ARM Holdings has submitted patches implementing support for the ARMv8.4-A instruction set update for the GNU Compiler Collection (GCC).

ARMv8.4-A adds a new Secure EL2 state, more cryptographic hashing algorithms are supported by the instruction set, support for Activity Monitors, improved virtualization support, and Memory Partitioning and Monitoring (MPAM) capabilities.

So far there aren't any ARMv8.4-A cores yet out in the market, but they're coming and ARM Holdings is readying the GCC compiler support. The GCC patches posted on Monday add support for the new ARM SHA3 / SHA512 / SM3 / SM4 crypto extensions as well as new FP16 multiply add/subtract instructions. These extensions are also made optional for earlier versions of ARMv8.

These patches for now can be found on gcc-patches. But with feature development now being over for the upcoming GCC 8 (GCC 8.1) stable release, there's the possibility this work might not land until GCC 9.0 development opens.