An LR parsing technique for extended context-free grammars

Extended context-free grammars allow regular expressions to appear in productions right hand sides, and are a clear and natural way to describe the syntax of programming languages.In this paper an LR parsing technique for extended context-free grammars is presented, which is based on an underlying transformation of the grammar into an equivalent context-free one.The technique is suitable for inclusion in one-pass compilers: the implementation requires little extensions to the algorithms working for normal LR grammars. Besides describing the parsing method, the paper shows also the algorithms for deriving the parsing tables; tables optimization is also discussed. Finally, this technique is compared with other proposals appeared in the literature.     

The parsing problem for affix grammars

Summary Affix grammars are an extension of context-free grammars which retain most of their advantages and eliminate most of their limitations with respect to the definition of programming languages and the specification of their translators. The extension allows definition of context-sensitive syntax features, and also allows semantics to be linked to syntax. In this paper, the parsing problem for affix grammars is explored and shown to be closely related to the parsing problem for context-free grammars. This enables a standard context-free parser constructor to be generalised to a constructor for affix grammars, essentially by addition of a preprocessor. The resulting constructors are compared with previously implemented or proposed constructors.     

On the generative capacity of context-free matrix forms

This paper deals with the concepts of a matrix form and strict interpretation. By a matrix form we mean a context-free matrix grammar. Via an interpretation mechanism it generates a family of structurally related grammars and these generate a family of languages. We study here the properties of matrix forms as generators for the families of regular, linear and context-free languages. It is for instance shown that an arbitrary matrix form with only one nonterminal symbol does not generate the family of context-free languages if it contains a matrix with at least two productions.     

一种特殊的上下文无关文法及其语法分析

SAQ系统是一个进行软件规约获取、检验和复用的实验系统，其中以上下文无关文法表示的概念是规约的一部分.SAQ要求将概念的词法和句法定义结合在一个上下文无关文法中.如果用常规的上下文无关文法描述诸如程序设计语言和自然语言等一些复杂概念的语法，则需要把诸如空格和回车等没有实质意义的分隔符包含到语法中去(这种描述方法称为朴素表示法),使得语法描述很累赘.为此，作者设计了一种特殊的上下文无关文法,它把通常上下文无关文法定义中的非终极符集合和终极符集合进行细化.用这种文法可以相对简洁地描述程序语言和自然语言等复杂概     

Evolutionary induction of stochastic context free grammars

This paper describes an evolutionary approach to the problem of inferring stochastic context-free grammars from finite language samples. The approach employs a distributed, steady-state genetic algorithm, with a fitness function incorporating a prior over the space of possible grammars. Our choice of prior is designed to bias learning towards structurally simpler grammars. Solutions to the inference problem are evolved by optimizing the parameters of a covering grammar for a given language sample. Full details are given of our genetic algorithm (GA) and of our fitness function for grammars. We present the results of a number of experiments in learning grammars for a range of formal languages. Finally we compare the grammars induced using the GA-based approach with those found using the inside-outside algorithm. We find that our approach learns grammars that are both compact and fit the corpus data well.     

Tree controlled grammars

Languages are studied which can be generated by context-free grammars under a single simple restriction which must be satisfied by its derivation trees. Using tree controlled grammars (TC grammars for short) all unambigous and some inherently ambigous context-free languages, and also some non context-free languages can be parsed in timeO(n ²). The classes of regular, linear, context-free, EOL, ETOL and type 0 languages can be characterized in a natural manner using TC grammars. A context-free generator for all type 0 languages is exhibited. Some normal forms for TC grammars are established but it is shown that many common normal forms (e. g. Greibach normal form) cannot be obtained for TC grammars in general.     

The complexity of the membership problem for some extensions of context-free languagest†

The time and tape complexity of some families of languages defined in the literature by altering methods of generation by context-free grammars is considered. Specifically; it is shown that the following families of languages can be recognized by deterministic multitape Turing machines either in polynomial time or within (log n)² tape:

1) the context independent developmental (EOL) languages;

2) the simple matrix languages;

3) the languages generated by derivation restricted state grammars.:

4) the languages generated by linear context-free grammars with certain non-regular control sets;

5) the languages generated by certain classes of vector grammars.

In fact, these languages are of the same tape complexity as context-free languages. Other results indicate the complexity of EDOL languages and the effects on complexity of applying the homomorphic replication operator to regular and context-free languages.     

Spinal-Formed Context-Free Tree Grammars

In this paper we introduce a restricted model of context-free tree grammars called spine grammars, and study their formal properties including considerably simple normal forms. Recent research on natural languages has suggested that formalisms for natural languages need to generate a slightly larger class of languages than context-free grammars, and for that reason tree adjoining grammars have been widely studied relating them to natural languages. It is shown that the class of string languages generated by spine grammars coincides with that of tree adjoining grammars. We also introduce acceptors called linear pushdown tree automata, and show that linear pushdown tree automata accept exactly the class of tree languages generated by spine grammars. Linear pushdown tree automata are obtained from pushdown tree automata with a restriction on duplicability for the pushdown stacks. Received May 29, 1998, and in revised form April 27, 1999, and in final form May 10, 1999.     

Fast recognition of context-sensitive structures

This paper is concerned with an extension of context-free LL(k) grammars, called RLL(k) grammars. RLL(k) grammars are powerful enough to generate non-context-free languages. In particular context-sensitive constructs of programming languages can be formalized conveniently. RLL(k) grammars have the pleasant property that fast syntactical check procedures exist. An algorithm for syntactical analysis with linear average cost is developed in this paper. A worst case quadratic upper bound is derived.     

Context-free languages over infinite alphabets

In this paper we introduce context-free grammars and pushdown automata over infinite alphabets. It is shown that a language is generated by a context-free grammar over an infinite alphabet if and only if it is accepted by a pushdown automaton over an infinite alphabet. Also the generated (accepted) languages possess many of the properties of the ordinary context-free languages: decidability, closure properties, etc.. This provides a substantial evidence for considering context-free grammars and pushdown automata over infinite alphabets as a natural extension of the classical ones. Received November 27, 1995 / March 4, 1997