alt Hacker NewsParsing is the front end to a compiler. Can't get semantics without first recognizing syntax. I have a hard time thinking about programming languages without seeing them as a parsing exercise first, every time.
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samus • yesterday at 3:28 PM
Getting an overview of parsing theory is mainly useful to avoid making ambiguous or otherwise hard to parse grammars. Usually one can't go too wrong with a hand-written recursive descent parser, and most general-purpose language are so complicated that parser generator can't really handle them. Anyway the really interesting parts of compiling happen in the backend.
Another alternative is basing the language on S-expressions, for which a parser is extremely simple to write.
The recommended advice is to start with semantics first. Syntax will change, there is not much point fixing it down too early.
Most of the work is actually the backend, and people sort of illusion themselves into "creating a language" just because they have an AST.