1.2. GNU Fortran and GCC

1.2 GNU Fortran and GCC

GNU Fortran is a part of GCC, the GNU Compiler Collection. GCC consists of a collection of front ends for various languages, which translate the source code into a language-independent form called GENERIC. This is then processed by a common middle end which provides optimization, and then passed to one of a collection of back ends which generate code for different computer architectures and operating systems.

Functionally, this is implemented with a driver program (gcc) which provides the command-line interface for the compiler. It calls the relevant compiler front-end program (e.g., f951 for Fortran) for each file in the source code, and then calls the assembler and linker as appropriate to produce the compiled output. In a copy of GCC which has been compiled with Fortran language support enabled, gcc will recognize files with .f, <