[MUD-Dev] Storing tokens with flex & bison

[J C Lawrence]

On Sun, 02 Jan 2000 00:33:00 +0100 
olag  <Ola> wrote:

> If speed isn't paramount and you don't need the most complicated
> grammar in the world then I wonder if not a recursive decent
> parser combined with a fairly direct OO representation for
> execution would do wonders for many MUDserver startups.

Walter Bright, the author of the Datalight C compiler, and later the
Symmantec nee Zortech nee Zorland C++ compiler (the first native C++
compiler on the planet (ie not CFRONT based)) ysed a recursive
decent parser for his C++ and C compilers.  Bloody good compilers
they were too BTW.  There are some long and fairly amusing (if
bitter) threads in comp.lang.c++ (IIRC correctly) on the area and
his assertion that C++ submitted reasonably well (then) to recursive
decent parsing.

I've used recursive decent parsing for all my micro-languages for
the simple reason that I was never willing to confront lex/yacc or
their derivatives and I'd done all my interesting language work
before I ran across PCCTS et al.  Recursive decent parsers are easy
to do, easy to get reasonably right as long as your language is
regular, and of course horrible to optimise or put a proper VM
under.  That all said, I agree, given current CPU speeds, for
hobbyest games and typical activity rates on your server (say a few
hundred users etc) there is little reason to not use a recursive
decent parser.

--
J C Lawrence                                 Home: claw at kanga.nu
----------(*)                              Other: coder at kanga.nu
--=| A man is as sane as he is dangerous to his environment |=--


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