Re: TeX syntax?

Jim Hill <gjthill@gmail.com>
25 Feb 2007 12:49:39 -0500

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[2 earlier articles]
Re: TeX syntax? adrian@cs.rhul.ac.uk (A Johnstone) (2007-02-09)
Re: TeX syntax? ara@nestle.csail.mit.edu (Allan Adler) (2007-02-09)
Re: TeX syntax? phlucas@f-m.fm (Philipp Lucas) (2007-02-12)
Re: TeX syntax? jhallen@TheWorld.com (2007-02-16)
Re: TeX syntax? gah@ugcs.caltech.edu (glen herrmannsfeldt) (2007-02-16)
Re: TeX syntax? jhallen@TheWorld.com (2007-02-25)
Re: TeX syntax? gjthill@gmail.com (Jim Hill) (2007-02-25)
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From: Jim Hill <gjthill@gmail.com>
Newsgroups: comp.compilers
Date: 25 Feb 2007 12:49:39 -0500
Organization: Compilers Central
References: 07-02-024
Keywords: macros
Posted-Date: 25 Feb 2007 12:49:39 EST

Russell Shaw asked for:
> something resembling the BNF of Knuth's TeX typesetting syntax?
> What symbols are fundamental, and what ones are derived?

It doesn't really parse at all, and its lexical entities are defined at
runtime, by the input it's lexing: spelling and boundaries are defined
and quite commonly, even for fundamental symbols, redefined several
times, in the input files themselves.

Most people could agree these would be bad things in a programming language.

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