The course teach modern compiler techniques applied to general-purpose programming language. The goal of the course is to give students a working knowledge of the foundations, tools, and engineering approaches used in developing formal language translators. The emphasis is on the construction of compilers to position students to build translators for little languages in their careers. The course topics include compilers and interpreters, including description of languages, finite state scanners, parsing, symbol tables, syntax directed semantics, code generation.

This course is based on a course that was originally designed by Laurie Hendren and Michael I. Schwartzbach which has been taught at a number of universities over the past decade. The course received a significant update by Robby and Matthew B. Dwyer in 2005 with respect to the projects and the tools that are used for compiler implementation; this update achieves a modernization of compiler construction technologies.

This is primarily an introductory compiling course that has been designed to recognize that most people will not build a large application like a compiler from scratch and that people learn by doing. Towards this end the project for the course involves the enhancement of an existing compiler code base. Students will be given a working compiler and will be required to extend it in significant ways. This will give them insights into how a compiler is designed and written that they can leverage for their enhancements. While serving this purpose, the course does present significantly more content on static analysis than is typically found in an introductory compiling course; thus it can serve as an effective introduction on advanced topics for graduate students.

Copyright 2005-2006, Matthew B. Dwyer and Robby. The course materials listed here are copyrighted materials and may not be used in other course settings outside of Kansas State University and University of Nebraska-Lincoln in their current form or modified form without the express written permission of one of the copyright holders. Selling notes to or being paid for taking notes by any person or commercial firm without the express written permission of one of the copyright holders are prohibited.