in reply to Useful non-Perl-specific references

I also find Alice in Wonderland and Tao Te Ching are useful books for programmers to read. Once again before most of the programming references people have posted.

One book I see on your list that I would personally recommend against reading is the Dragon Book--it's a book that's a classic because it was the first one of note in the field and everyone knows of it, not because it's actually any good. Most of the other compiler books I've come across are better, and arguably you'd do better making it up as you went along.

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Re^2: Useful non-Perl-specific references
by mr_mischief (Monsignor) on Jun 25, 2003 at 22:55 UTC
    Does that apply, in your opinion, to the second Dragon as well as the first? I'm not fond of the first myself. The second isn't fabulous, but I consider it to be quite good. I, however, am not an expert in the field of writing compilers by any stretch. I've written compilers, but admittedly not that well. I am very interested in the pros and cons of any of the texts and references mentioned in this thread.

    Christopher E. Stith
    use coffee;
[reply]
      That is my opinion on the 2nd edition Dragon. :) I don't have a first edition of it, but all the other compiler books in my collection are better than the Dragon. (Arguably the copy of the Tao Te Ching I have is a better compiler book than the Dragon...)
[reply]
        I'd like to now what those are. I don't have any really good books dedicated to compiler design I guess.

        I have the O'Reilly lex & yacc book, I have the aforementioned Programming Language Pragmatics which isn't per se a how-to on compiler writing but has lots of suggestions on certain topics within the realm of writing compilers, Writing Compilers and Interpreters by Ronald Mak (with which I am not very impressed although it does teach how to write a non-optimizing recursive descent parser fairly effectively), and a few books which touch on interpretation and compilation (including books on assembly, on the general practices of programming, on embedded programming, on advanced user interfaces, etc.).

        Of the group which I have, the Dragon is the best one devoted entirely to the hows and whys of building a whole compiler. Lex&Yacc and Programming Language Pragmatics together make for a good team, though.

        Christopher E. Stith
        use coffee;
[reply]
Re: Re: Useful non-Perl-specific references
by YAFZ (Pilgrim) on Jun 26, 2003 at 20:18 UTC
[reply]

In Section Meditations