📝Swift Intermediate Language (SIL)
SIL is a Swift Intermediate Language, an intermediate representation of Swift that sits between AST and LLVM IR.
It is very similar to LLVM IR but is higher level and Swift-specific. It preserves more source language information (types).
Notable features:
- High-level type system (including generics)
- Constants are instructions. No Value/Constant divide. There is a place to attach source information to literals, etc.
- No phi nodes. Instead, basic blocks receive arguments.
- SIL does not know about objects’ layout—this is handled by LLVM IR lowering.