gforth VS arocc

Compare gforth vs arocc and see what are their differences.

gforth

Gforth mirror on GitHub (original is on Savannah) (by forthy42)

arocc

A C compiler written in Zig. (by Vexu)
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gforth arocc
8 10
139 747
- -
9.8 9.6
7 days ago 1 day ago
Forth Zig
GNU General Public License v3.0 only MIT License
The number of mentions indicates the total number of mentions that we've tracked plus the number of user suggested alternatives.
Stars - the number of stars that a project has on GitHub. Growth - month over month growth in stars.
Activity is a relative number indicating how actively a project is being developed. Recent commits have higher weight than older ones.
For example, an activity of 9.0 indicates that a project is amongst the top 10% of the most actively developed projects that we are tracking.

gforth

Posts with mentions or reviews of gforth. We have used some of these posts to build our list of alternatives and similar projects. The last one was on 2022-12-02.

arocc

Posts with mentions or reviews of arocc. We have used some of these posts to build our list of alternatives and similar projects. The last one was on 2023-05-15.
  • no more bit fiddling (and introducing bilge)
    4 projects | /r/rust | 15 May 2023
    Possible reference as it requires to use the compiler as part of language abi: https://github.com/Vexu/arocc/issues/178 Not sure, where a better thread with explanations of the flaws is.
  • Zig Build System
    8 projects | news.ycombinator.com | 14 Apr 2023
    Zig calls clang to compile C code. This doesn't add a new dependency since Zig already depends on LLVM. In the future when Zig doesn't depend as much on LLVM, there might be a reason to use a C compiler written in Zig (e.g. https://github.com/Vexu/arocc)
  • Aro: A C compiler written in Zig
    4 projects | news.ycombinator.com | 4 Feb 2022
  • Zig 0.9.0
    12 projects | news.ycombinator.com | 20 Dec 2021
    > Does this mean that y'all are open to the self-hosted compiler supporting CPU architectures unlikely to ever have LLVM support?

    Yes! We won't block 1.0 on the quality of the less mainstream targets, but that's what the tier system is for - to ship a compiler that has varying levels of quality for various targets, while communicating clearly to users what kind of experience they can expect for each one.

    SuperH patches are absolutely welcome.

    > how is zig cc anticipated to work with a self-hosted Zig? Will there be a dependency on clang [...]?

    The main distribution of Zig will be LLVM/Clang-enabled. However it is already possible to build a version of Zig that does not have these features enabled. In such case, compiling C, C++, and Objective-C code will result in an error.

    However, the arocc project[1] is emerging, which, depending on a combination of how much funding ZSF gets and how much enthusiasm the unpaid contributors working in their spare time have, is looking like a promising C frontend that would be available even without LLVM/Clang. It is C only, however, with no intention of compiling C++ or Objective-C.

    > would zig cc support the planned C backend?

    As it is currently implemented: no. Zig invokes clang to turn C source code into object files.

    However, with the arocc frontend above, this would be converting the C source code into ZIR (or perhaps AIR), which could then be lowered with any of the backends, including the (partially complete) C backend. In such case, the C output would look drastically different than the input. It would look more like an IR than natural C code that a human would write.

    [1]: https://github.com/Vexu/arocc

  • [Rust advocates] demean software that's not memory safe the way that politicians use their words to sow anger. C has won, and Rust blew it's shot aiming at C++ instead.
    2 projects | /r/programmingcirclejerk | 20 Sep 2021
    Implementing only the language part takes like 10k LOC.
  • Maintain It with Zig
    16 projects | news.ycombinator.com | 8 Sep 2021
  • Adding ANSI C11 C compiler to D so it can import and compile C files directly
    10 projects | news.ycombinator.com | 9 May 2021
    > 9. Without a C compiler, we're stuck with, wedded to, and beholden to libclang.

    > I wouldn't be surprised that the eventual cost of adapting ourselves to

    > libclang will exceed the cost of doing our own C compiler.

    This is a really insightful point. I had to learn this the hard way :)

    We might follow your lead on this, as we have done with so many other great ideas implemented in D.

    Ironically, Vexu started from the other side as you, with the preprocessor mostly done, but the backend left to-do: https://github.com/Vexu/arocc

    One thing that might make libclang worth the cost, however, is its ability to compile C++ code as well. On Zig's end of things, all we have to do is provide libcxx, libcxxabi, libunwind, compiler-rt, and linking, and then libclang is really pulling a lot of weight by compiling C++ code into object files. Sadly this ability is just too useful in practice to ignore. For example, LLVM itself is C++ so if Zig wants to be able to bootstrap itself, it needs this capability.

    Still, I think your maneuver here is the best long-term approach to tackle this problem, and I imagine as time goes on we'll start to migrate towards D's solution here. Maybe someday the Zig distribution that does not have LLVM extensions enabled will be the more popular one!

    I'll be watching the evolution of this new feature in D with great interest!

What are some alternatives?

When comparing gforth and arocc you can also consider the following projects:

elfort - A Forth metacompiler that directly emits an executable binary for x86-64 Linux written in Arkam

zeptoforth - A not-so-small Forth for Cortex-M

mach - zig game engine & graphics toolkit

stage0 - A set of minimal dependency bootstrap binaries

swapforth - Swapforth is a cross-platform ANS Forth

zig-riscv-embedded - Experimental Zig-based CoAP node for the HiFive1 RISC-V board

miniforth - A bootsector FORTH

zig - General-purpose programming language and toolchain for maintaining robust, optimal, and reusable software.

bzflag - 3D multi-player tank battle game

dstep - A tool for converting C and Objective-C headers to D modules

RIIR - why not Rewrite It In Rust

utfcpp - UTF-8 with C++ in a Portable Way