Re: recursive comments and Re: Techniques for writing an interpreter

Stefan Monnier <monnier@tequila.cs.yale.edu> writes:


      (1) What languages allow recursive comments ?


Standard ML does:


[1, (* 2 (* 3 *) 4 *) 5]


evaluates to the list [1, 5].


And ["(*", "1", "*)"]


evaluates to the list ["(*", "1", "*)"].


      (2) What languages enforce a "lexing" of the content of comments
      (so that an end-comment inside a string inside a comment is ignored) ?


Standard ML doesn't. Would it be useful? It would prevent you from
writing comments containing otherwise innocent TeX code such as


(* Chalmers, G\"oteborg, Sverige *)


      [C does if you count #if 0 as a comment. -John]


Right on (1) but not on (2) --- as far as I can see.


Peter Sestoft
--
Department of Mathematics and Physics * http://www.dina.kvl.dk/~sestoft/
Royal Veterinary and Agricultural University * Tel +45 3528 2334
Thorvaldsensvej 40, DK-1871 Frederiksberg C, Denmark * Fax +45 3528 2350
[Sure it does. Consider this C source:


#if 0
int first;
/*
#endif
int second;
#if 0
*/
int third;
#endif


C considers this to be completely blank and does not see the
definition of second, since the first endif is inside a
comment. Strings and #if don't interact because #if has to be the
first thing on a line and C doesn't permit multi-line strings. -John]
--

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