Subj : Re: How-to on writing an interpreter?
To   : comp.programming
From : Flavius Vespasianus
Date : Mon Jul 18 2005 04:09 am

"C. Rebert" <cvrebert@gmail.com> wrote in news:1121485564.371721.318960
@g43g2000cwa.googlegroups.com:

> I'm trying to implement an interpreter for a programming language, but
> so far haven't been able to find any good materials on how to write a
> simple stack-based interpreter. I would appreciate it if someone could
> point me to some resources on writing such an interpreter. I'd be open
> to buying such materials, as long as they aren't ludicrously expensive.
> Thanks for your time.

There are about 5 books on compilers and interpreters available on 
Amazon.

(Apparently Aho et all have a new compiler book coming out in Nov.)

Having done it many times, I will give a brief outline.....

The basic process is to define the language and to define the 
intermediate structure to be interpreted. The latter will be symbol 
tables and trees/graphs representing the code to execute.  (OO languages, 
such as C++ are EXTREMELY well suited for such applications) 

Then you have to write a parser to convert the language into the 
intermediate form.

Then you have to write the interpeter itself that "execute" the 
intermediate form.

A good compiler book(even one that did not specifically deal with 
interpreters) is what you need to learn.

.