evaluated, the SemIR for it is typically immediately generated as SemIR::Insts. To help generate the IR to an appropriate context, scopes have separate SemIR::InstBlocks.

Delayed evaluation (not yet implemented)

Sometimes, nodes will need to have delayed evaluation; for example, an inline definition of a class member function needs to be evaluated after the class is fully declared. The SemIR::Insts cannot be immediately generated because they may include name references to the class. We’re likely to store a reference to the relevant Parse::Node for each definition for re-evaluation after the class scope completes. This means that nodes in a definition would be traversed twice, once while determining that they’re inline and without full checking or IR generation, then again with full checking and IR generation.

Templates (not yet implemented)

Templates need to have partial semantic checking when declared, but can’t be fully implemented before they’re instantiated against a specific type.

We are likely to generate a partial IR for templates, allowing for checking with the incomplete information in the IR. Instantiation will likely use that IR and fill in the missing information, but it could also reevaluate the original Parse::Nodes with the known template state.

Rewrites

Carbon relies on rewrites of code, such as rewriting the destination of an initializer to a specific target object once that object is known.

We have two ways to achieve this. One is to track the IR location of a placeholder instruction and, if it needs updating, replace it with a “rewrite” SemIR::Inst that points to a new SemIR::InstBlock containing the required IR and specifying which value is the result of that rewrite. This is expressed in SemIR as a splice_block instruction. Another is to track the list of instructions to be created separately from the node block stack, and merge those instructions into the current block once we have decided on their contents.

Types

Type expressions are treated like any other expression, and are modeled as SemIR::Insts. The types computed by type expressions are deduplicated, resulting in a canonical SemIR::TypeId for each distinct type.

Type printing (not yet implemented)

The TypeId preserves only the identity of the type, not its spelling, and so printing it will produce a fully-resolved type name, which isn’t a great user experience as it doesn’t reflect how the type was written in the source code.

Instead, when printing a type name for use in a diagnostic, we will start with one of two InstIds:

  • A InstId for a type expression that describes the way the type was computed.
  • A InstId for an expression that has the given type.

In the former case, the type is pretty-printed by walking the type expression and printing it. In the latter case, the type of the expression is reconstructed based on the form of the expression: for example, to print the type of &x, we print the type of x and append a *, being careful to take potential precedence issues into account.

TODO: This requires being able to print the type of, for example, x.foo[0].bar, by printing only the desired portion of the type of x, and similarly may require handling the case where the type of an expression involves generic parameters whose arguments are specified by that expression. In effect, the type computation performed when checking an operation is duplicated into the type printing logic, but is simpler because errors don’t need to be detected.

This approach means we don’t need to preserve a fully-sugared type for each expression instruction. Instead, we compute that type when we need to print it.

Expression categories

Each SemIR::Inst that has an associated type also has an expression category, which describes how it produces a value of that type. These SemIR::ExprCategory values correspond to the Carbon expression categories defined in proposal #2006:

ExprCategory::NotExpression

This instruction is not an expression instruction, and doesn’t have an expression category. This is used for namespaces, control flow instructions, and other constructs that represent some non-expression-level semantics.

ExprCategory::Value

This instruction produces a value using the type’s value representation. Lowering the instruction will produce an LLVM value using that value representation.

ExprCategory::DurableReference and ExprCategory::EphemeralReference

This instruction produces a reference to an object. Lowering will produce a pointer to an object representation.

ExprCategory::Initializing

This instruction represents the initialization of an object. Depending on the initializing representation for the type, the initializing expression instruction will do one of the following:

  • For an in-place initializing representation, the instruction will store a value to the target of the initialization.

  • For a by-copy initializing representation, the instruction will produce an object representation by value that can be stored into the target. This is currently only used in cases where the object representation and the value representation are the same.

  • For a type with no initializing representation, such as an empty struct or tuple, it does neither of the above things.

Regardless of the initializing representation, an initializing expression should be consumed by another instruction that finishes the initialization. For a by-copy initialization, this final instruction represents the store into the target, whereas in the other cases it is only used to track in SemIR how the initialization was used. When an in-place initializer uses a by-copy initializer as a subexpression, an initialize_from instruction is inserted to perform this final store.

ExprCategory::Mixed

This instruction represents a language construct that doesn’t have a single expression category. This is used for struct and tuple literals, where the elements of the literal can have different expression categories. Instructions with a mixed expression category are treated as a special case in conversion, which recurses into the elements of those instructions before performing conversions.

Value bindings

A value binding represents a conversion from a reference expression to the value stored in that expression. There are three important cases here:

  • For types with a by-copy value representation, such as i32, a value binding represents a load from the address indicated by the reference expression.

  • For types with a by-pointer value representation, such as arrays and large structs and tuples, a value binding implicitly takes the address of the reference expression.

  • For structs and tuples, the value representation is a struct or tuple of the elements’ value representations, which is not necessarily the same as a struct or tuple of the elements’ object representations. In the case where the value representation is not a copy of, or pointer to, the object representation, value_binding instructions are not used, and a tuple_value or struct_value instruction is used to construct a value representation instead. value_binding should still be used in the case where the value and object representation are the same, but this is not yet implemented.

Handling Parse::Tree errors (not yet implemented)

Parse::Tree errors will typically indicate that checking would error for a given context. We’ll want to be careful about how this is handled, but we’ll likely want to generate diagnostics for valid child nodes, then reduce diagnostics once invalid nodes are encountered. We should be able to reasonably abandon generated IR of the valid children when we encounter an invalid parent, without severe effects on surrounding checks.

For example, an invalid line of code in a function might generate some incomplete IR in the function’s SemIR::InstBlock, but that IR won’t negatively interfere with checking later valid lines in the same function.

Alternatives considered

Using a traditional AST representation

Clang creates an AST as part of compilation. In Carbon, it’s something we could do as a step between parsing and checking, possibly replacing the SemIR. It’s likely that doing so would be simpler, amongst other possible trade-offs. However, we think the SemIR approach is going to yield higher performance, enough so that it’s the chosen approach.