ESDF: A proposal for a more flexible SDF handling

Abstract

By the means on its annotations, Syntax Definition Formalism (SDF) seems to be extensible: the user is tempted to tailor its grammar syntax by adding new annotation kinds. Unfortunately the standard SDF crunching tools from Stratego/XT do not support the extension of SDF, and the user has to develop the whole set of tools for her home grown extension(s). We present the SDF tool set that provides “weak” genericity with respect to the grammar grammar: support for arbitrary SDF annotations. We would like to contribute it to Stratego/XT since its components subsume their stock peers. Finally, we present a set of four extensions we find useful.