pyqbe 0.0.2

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pyqbe

Python bindings for QBE, a compiler backend that generates optimized assembly. Pass QBE IR as a string, get assembly back — no external QBE binary needed.

Note: This is a hobby project.

What is this?

QBE is a small, fast compiler backend (think LLVM but ~10k lines of C). pyqbe wraps it as a Python package so you can generate assembly programmatically without shelling out to a binary.

import pyqbe

ir = """
function w $add(w %a, w %b) {
@start
    %c =w add %a, %b
    ret %c
}
"""

asm = pyqbe.compile(ir)
print(asm)

Why?

If you're building a compiler, DSL, or code generation tool in Python, you need a backend. QBE gives you optimized assembly for free — pyqbe makes it accessible from Python without any system dependencies.

Targets

QBE supports:

• amd64 — Linux (SysV ABI) and macOS
• arm64 — Linux and macOS (Apple Silicon)
• riscv64 — Linux
• amd64_win — Windows (64-bit, requires UNIX toolchain)

Installation

pip install pyqbe

From source

Requires a C compiler and g++ with pybind11.

git clone --recurse-submodules https://github.com/Marpuriganesh/pyqbe
cd pyqbe
pip install .

--recurse-submodules is required — QBE is included as a git submodule.

Status

Early development. API is not stable.

• QBE as git submodule
• wrapper/qbe_api.c — FILE* shim + C entry point
• wrapper/binding.cpp — pybind11 glue
• meson.build — build config
• GitHub Actions + cibuildwheel for prebuilt wheels
• Windows scenario (deferred)

How it works

QBE's parse() function takes a FILE*. pyqbe wraps this with a thin shim that turns a Python string into an in-memory FILE* (fmemopen on Linux/macOS, tmpfile fallback on Windows), calls QBE's internals directly, and captures the assembly output — all in-process.

Python string (QBE IR)
        ↓
   string_to_file()        ← FILE* shim
        ↓
   qbe parse() + emit()    ← QBE internals
        ↓
   assembly string

Related

• QBE — the compiler backend this wraps
• LowPy — systems programming language using pyqbe as its backend

License

QBE is MIT licensed. pyqbe wrapper code is also MIT licensed.