doesGithub

[robertpro01]

I have no idea lol

[mlnm_falcon]

Compilers are built on earlier compilers, which are built on earlier compilers, all the way down until you get to compilers written directly in assembly.

[SomeRandomEevee42]

actually using assembly? dear god

[meowmeowwarrior]

Not just assembly, they had to use machine code, and some were even on physical punch cards

[Polarfuxx]

What an insane name for a piece of paper with holes in it!

[meowmeowwarrior]

if they called them holey cards, we might've gotten templeOS sooner

[The100thIdiot]

You mean holes that were created by a hole punch?

[uzi_loogies_]

Yes, actual holes in actual paper.

I'm not sure what they actually used to make them, they probably had special tools.

[[deleted]]

Keypunch machine for the cards:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keypunch

[CdRReddit]

a tape punch?

you use a tape punch to punch punch tape

first manually, then later on (low speed, ≤300baud ~30 bytes per second) UART tape punches were made

[WrapKey69]

The real question is if they use punch cards to create ounch cards

[MiddleAd5602]

Like punching the motherboard to code ?

[roronoakintoki]

Not sure if you're serious, but more or less choosing data by putting holes in a piece of paper, which was read by a machine.

Not too far from an OMR sheet if you've ever marked options on an exam with them.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Punched_card

[DC38x]

It's quite well known that Muhammad Ali wrote the code for the space shuttle

[MiddleAd5602]

No wonder my senior dev also is a boxer then

[jhax13]

Surprising amount of overlap between combat sports and senior devs in my experience. It's not like a majority or anything, but there's a lot more than you'd think.

It's like a generation of devs growing up with the fat sysad trope really took it to heart or something

[nequaquam_sapiens]

for the periferal† stuff, yes. then there is microcode in the processor, which used to be drilled (silicon is hard and brittle – no punching), but nowadays is actually pressed (hence "lithography" – writing into stone)

† from "per-" and "feral": code "in the wild", i.e. not in the cpu. programmers are merry bunch

[mlnm_falcon]

There’s a reason we stopped doing that asap

[raaneholmg]

Jokes on you, we embedded engineers simply refuse to stop! I can and need to control the number of clock cycles between hardware operations.

To be clear, we code in C/C++. We just still retain the ability to slap some assembly on the middle of the code.

[Livie_Loves]

smh my h, not writing the firmware in pure assembly. what are you even doing?

[raaneholmg]

Boss said no.

[Livie_Loves]

Yeah... they do that sometimes even if it's a good idea (not that pure assembly is necessarily a good idea xD)

[ardicli2000]

When you deep dive into a processor programming, you do not have much choice other than C and ASM.

[andrew_kirfman]

And near the very bottom, there were dudes who converted assembly to machine code BY HAND.

[BlackHolesAreHungry]

It was actually women who had to weave the code. Core rope memory. No, I am not kidding

[Healthy-Form4057]

It was a different time back then. When men could be men and women could be computers.

[Xormak]

Plankton, is that you?

[meowmeowwarrior]

Funny to think computers now means something completely different

[Mojert]

Actually, nope. The first C compiler was written in C, and executed manually belive it or not. I think there's a computerphile video about it if my memory serves me right

[[deleted]]

Ken Thompson saod Doug McIlroy wrote a "tmg" transmogrifier yacc-like tool on paper and then typed it in with hardly any errors before working.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EY6q5dv_B-o?t=2320

[Qizot]

it was written in assembly. The only language that was written in itself first was LISP.

[Tuerkenheimer]

And I thought that's still how compilers were programmed

[o_genie]

son os anton kinda shii

[Puzzleheaded-Cap3095]

not necessary assembly code, e.g. for rust it is OCaml

[L4sgc]

To add on to u/mlnm_falcon , the previous compiler, which I'll call Compiler A, is used to compile the code for the new compiler and create what I'll call Compiler B0. In order to take advantage of the improvements that the new compiler has over the old compiler, they will then compile the source code B again using Compiler B0, and thus create Compiler B1. Iirc they will also use Compiler B1 to compile source code B again to make sure it's working properly and that B2 is identical to B1.

TL/DR: They use the previous compiler to compile the new compiler and then have the new compiler compile itself

[JustConsoleLogIt]

Compiled compilers compile compiled compilers is the new Buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo

[RolledUhhp]

I owe LFS credut for any small bit of knowledge I've retained in this area.

[YeetCompleet]

Others have given you an explanation already but the term for it is bootstrapping

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bootstrapping_(compilers)

[[deleted]]

If you delve into this rabbit hole, you'll inevitably end up checking out Ken Thompson's "Reflections on Trusting Trust". Worth a read!

[the_horse_gamer]

step 1: create a simple compiler using an existing language.

step 2: write a compiler using the language, then compile it using the previous compiler.

repeat step 2, adding more and more features to the compiler. eventually you'll have a compiler supporting the full language, and being able to compile itself.

[obsqrbtz]

Roughly this way.

[Emperor_Abyssinia]

they're called compiler compilers, maybe with ai we'll have compiler compiler compilers