A highly configurable compiler
You can use a variety of compiler invocation commands and options to tailor the compiler to your unique compilation requirements.
Compiler invocation commands
XL C/C++ provides several commands to invoke the compiler, for example, xlC, xlc++, and xlc. Compiler invocation commands are provided to support most standardized C/C++ language levels and many popular language extensions.
All the invocation commands allow for threadsafe compilations. You can use them to link programs that use multithreading.
For more information about XL C/C++ compiler invocation commands, see Invoking the compiler.
Compiler options
- Debugging your applications
- Optimizing and tuning application performance
- Selecting language levels and extensions for compatibility with nonstandard features and behaviors that are supported by other C or C++ compilers
- Performing many other common tasks that would otherwise require changing the source code
You can specify compiler options through a combination of environment variables, compiler configuration files, command line options, and compiler directive statements embedded in your program source.
For more information about XL C/C++ compiler options, see Compiler options reference.
Custom compiler configuration files
The installation process creates a default compiler configuration file containing stanzas that define compiler option default settings.
If you frequently specify compiler option settings other than the default settings of XL C/C++, you can use makefiles to define your settings. Alternatively, you can create custom configuration files to define your own frequently used option settings.
For more information about using custom compiler configuration files, see Using custom compiler configuration files.
