compiler

Nov 3, 2023

• Lexical Analysis
• Parsing
• Semantic Analysis
• Optimization
• Code Generation

• Abstraction = detached from concrete details
  • “Abstraction is selective ignorance” - Andrew Koenig
• Modes of abstraction
  • Via languages/compilers: High-level code, few machine dependencies Via functions and subroutines: Abstract interface to behavior
  • Via modules: Export interfaces; hide implementation
  • Via classes/abstract data types: Bundle data with its operations

• Error handling (“When I encounter code which is incomplete or erroneous, I would like to present the user with a helpful message for each error in the program instead of immediately dying with an unhelpful message at the first error.”)
• Syntax challenges (“When you encounter a -, is it unary negation or a minus sign?”)
• Semantics challenges (“Can I correctly resolve function overloads per the PL specification for each invocation?”)
• Typing challenges (“Does the compiler determine type correctness via type inference, type checking, or ‘both’?”)

• Understanding the differences: traditional interpreter, JIT compiler, JIT interpreter and AOT compiler - Software Engineering Stack Exchange
• compiler construction - How does compiling circular dependencies work? - Stack Overflow
  • Use two pass or multi pass compiler to deal with circular dependencies
• GitHub - jamiebuilds/the-super-tiny-compiler: Possibly the smallest compiler ever
• JIT Compiler
• Interpreter
• Compilation
• ELF
• Finite Automata
• gcc

• Software Foundations
• scheme2006.cs.uchicago.edu/11-ghuloum.pdf