binary translation

In computing, binary translation is a form of binary recompilation where sequences of instructions are translated from a source instruction set to the target instruction set. In some cases such as instruction set simulation, the target instruction set may be the same as the source instruction set, providing testing and debugging features such as instruction trace, conditional breakpoints and hot spot detection. The two main types are static and dynamic binary translation. Translation can be done in hardware (for example, by circuits in a CPU) or in software (e.g. run-time engines, static recompiler, emulators). Motivation Binary translation is motivated by a lack of a binary for a target platform, the lack of source code to compile for the target platform, or otherwise difficulty in compiling the source for the target platform. Statically-recompiled binaries run potentially faster than their respective emulated binaries, as the emulation overhead is removed. This is similar to the difference in performance between interpreted and compiled programs in general.