Hi,
I know that this topic was here few times, last time I came with some questions.
The goal of this email is both to purpose some simple tcc "meta" extension and to ask
some further help to implement what I need.
My intention is to extend C with some features for object (oriented) programming.
In my previous email about the topic I mentioned that I wanted to implement those
extensions with macros. Though I invested a lot of time, I realized that it was rather
a stoic exercise and with the macros will be impossible to implement more powerful
constructs like type checking.
After lot of brainstorming, I have a better understanding of what extensions I would like
to have and how I want to implement them.
I will basically need 4 constructs:
1. a struct like construct, "black". This is the blackbox of the object. This will be mainly
defined in the source file and holds private objects/members. So far did not find
a better name. One candidate would be "implementation", but it is also not really
the implementation etc.
example:
black MyType
{
type1 member1;
type2 member2;
type3 member3;
};
2. a struct like construct, "white". Again, did not find a better name, "interface" could have
been a candidate, but the real interface to the object will be the virtual methods declared
inside the "white" block + the static methods that are defined outside of the block.
white MyType: Object /* inheritance, though there will be no public/private keywoards for the moment */
{
type1 aVirtualMethod();
type1 member1; /* this is the declaration of on accessor that will be "bound" to the one with
same name from the /*black*/
}
3. a method declaration and definiton. This will be similar to the C++ method definition.
/* in the header file */
type1 MyType:.aNonVirtualMethod();
/* later in the implementation file */
type1 MyType:.aNonVirtualMethod();
note here the usage of the ":." instead of "::" as the semantic is a bit different than in C++
4. method call
type1 object;
object..aVirtualMethod();
the token here is ".." instead of "." or "->"
This is again has different semantics. But would not bother with details for the moment.
Further new constructs are in my mind for fibers, continuations (yes they will be different) and and.
Decided to call this "babel C", so files will probably have extension bh/bc (header/implementation)
The bc file will be translated into pure C by the modified tcc. A construct like 1. will be translated into
a C struct with some additional part etc + some glue code. (Will not go into details, but will publish soon the details).
Construct 2 will be also translated into a struc + some glue code, the same with 3. and 4.
I studied the tcc parser and compiler bit more in depth. Found more or less where I should patch. I kept things easy,
(you remember wanted to use some special syntax with @ etc. etc.), so that my stuff fits easyl
into the parsers logic.
What I need now and this is the minimum that would be probably nice to see it going upstream.
My first naiv approach wast to save a pointer in the input buffer and:
-> anything that is normal C syntax, after successful parsing of a declaration or part of a declaration,
send the input to the output
-> anything that is syntax extension, fill in a kind of template and send the result to the output.
This task became though a bit complex for me due to the pre-processing. Got a bit lost with token managemnt,
but probably after further hours could find the solution. Though some hints would be welcome.
I got the suggestion to separate the code from original tcc, keep the parser and implement my code generation.
Not sure that this would make my life easier. Do not think this is a good idea as the assembly code generation
bits would not disturb me (the part that would be redundant for me).
My own first question seems to be confusing as it is not easy to ask it :)... I am rather expecting some hints..
The second question if you could suggest some basic changes in the parser and supporting code that
would make life easier to implement such extensions for code generation.
thanks a lot,
mobi phil