Test Your Compiler Construction Skills with this Quiz!

Introduction to Compiler Construction

• The course covers topics such as lexical analysis, top-down parsing, bottom-up parsing, syntax-directed translation, intermediate code generation, code optimization, and code generation.
• The required textbook is "Compilers: Principles, Techniques, and Tools" by Alfred V. Aho, Ravi Sethi, and Jeffrey Ullman.
• The course objectives include building a compiler for a simplified programming language, using compiler construction tools, defining LL(1), LR(1), and LALR(1) grammars, and understanding compiler analysis, optimization techniques, and code generation.
• The history of compilers began with the need to reuse software on different CPUs in the 1950s, leading to the creation of FORTRAN compilers.
• Compiler technology has been applied in unexpected areas such as text-formatting languages, silicon compiler for VLSI circuits, OS command languages, and database query languages.
• Compilers convert high-level language source code into machine code, which can be pure machine code, augmented machine code, or virtual machine code.
• Compilers may generate assembly or other source format, relocatable binary, or absolute binary.
• There are three ways to convert source code to machine code: compiling, interpreting, and hybrid (just-in-time).
• Interpreters translate one statement at a time and are best suited for development environments, while compilers scan the entire program and are best suited for production environments.
• The structure of a compiler includes a scanner, parser, semantic routines, optimizer, and code generator.
• Compiler passes can be single-pass or multi-pass, with multi-pass compilers solving problems of designing compilers for different programming languages or different machines/systems.
• Compiler design considerations include debugging compilers, optimizing compilers, and retargetable compilers, with cross compilers being able to create executable code for a platform other than the one on which the compiler is running.