Re: 3DLDF

[Laurence Finston]

Hans Aberg wrote:> 

> 
> You may have a look at the Bison manual, how it quickly goes through some
> examples. Of course, this Bison manual does not give as much instructions
> as some newbies would want. I think that the some of the examples in your
> Pictures sections should be lifted out to produce the equivalent of the
> Bison calculator example.
> 

I've done more than have a look at the Bison manual.  I think it's very good.

> 
> You do as you want, as it is your program. But you sounds as Akim Demaille
> before he implemented M4 into Bison.
> 

If it ever seems useful to me, I'll  do it.  I appreciate the suggestion in
any case.

> 
> I think that these discussions started with your problems of using Bison to
> implement a MetaFont-like language. But if you have no problems there, just
> go ahead.
> 

No, it started with a discussion about `%union' and the relative merits of
using `void*' and a base class.  It then moved on to a discussion about
`static_cast()' versus `dynamic_cast()'.  

I haven't had many problems with Bison, it works a treat.  I don't consider it
a major problem that it's apparently not possible to implement all of the
features of Metafont's parser using Bison.  I wouldn't expect it to be.

> 
> The point (no pun intended!) with the intermediate language is that 
> you no
> longer need to have that coupling: 

I see this coupling as an advantage rather than a disadvantage.
Different people have different approaches to programming.  That this is
possible is one of the things that makes it an art, in my opinion.  I
originally thought that the title of Knuth's  _The Art of Computer
Programming_ was a joke, and that it wouldn't be a serious book.  Then I
looked inside.   

It was largely Knuth that made me realize that programming could be a creative
activity and that it could be pursued on a high level --- as high as one is
able to go.   But one doesn't need to be a great computer scientist or
mathematician to program something useful and interesting.  It's also possible
to make a lot out of a little.

Laurence