TOPDOWNPARSING,RECURSIVEDESCENT PREDICTIVEPARSING

Topdownparsing:
Thetopdownconstructionofaparsetreeisdonebystartingwiththe root,labeledwiththestartingnonterminal,andrepeatedlyperformingthe followingtwosteps
1. atnoden,labeledwithnonterminalA,selectoneoftheproductionsforA

andconstruct childrenatnforthesymbolsontherightsideoftheproduction

2. Findthenextnodeatwhichthesubtreeisconstructed. Forsomegrammars,theabovestepscanbeimplementedduringasingleleft torightscanoftheinputstring.Thecurrenttokenbeingscannedontheinput isoftencalledasthelookaheadsymbol.Initiallythelookaheadsymbolisthe firsti.etheleftmosttokenoftheinputstring. Letusconsiderthefollowinggrammar. A>BA |a |aa B> BB |b andnowconsidertheinputstringbbaa

Thetopdownparsingwouldlooklikethisindifferentsteps

1.

input:bbaa,thehighlightedcharacterindicatesthelookahead. 2. A

B 3. A

B B 4. B A B B b
5. input:bbaa

A B

B B

A A B

b
6. input:bbaa

b A B A Baa b

B b

Herewehaveassumedthat,atthefirstattempttheparserwouldknow whichproductiontousetogettherightoutput,butingeneral,theselectionofa productionofanonterminalmayinvolvetrialanderror,thatiswemayhaveto tryaproductionandbacktracktotryanotherproductionifthefirstisfoundto beunsuitable.Aproductionisunsuitable,ifafterusingtheproduction,we cannotcompletethetreetomatchtheinputstring.wewilldiscussthisparsing inthenextsection. RECURSIVEDESCENTPARSING

Thisisgeneralformoftopdownparsing,calledrecursivedescent parsingwherebacktrackingmaybeinvolved.Thisisabadtypeof parsingwhichinvolvesrepeatedtryingtogetthecorrectoutput.This canalsobetermedasbruteforcetypeofparsing.Presently,thistype ofparsingisoutdated,justbecausetherearemuchbettermethodsof parsingwhichwewillbediscussinglater. Considerthegrammar: S> cAd|bd A>ab|a

andtheinputstringiscad. Toconstructthetree,wecreateaninitialtreeofjustonenodeS. Theinputpointerpointstoc,andweusethefirstproduction,fors togettheexpandedtree. S c A d

Theleftmostleaflabeledcmatchesthefistsymboloftheinputand henceweadvancethepointertothesecondsymboloftheinputwhich isa.wenowexpandAbyitsfirstproductiontoobtainthefollowing tree. S c a A d b

nowwehaveamatchforthesecondsymboloftheinputandhence advabcethepointertod,andcompareitwiththenextleafb,which doesnotmatch,wereportfailureandgobacktoseewhetherthereis analternativeproductionforA. IngoingbacktoA,wemustbacktracktheinputpointertoa. findinganotherproduction,wetryoutthenextconfiguration. S

A a

Nowtheleafamatcheswiththesecondsymboloftheinputandthe thethirdleafdmatcheswiththethirdsymboloftheinput. Andbecausetheinputstringisconsumed,wehaltanddenotethe successfulcompletionofparsing.

PREDICTIVEPARSING: Thisisatopdownparsingmethodwhereweexecuteasetof recursivesetofprocedurestoprocesstheinput.Aprocedureis associatedwithanonterminalofagrammar.Herethelookahead symbolunambiguouslydeterminestheprocedureselectedforeach nonterminal.Thesequenceofprocedurescalledinprocessingthe inputimplicitlydefinesaparsetreefortheinput. Considerthegrammar: S> cAd|bd A>ab|e PSEUDOCODEforapredictiveparser functionmatch(tokent) { iflookahead=t then lookahead=nexttoken() elseerror }

functionS { iflookaheadisin{c} match(c),A(),match(d); elseiflookaheadisin{b} match(b),match(d); elseiflookaheadisin{a,e} A(); elseerror } functionA { iflookaheadisin{a} match(a),match(b); elseiflookaheadisin{e} match(e); elseiferror }

inputstring:ced Thefunctionmatch()comparesthecurrentlookaheadsymbolwith theargumenttokenandifmatchedchangesthelookaheadsymbolby advancingtheinputpointer. Parsingbeginswithacalltotheprocedureforthestarting nonterminalSinourgrammar.Becausethelookahead'c'isintheset {c},thefunctionSexecutesthecode:

iflookaheadisin{c} match(c),A(),match(d); onceitmatched'c',thefunctionA()iscalledandchecksoutthatthe nextinputsymbol'e'isthenintheset{e},itexecutesthecode: elseiflookaheadisin{e} match(e); Afterthematchingof'e'isoveritreturnsfromthefunctionA()and matchesthenexttokenwith'd'. someimportantpoints: Predictiveparsingreliesoninformationaboutwhatfirstsymbolscan begeneratedbyrightsideofaproduction.
IfA>isaproduction,thenFIRST(

)isdefinedasthesetoftokens thatappearasthefirstsymbolsofoneormorestringsgeneratedfrom. soobviouslyifA> A>aretwoproductions andifFIRST( ),FIRST()arenotdisjoint,thenthisparsingwouldfalter.

Also,thisparsingwouldfalterifthereisLEFTRECURSIONinthegrammar. Inthatcasetheparserwillloopforever.

Considertheleftrecursiveproductionexpr>expr+term supposetheprocedureforexprdecidestoapplythisproduction.Therightside

beginswithexprsotheprocedureforexpriscalledrecursivelyandtheparser loopsforever.Notethatthelookaheadsymbolchangesonlywhenaterminalin therightsideismatched.Sincetheproductionbeginswiththenonterminal expr,nochangestotheinputtakeplacebetweenrecursivecalls,causingthe infiniteloop.

P.NagenderReddy 03CS1021