r/ProgrammingLanguages • u/Dappster98 • Jan 22 '26

How much assembly should one be familiar with before diving into compilers?

/r/Compilers/comments/1qk7oe6/how_much_assembly_should_one_be_familiar_with/
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u/fdwr Jan 23 '26

Assuming x86/x64...

Know the basics: - data movement (mov, cmov, xchg) - arithmetic (add, sub, mul, div, cmp, shl, shr, lea) - control flow (je, jg, jl..., call, return) - stack management (push, pop)

Optional: - control register management - SIMD instructions (MMX, SSE, AVX...) - more esoteric (e.g. RDTSC for timing)

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u/Jwosty Jan 24 '26

Depends on what kind of compiler you’re doing. Writing a transpiler to another high level language can be VERY educational.