Re: BNF, was specifying semantics

wclodius@earthlink.net (William Clodius)
Mon, 30 Jun 2014 22:00:15 -0600

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Re: BNF, was specifying semantics wclodius@earthlink.net (2014-06-30)
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From: wclodius@earthlink.net (William Clodius)
Newsgroups: comp.compilers
Date: Mon, 30 Jun 2014 22:00:15 -0600
Organization: Compilers Central
References: 14-06-010 14-06-023 14-06-025 14-06-026 14-06-028
Keywords: syntax
Posted-Date: 02 Jul 2014 23:06:58 EDT

George Neuner <gneuner2@comcast.net> wrote:


> On Sat, 28 Jun 2014 20:10:27 +0100, Andy Walker <news@cuboid.co.uk>
> wrote:
>
> >On 26/06/14 05:54, George Neuner wrote:
> >> [...] What we refer to as "Backus-Naur Form"
> >> today is not the original used for Algol-58, [...].
>
> >Backus proposed his system for "metalinguistic formulae" [as used
> >in the Algol 60 report] in 1959, and it was adopted by Naur, the
> >editor of the papers and the report defining Algol 60.
>
> Yup, I goofed: BNF was Algol 60, not 58.
>
> Incidentally, Naur didn't simply adopt Backus's forms, he made a
> number of improvements. There was a move early to call it Backus
> Normal Form, but Naur's contribution was deemed significant enough
> that it came to called Backus-Naur instead.


Backus designed his initial version of BNF to describe the syntax of
Algol 58 for the International Conference on Information Processing of
UNESCO in 1959. Peter Naur in attending the conference was surprised
to discover that the syntax that Backus presented was different from
what he thought. He then examined the original report and discovered
that the desciption was ambiguous, and was compatible with both
Backus's and his interpretation. He also recognized that BNF would
allow an unambiguous description and adapted it for the Algol 60
report.

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