Re: Best language for implementing compilers?

From	George Neuner <gneuner2@comcast.net>
Newsgroups	comp.compilers
Subject	Re: Best language for implementing compilers?
Date	2019-02-08 18:36 -0500
Organization	A noiseless patient Spider
Message-ID	<19-02-004@comp.compilers> (permalink)
References	<19-02-002@comp.compilers>

Show all headers | View raw

On Fri, 8 Feb 2019 12:20:18 +0000, "Costello, Roger L."
<costello@mitre.org> wrote:

>What is it about ML that makes it such a good language for implementing
>compilers?

Compiling involves a lot of pattern matching, and pattern matching is
a native feature of ML.

I can recall papers from that same era advocating writing compilers in
Prolog, or similar declarative languages, in which essentially all
programming is done with pattern matching.

Lisp and Lisp-like languages - Scheme, Racket, etc. - are also nice to
work with for compiler writing. These languages don't natively include
pattern matching, but they are extensible [using metaprogramming] and
there are good pattern match libaries available for most popular
implementations.

Racket, in particular, is a "batteries included" Scheme derivative
that includes ML-like pattern matching in its basic distribution.

George

Back to comp.compilers | Previous | Next — Previous in thread | Next in thread | Find similar

Thread

Best language for implementing compilers? "Costello, Roger L." <costello@mitre.org> - 2019-02-08 12:20 +0000
  Re: Best language for implementing compilers? Nala Ginrut <nalaginrut@gmail.com> - 2019-02-09 00:27 +0800
  Re: Best language for implementing compilers? George Neuner <gneuner2@comcast.net> - 2019-02-08 18:36 -0500
    Re: Best language for implementing compilers? Bart <bc@freeuk.com> - 2019-02-11 12:59 +0000
      Re: Best language for implementing compilers? drb@ihatespam.msu.edu (Dennis Boone) - 2019-02-12 09:38 -0600
        Re: Best language for implementing compilers? drb@ihatespam.msu.edu (Dennis Boone) - 2019-02-19 11:22 -0500
          Re: Best language for implementing compilers? arnold@skeeve.com (Aharon Robbins) - 2019-02-20 11:48 +0000
      Re: Best language for implementing compilers? Kaz Kylheku <157-073-9834@kylheku.com> - 2019-02-12 16:45 +0000
      Re: Best language for implementing compilers? mertesthomas@gmail.com - 2019-03-09 01:47 -0500
        Re: Best language for implementing compilers? Hans-Peter Diettrich <DrDiettrich1@netscape.net> - 2019-03-09 10:14 +0100
          Re: Best language for implementing compilers? George Neuner <gneuner2@comcast.net> - 2019-03-09 22:47 -0500
          Re: Best language for implementing compilers? Kaz Kylheku <157-073-9834@kylheku.com> - 2019-03-10 05:40 +0000
        Re: Best language for implementing compilers? Bart <bc@freeuk.com> - 2019-03-09 12:34 +0000
        Re: Best language for implementing compilers? George Neuner <gneuner2@comcast.net> - 2019-03-09 22:57 -0500
          Re: Best language for implementing compilers? Kaz Kylheku <157-073-9834@kylheku.com> - 2019-03-10 05:48 +0000
      Re: Best language for implementing compilers? Christopher F Clark <christopher.f.clark@compiler-resources.com> - 2019-03-10 04:13 -0700
        Re: Best language for implementing compilers? Bart <bc@freeuk.com> - 2019-03-10 15:33 +0000
          Re: Best language for implementing compilers? Christopher F Clark <christopher.f.clark@compiler-resources.com> - 2019-03-11 10:49 -0700
            Re: Best language for implementing compilers? Hans-Peter Diettrich <DrDiettrich1@netscape.net> - 2019-03-12 06:54 +0100
              Re: Best language for implementing compilers? Bart <bc@freeuk.com> - 2019-03-13 01:50 +0000
        Re: Best language for implementing compilers? Hans-Peter Diettrich <DrDiettrich1@netscape.net> - 2019-03-10 16:13 +0100
          Re: Best language for implementing compilers? Christopher F Clark <christopher.f.clark@compiler-resources.com> - 2019-03-11 10:06 -0700
        Re: Best language for implementing compilers? George Neuner <gneuner2@comcast.net> - 2019-03-10 18:23 -0400
        Re: Best language for implementing compilers? George Neuner <gneuner2@comcast.net> - 2019-03-10 18:58 -0400
  Re: Best language for implementing compilers? "Robin Vowels" <robin51@dodo.com.au> - 2019-02-09 19:58 +1100
  Best language for implementing compilers? David Lovemore <davidlovemore@gmail.com> - 2019-02-12 03:28 -0800
  Re: Best language for implementing compilers? mertesthomas@gmail.com - 2019-03-12 10:40 -0700

csiph-web