[antlr-interest] Building own interpreter

[Andreas Stefik]

William,

This is a complex question to answer, and it really depends on your
needs. For example, creating a whole compiler from scratch is
difficult, but possible. We have our own compiler (with an ANTLR front
end), that integrates our own custom language, called HOP, which is
basically a novice programming language we distribute to schools for
the blind. Our implementation is on sourceforge and is under GPL2, so
you are welcome to look at it (Search for "Sodbeans"). We also
integrate our custom compiler into NetBeans.

On the other hand, if your needs allow it, you can also do things like
have your antlr grammar generate java byte code or assembly directly,
which is sometimes easier, again depending on what you need. And very
simple interpreters for very simple languages aren't too tough, if you
know what you are doing, and depending on your requirements.

Hope that gives you some tips, at least. Short answer: Yes, it's
definitely possible, but it depends on your goals, and it's typically
not something you would bang out in a weekend.

Andreas Stefik, Ph.D.
Department of Computer Science
Southern Illinois University Edwardsville

On Fri, Apr 9, 2010 at 1:44 PM, William v Doorn <williamvdoorn at gmail.com> wrote:
> Hello all,
>
> I've been reading the The definitive ANTLR book and I've made my own small
> language using the AST strcuture.
>
> Now I was wondering, is it hard to make my own compiler/interpeter for this?
> I can feed files and such to it, but how would I make my own
> interpreter/compiler?
>
> Thanks,
>
> William van Doorn
>
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