ABI and ISA

ABI定义了如何使用ISA。

ISA定义了机器码的使用规则。

http://www.delorie.com/gnu/docs/gmp/gmp_6.html

ABI and ISA

ABI (Application Binary Interface) refers to the calling conventions between functions, meaning what registers are used and what sizes the various C data types are. ISA (Instruction Set Architecture) refers to the instructions and registers a CPU has available.

Some 64-bit ISA CPUs have both a 64-bit ABI and a 32-bit ABI defined, the latter for compatibility with older CPUs in the family. GMP supports some CPUs like this in both ABIs. In fact within GMP `ABI' means a combination of chip ABI, plus how GMP chooses to use it. For example in some 32-bit ABIs, GMP may support a limb as either a 32-bit long or a 64-bit long long.

By default GMP chooses the best ABI available for a given system, and this generally gives significantly greater speed. But an ABI can be chosen explicitly to make GMP compatible with other libraries, or particular application requirements. For example,