The structure of a generalized programming language compiler

High-level programming languages have been developed to simplify the communication problem between the user and the computer. The processing of a program that is written in a high-level language is accomplished through the compiler. The general trend in compiler construction has been the building of a specific compiler for a specific language. Thus, a given computer system will have more than one compiler if more than one high-level language is made available to the users. Various researchers in the language theory area have attempted to show the theoretical ways of designing a single compiler for different languages. However, these theoretical approaches have not delved into the complete structure of a generalized compiler. The usual approach has been to show the various methods of syntax analyses with minimal coverage of semantics design, althoughsemantics is usually considered to be the most complex part of any compiler. This dissertation presents an alternative approach to the design of a generalized compiler for phrase structured languages. A well-defined algorithm is presented to construct the driver table for the bottom-up method of syntax analysis. The solution to the problem of semantics design is shown with a method that requires the syntax analyzer to construct a macro instruction for each recognized prime phrase in a given sentential form. This is referred to as the "macro semantics" method. A proposed macro semantic language is shown to aid the compiler builder in the construction of an efficient macro generator. The macro generator proposed in this dissertation is primarily designed for the specific needs of the compiler under consideration. It is not a general purpose macro processor. One will note that the use of macro semantics will not only simplify the structure of the generalized compiler, but also facilitate for compiler extensibility