A FrontEnd in C++?

[Gabriel Dos Reis]

Zack Weinberg <zack@codesourcery.com> writes:

| On Mon, Aug 19, 2002 at 05:46:18PM +1000, Fergus Henderson wrote:
| > On 17-Aug-2002, khalid aggag <khalidaggag@hotmail.com> wrote:
| > > I am currently developing a new Frontend for an educational language for 
| > > GCC. I have the language's lexical analysis and parsing modules in C++. Is 
| > > it possible to develop a frontend for gcc written completely in C++?
| > 
| > Yes, it is possible.
| > People have written frontends for gcc in languages other than C before.
| > For example, the Ada front-end is written in Ada, and the Mercury
| > front-end is written in Mercury. 
| 
| Based on the number of problems we have encountered with the Ada front
| end compared to the others, I think that as a matter of project policy
| writing front ends in any language other than C should be discouraged.

It is far from clear that those problems aren't deficiencies in the
GCC's own architecture; any project that would make it possible to use
the targetted language as an implementation language for front-ends
should be highly encouraged IMSHO.

-- Gaby