[antlr-interest] request for comments on language implementation

[Andy Tripp]

Hi Michael,
Jiffle looks very cool!

A quick "how to compile and run demos" document would be nice.

Now that you've implemented AST rewrites via ANTLR, I'm curious about whether
you're happy with what you have or whether you think it would have
been easier to implement by just manipulating the ASTs "by hand"
(i.e. just manipulate the tree structure in you Java code the way you
would if ANTLR treewalkers didn't exist).

Here's my take on the issue: 
http://www.antlr2.org/article/1170602723163/treewalkers.html

I can see already you're no longer a neophyte - I would bet that what you're
doing is more complicated than most usages of ANTLR.

A small guide to the code would be nice - just explaining how the code is structured
and maybe an example showing what each of the AST-transform steps is doing.

One issue that comes up occasionally is grammar inheritance.
For example, you have the exact same definition of expr_op in several of 
your .g files. So you might want to look into that.

Proving an ant build.xml would be nice.
And, uhhh, what happened to Morph2.g and Morph3.g?  :)

Andy

Michael Bedward wrote:
> Hi folks,
> 
> This is a plug and a request for feedback on my first ANTLR project:
> Jiffle - a simple language for creating raster images from maths
> expressions.
> 
> You can find it at http://code.google.com/p/jai-tools/
> 
> Look for the Jiffle link at the bottom of that page.  There is a
> preliminary description of the language's purpose and grammar there
> plus you can browse the code including the grammar files.
> 
> I'm using the cascading AST rewrites approach with Jiffle and I'd be
> particularly grateful for any comments on this aspect of the
> implementation.  Since I'm very much an ANTLR neophyte there is bound
> to be a lot of inefficient / inappropriate / just plain wrong stuff in
> the grammars and associated code.  Any feedback on how to do things
> better will be gratefully received.  Be brutal !
> 
> cheers
> Michael
> 
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