Frequently asked questions

Is Cheerp free software? Or is it proprietary?

Cheerp is 100% free software. The Cheerp compiler, headers and libraries are licensed under the Apache License v2.0 with LLVM Exceptions license, the same license as the upstream LLVM/Clang projects. The musl implementation of the C library is released under the MIT licence.

Both licenses are permissive and allow Cheerp to be used for both commercial and non-commercial projects with no strings attached.

Should I release my code if I use cheerp?

No. Neither the Apache License nor the MIT license are “copyleft”. You are under no obligation of releasing any of your code if you use Cheerp.

Does Cheerp enforce C++ type safety at run-time?

No. Similarly to what happens when compiling native code from C++, type information is only used to enforce type safety at compile time. Generated code (both from Cheerp or from traditional compilers) keeps no type information at run-time. This also means that type safety has no overhead at run-time. If you change the internal representation of an object using e.g. a JavaScript debugger, the results will probably be bad, unless you know very well what you are doing.

What features of C++ are currently not supported?

Cheerp currently supports most of C++ features up to C++20. While we try very hard to have a full C++20 compatibility, some features are currently not supported in JavaScript mode. All C++20 features are expected to work in WebAssembly mode.

  • Global ordering of pointers . This means that pointers have a definite ordering (as required by the standard) only if they are part of the same array. Unrelated pointers at the moment have undefined ordering, which means that constructs like std::map<void*> will not work in Cheerp when compiling to JavaScript.

Does Cheerp support C++ excepptions?

Yes, exceptions are supported in both WebAssembly and JavaScript modes. They must be enabled by passing the -fexceptions command line to Cheerp, following which the compiler will correctly parse and implement exception handlers.

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