CSIS 480 - Compiler Project

This course includes a non-trivial programming project - the development of a functional compiler. The following documents provide information about the programming langage we will be implementing, dubbed Hansen by previous students:

You should print these documents out, as they are made available, and keep them with you for reference purposes. Initially, only the grammar for HansenLite is available.

The Compiler Project

The project will proceed in three phases:
1) Lexical Analyzer
Implement a stand-alone lexical analyzer that accepts a text file containing a source program as input and produces a stream of tokens representing the program as output, showing lexemes for the tokens such as identifier, number, and arithmetic_operator. The program should be designed using a table-driven approach to a finite-state-automata. Code should be designed with ease of maintenance and extension in mind, making extensive use of named constants, for example, and avoiding hard-coded values wherever possible.
2) Predictive Parser
Implement a non-recursive top-down predictive parser that uses the context-free grammar given for our language to analyze the syntax of a source program. Like the lexical analyzer, the parser will be a table-driven finite-state-automata with the addition of one or more pushdown stacks. As before, code should be carefully designed for extensability and readability. The lexical analyzer from the previous phase of the project will be used to supply your parser with a stream of tokens for parsing. Your parser should accept a text file containing a source program as input and produce a leftmost derivation of the program in the given context-free grammar as output. Any lexical or syntax errors found should be noted with an indication of their location in the program. The symbol table(s) should be printed out at the end of the program.
3) Compiler
Implement a compiler that translates the source program into assembly-code using a syntax-directed definition of semantic rules for our grammar. Your compiler will generate ARM assembly-code.
A fourth phase may include extending the compiler to accommodate additional features added to the basic programming language. While extending our existing compiler should be relatively simple, we may instead use this phase to learn how to use a practical compiler-compiler tool.

General Instructions

Your programs may be written in any approved language. Do not use automated tools for generating portions of the compiler (e.g., Lex, Yacc, JavaCC). Programs should be well designed, implemented, and documented - I can not over-emphasize the importance of documenting your code for this project.

A significant portion of your course grade will depend on how well you accomplish the programming tasks.

Last modified: , by David M. Hansen