[self-interest] Grammar questions

[Stefan Matthias Aust]

Hi!

I was trying to understand the Self grammar to implement a Self parser.  I
failed.  Now I've a couple of questions regarding the ambiguities of the
grammar.  I'm working with the grammar shown in appendix 2.C of the Self
4.0 language reference.

Currently, I've two problems: a) How can I distinguish a simple expression
enclosed in parenthesis from an object definition - and b) how to detect
the end of a slot list?

I expanded the BNF rules to deal with message precedence as follows:

expression = keyword-message
keyword-message = binary-message {keyword-send} | resend...
keyword-send = small-keyword keyword-message {cap-keyword keyword-message}
binary-message = unary-message {binary-send} | resend...
binary-send = operator unary-message
unary-message = primary {unary-send} | resend...
unary-send = identifier
primary = [receiver]
receiver = identifier | constant

now, to allow expressions in parentheses, we need to add a rule

 receiver = "(" expression ")"

however, now there's no chance to distinguish this from the regular-object
definition, which is one alternative of constant, because "( 1 + 2 )" could
also be a valid method object.  Did I miss something here?

The second problem is with operators.  Appendix 2.B says about operators:

op-char = ... '-' | '^' | '|' | ...
operator = op-char {op-char}

which especially means that ^ and | are valid operators and furthermore,
that for example '=-1' is ambigious. Let's ignore _that_ problem for now.
My trouble are ^ and | as operators.

Currently, my parser will fail on (| a = 1 |) because it thinks that
there's a slot "a" to which a binary expression is assigned of which the
second part is missing. It doesn't detect the end of the slot list.

My parser also fails on this, which might be a legal Self expression
according to the grammar:  (| | x = ( ... ) |)  If "|" is a valid operator,
it must be possible to use it in a binary-slot definition.

Here's another problem with '^':  ^12  can be parsed both as "self ^ 12"
and "return 12".

My solution would be to bann ^ and | as valid operators, but what does the
Self spec say, what does the offical Self parser do?  I need help.

Thanks in advance,
bye
--
Stefan Matthias Aust  //  Are you ready to discover the twilight zone?

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