A naming specification language for syntax-directed editors

Abstract

A naming specification language, NSL, is described, which supplements existing syntax and semantics specification techniques for syntax-directed editor generation. NSL allows the editor implementor to define language-specific naming and scoping features in terms of a set of high-level abstractions. This facilitates editor generation by requiring considerably less work than either hand coding or specification using techniques more general than NSL. A modified editor-generator kernel architecture is described that efficiently implements the abstractions of NSL. This architecture supports NSL by a naming layer, which supplements the tree structure with graph edges, providing additional paths for semantic information propagation. The principal source of efficiency in this architecture is the direct propagation of incremental semantic evaluation from name declarations to name references. Also described are means by which NSL could be supported using previously proposed techniques for enhancing the performance of the attribute grammar paradigm.<>