Programming language syntax design (was Re: ... typedef problem)

Stephen J Bevan <bevan@computer-science.manchester.ac.uk>
Wed, 15 Jan 92 13:22:28 GMT

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Newsgroups: comp.compilers
From: Stephen J Bevan <bevan@computer-science.manchester.ac.uk>
Keywords: parse, design
Organization: Compilers Central
References: 92-01-049
Date: Wed, 15 Jan 92 13:22:28 GMT

      [On the other hand, some of us would put "easy to parse using yacc" fairly
      low on our list of criteria for good language design. -John]


Maybe that's why there are so many (syntactically) badly designed
languages :-)


IMHO by definition the "syntax" should be parsable by a context free
grammar. As I said previously if you don't design it like this you should
have a good reason. I have nothing against languages that deviate from
the rule as long as there is some real benefit from it. The Ada example I
gave is one example of this. I'm at a loss to think of another one.


Also, I don't consider "yacc" to be the last word in syntax analysis.
Like C it's old and past it's prime. There are better tools freely
available (e.g. GMD toolbox), if only people would use them.


Stephen J. Bevan bevan@cs.man.ac.uk
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