[antlr-interest] antlr or javacc?

Andreas Stefik stefika at gmail.com
Fri Dec 16 14:06:32 PST 2011


Li Li,

I have both implemented compilers in JavaCC and ANTLR and also taught
classes in the same. Antlr wins, hands down, for at least the
following reasons:

1. Antlr is more flexible

2. Antlr has great documentation and a rich community. The JavaCC
documentation is truly awful.

3. Antlr has targets so you can use different platforms.

4. Antlr has rule rewriting and tree walkers. These features alone
make writing a compiler much more pleasant.

5. Antlr has LL *, whereas if I recall JavaCC has fixed lookahead,
which makes writing grammars a little less flexible.

6. Antlr has semantic predicates.

7. Antlr is actively developed. Last I checked, and it's been a while,
javaCC wasn't a very active project.

The list goes on and on. I have no vested interest in choosing either,
but in my view, antlr is a far superior technology.

Stefik


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