There’s a principle called “eating your own dogfood”. By using a tool, you demonstrate the usefulness of the tool. It is often asked, “if the compiler for language X isn’t written in language X, why should I risk using it?” This of course only applies to languages suitable for the domain of compiler writing.
This is based on the Expression Evaluator grammar by Terrence Parr. The grammar for this example: grammar Expr002; options { output=AST; ASTLabelType=CommonTree; // type of $stat.tree ref etc… } prog : ( stat )+ ; stat : expr NEWLINE -> expr | ID ‘=’ expr NEWLINE -> ^(‘=’ ID expr) | NEWLINE -> ; expr … Read more
Assembly instructions are (generally) a direct mapping to opcodes, which are (multi-)byte values of machine code that can be directly interpreted by the processor. It is quite possible to write a program in opcodes directly by looking them up from a table (such as this one for the 6039 microprocessor, for example) that lists them … Read more
The best paper I ever read on compilers is dated 1964 “META II a syntax-oriented compiler writing language” by Val Schorre. (http://doi.acm.org/10.1145/800257.808896) In 10 pages, he shows you how to build an astoundingly simple but very effective compiler-compiler, provides you with with the compiler-compiler grammar and provides you with enough details for you to hand … Read more
Compilers Compilers were the first sort of translator program to be written. The idea is simple: You write the program, then hand it to the compiler which translates it. Then you run the result. Interpreters An interpreter is also a program that translates a high-level language into a low-level one, but it does it at … Read more
Is there a way to actually write a compiler in its own language? You have to have some existing language to write your new compiler in. If you were writing a new, say, C++ compiler, you would just write it in C++ and compile it with an existing compiler first. On the other hand, if … Read more
This is called “bootstrapping”. You must first build a compiler (or interpreter) for your language in some other language (usually Java or C). Once that is done, you can write a new version of the compiler in language Foo. You use the first bootstrap compiler to compile the compiler, and then use this compiled compiler … Read more
Big List of Resources: A Nanopass Framework for Compiler Education ¶ Advanced Compiler Design and Implementation $ An Incremental Approach to Compiler Construction ¶ ANTLR 3.x Video Tutorial Basics of Compiler Design Building a Parrot Compiler Compiler Basics Compiler Construction $ Compiler Design and Construction $ Crafting a Compiler with C $ Crafting Interpreters [Compiler … Read more
One easy way to understand “ABI” is to compare it to “API”. You are already familiar with the concept of an API. If you want to use the features of, say, some library or your OS, you will program against an API. The API consists of data types/structures, constants, functions, etc that you can use … Read more