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From: grotheer AT PROBLEM_WITH_INEWS_DOMAIN_FILE (Olaf Grotheer)
Newsgroups: comp.os.msdos.djgpp
Subject: Re: Bison/Flex
Date: 28 Jul 1995 13:26:08 GMT
Organization: MPI fuer Festkoerperforschung, Stuttgart
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George C. Moschovitis (gmoscho AT alexander DOT cc DOT ece DOT ntua DOT gr) wrote:
: What exactly are the bison ond flex utilities ?
They are the Gnuish versions of the programs  lex  and  yacc (yet another
compiler compiler) respectively. lex (or flex) takes a description of what
should be considered as a 'token' and produces C-source code that will compile
into a program that seperates a sequence of characters, say
an input file into a sequence of tokens. yacc takes a description of a
'grammar', rules explaining what sequence of tokens should be considered
meaningful and again produces C-source code now for a compiler that will
interprete the sequence of tokens.
: Are they usefull?
Yes, I think so. For a simple problem, its easier to write code by hand, but
for a problem of moderate size, lex and yacc are quite valuable. (I haven't
tried really big problems yet :-) )
: Where can I find info?
Where are many books out explaining  lex  and  yacc. They are really
compatible with  flex  and  bison.
Hope that helps.
	Olaf.