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Centrum voor Wiskunde en lnformatica Centre for Mathematics and Computer Science J. Heering, P. Klint, J.G. Rekers Incremental generation of parsers , Computer Science/Department of Software Technology Report CS-R8822 May Biblk>tlleek Centrum ypor Wisl~unde en lnformatk:a Am~tel>dam The Centre for Mathematics and Computer Science is a research institute of the Stichting Mathematisch Centrum, which was founded on February 11, 1946, as a nonprofit institution aim ing at the promotion of mathematics, computer science, and their applications. It is sponsored by the Dutch Government through the Netherlands Organization for the Advancement of Pure Research (Z.W.0.). q\ ' Copyright (t:: Stichting Mathematisch Centrum, Amsterdam 1 Incremental Generation of Parsers J. Heering Department of Software Technology, Centre for Mathematics and Computer Science P.O. Box 4079, 1009 AS Amsterdam, The Netherlands P. Klint Department of Software Technology, Centre for Mathematics and Computer Science P.O. Box 4079, 1009 AS Amsterdam, The Netherlands and Programming Research Group, University of Amsterdam P.O. BOX 41882, 1009 DB Amsterdam, The Netherlands J. Rekers Department of Software Technology, Centre for Mathematics and Computer Science P.O. Box 4079, 1009 AB Amsterdam, The Netherlands A parser checks whether a text is a sentence in a language. Therefore, the parser is provided with the grammar of the language, and it usually generates a structure (parse tree) that represents the text according to that grammar. Most present-day parsers are not directly driven by the grammar but by a 'parse table', which is generated by a parse table generator. A table based parser wolks more efficiently than a grammar based parser does, and provided that the parser is used often enough, the cost of gen erating the parse table is outweighed by the gain in parsing efficiency.
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