Parsing plays an important role in static program analysis: during this step a structural representation of code is created upon which further analysis is performed. Parser generator tools, being provided with syntax specification, automate parser development. Language documentation often acts as such specification. Documentation usually takes form of ambiguous grammar in Extended Backus-Naur Form which most parser generators fail to process. Automatic grammar transformation generally leads to parsing performance decrease. Some approaches support EBNF grammars natively, but they all fail to handle ambiguous grammars. On the other hand, Generalized LL parsing algorithm admits arbitrary context-free grammars and achieves good performance, but cannot handle EBNF grammars. The main contribution of this paper is a modification of GLL algorithm which can process grammars in a form which is closely related to EBNF (Extended Context-Free Grammar). We also show that the modification improves parsing performance as compared to grammar transformation-based approach.

Original languageEnglish
Title of host publicationTools and Methods of Program Analysis - 4th International Conference, TMPA 2017, Revised Selected Papers
EditorsVictor Zakharov, Vladimir Itsykson, Andre Scedrov
PublisherSpringer Nature
Pages24-37
Number of pages14
ISBN (Print)9783319717333
DOIs
StatePublished - 1 Jan 2018
Event4th International Conference on Tools and Methods of Program Analysis, TMPA 2017 - Moscow, Russian Federation
Duration: 3 Mar 20174 Mar 2017

Publication series

NameCommunications in Computer and Information Science
Volume779
ISSN (Print)1865-0929

Conference

Conference4th International Conference on Tools and Methods of Program Analysis, TMPA 2017
Country/TerritoryRussian Federation
CityMoscow
Period3/03/174/03/17

    Research areas

  • EBNF, ECFG, Extended context-free grammar, Generalized parsing, GLL, Parsing, Recursive automata, RRPG, SPPF

    Scopus subject areas

  • Computer Science(all)
  • Mathematics(all)

ID: 48535002