Path: csiph.com!weretis.net!feeder6.news.weretis.net!news.misty.com!news.iecc.com!.POSTED.news.iecc.com!nerds-end From: Tom Shields Newsgroups: comp.compilers Subject: Re: Announcing Ox release 1.10.1 Date: Mon, 7 Feb 2022 20:46:10 -0600 Organization: Compilers Central Lines: 72 Sender: news@iecc.com Approved: comp.compilers@iecc.com Message-ID: <22-02-012@comp.compilers> References: <22-02-001@comp.compilers> Mime-Version: 1.0 (Mac OS X Mail 15.0 \(3693.40.0.1.81\)) Content-Type: text/plain; charset="UTF-8" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit Injection-Info: gal.iecc.com; posting-host="news.iecc.com:2001:470:1f07:1126:0:676f:7373:6970"; logging-data="92688"; mail-complaints-to="abuse@iecc.com" Keywords: tools, parse, attribute Posted-Date: 07 Feb 2022 21:58:07 EST X-submission-address: compilers@iecc.com X-moderator-address: compilers-request@iecc.com X-FAQ-and-archives: http://compilers.iecc.com Xref: csiph.com comp.compilers:2891 Howdy, Roger, responses to your questions below: > On Feb 7, 2022, at 1:21 PM, Roger L Costello wrote: > > Hello Tom, > > I have a few questions about Ox: > > 1. Is there a complete, up-to-date, easy-to-read Ox manual? Kurt Bischoff, the original (primary?) Ox developer at Iowa State University, wrote a tutorial (dtd 5 Nov 1993) and a reference manual (dtd 14 Nov 1993). I have attempted to keep both documents current as I’ve expanded on the original Ox functionality - the reference manual more extensively than the tutorial. Both documents are in the ‘./docs’ distribution directory, in both PDF and in LaTeX source form. I believe that both documents are current, although it is certainly possible that I’ve missed something. To date, this is a one-man labor of love ;-) As to whether the documents are “easy-to-read”, you will have to be the judge of that. I suspect that the reference manual might be considered a bit cryptic if one isn’t already familiar with attribute grammars. Furthermore, the limitations of the current Ox translator (in particular, allowing arbitrary C/C++ code in an attribute's definition), make it easy to create hidden attribute dependencies that will randomly break the Ox-generated code. I’m open to constructive comments from users, but so far no one has said anything to me directly. > 2. Are there any published books on Ox? No … do you want to write one? The original Ox distribution includes an example compiler for a small programming language, GPPL, built using Ox (and originally Yacc and Lex). The compiler generates C source code. I have maintained the GPPL compiler, but only to the extent required to enable it to compile, link & execute. Kurt Bischoff wrote a report describing the compiler: "GPPL: A Small Block-Structured Imperative Programming Language Implemented using Ox”, Iowa State University TR#92-32, December, 1992. A Postscript file of that document from Kurt’s last known Ox distribution is in the ‘./gppl’ distribution directory. > 3. Is there an Ox group on Stack Overflow? Not that I am aware of. I did a search just now on the Stack Overflow web and only found 2 questions that were obviously about Ox, both from the same user in April & May of 2021. I guess I should investigate how to set up a trigger to get notified of future Ox questions. > 4. Are there any commercial products that were developed using Ox? Not to my knowledge. I don’t get much user feedback, save for the infrequent bug report. According to the SourceForge server, there have been a total of 472 downloads of the various Ox distribution files since December 2018, which was when I first registered the project. That tells me is there is a non-trivial level of interest, so I’ve kept at it. Regards, Tom Shields