Branch distance optimization of structured programs

AbstractOne of the functions of code generation (or peephole optimization of generated code) is to find a linear arrangement of code segments such that the sum of branch distances between code segments is minimized. The problem is a generalization of the optimal linear arrangement problem which is known to be NP-hard. However, it has important applications in generating object code for pipeline and cache machines. This paper presents a branch-and-bound method which incorporates a heuristic for deriving a near-optimal initial solution