Creating a Portable Programming Language Using Open Source Software

On a first glance, the field of compiler construction and programming language design may not seem to have experienced major innovations over the last decade. By now, it is almost common knowledge how a lexer works, how parsing is done, but not many have yet realized how Open Source software - and in particular the GNU Compiler Collection - have silently offered language implementors new and better ways to do their job. Therefore, this paper describes the novel advantages Open Source software provides and, furthermore, it illustrates these with practical examples showing how the presented concepts can be put into practice. Another important contribution of this paper is to give an overview over the existing limitations and the technical problems that can occur when creating an Open Source based programming language implementation.