Upgrade to Pro
— share decks privately, control downloads, hide ads and more …
Speaker Deck
Features
Speaker Deck
PRO
Sign in
Sign up for free
Search
Search
Parsing with Blocks
Search
Chris Eidhof | @chriseidhof
May 08, 2014
Technology
260
2
Share
Embed
Copy iframe code
Copy JS code
Copy link
Start on current slide
Parsing with Blocks
CocoaHeads Hamburg
Chris Eidhof | @chriseidhof
May 08, 2014
More Decks by Chris Eidhof | @chriseidhof
See All by Chris Eidhof | @chriseidhof
Dutch FP Day 2015
chriseidhof
2
400
Tiny Networking in Swift
chriseidhof
2
19k
Functional Swift - Brooklyn
chriseidhof
3
1.3k
Functional Swift - SF
chriseidhof
6
26k
Functional Swift
chriseidhof
6
1.3k
Functional Swift
chriseidhof
1
170
Functional Programming in Swift
chriseidhof
40
19k
Lighter View Controllers
chriseidhof
4
210
Practical Concurrent Programming
chriseidhof
4
300
Other Decks in Technology
See All in Technology
AIチャット検索改善の3週間
kworkdev
PRO
2
140
Bucharest Tech Week 2026 - Guardians of the Cloud-Native Galaxy
edeandrea
PRO
0
130
現地で盛り上がった WWDC26 Keynote
zozotech
PRO
1
270
クラウドファンディング版StackChan 3体(4体)をインタラクティブな体験型作品にして展示もした話 / スタックチャンお誕生日会2026
you
PRO
0
100
Bucharest Tech Week 2026 - Reinventing testing practices in the AI era
edeandrea
PRO
1
170
Android の公式 Skill / Android skills
yanzm
0
160
AIAU_UMEMOGU_ninomiya_slide
ninomiya_ii
0
240
AI駆動開発を通して感じた、 AI時代のデザイナーの役割変化
whisaiyo
4
2.3k
コミュニティの有益性 ~JAWS Days 2026 での体験を通して~ / The Benefits of a Community ~Through My Experience at JAWS Days 2026~
seike460
PRO
0
190
When Platform Engineering Meets GenAI
sucitw
0
130
あなたの知らないPDFのアクセシビリティ
lycorptech_jp
PRO
0
220
2026TECHFRESH畢業分享會 - 原生還是跨平台? App 開發踩坑實錄
line_developers_tw
PRO
0
1.3k
Featured
See All Featured
Navigating Weather and Climate Data
rabernat
0
220
The Impact of AI in SEO - AI Overviews June 2024 Edition
aleyda
5
1.1k
Fight the Zombie Pattern Library - RWD Summit 2016
marcelosomers
234
17k
Primal Persuasion: How to Engage the Brain for Learning That Lasts
tmiket
0
370
svc-hook: hooking system calls on ARM64 by binary rewriting
retrage
2
300
The Web Performance Landscape in 2024 [PerfNow 2024]
tammyeverts
12
1.2k
Building Flexible Design Systems
yeseniaperezcruz
330
40k
Why You Should Never Use an ORM
jnunemaker
PRO
61
9.9k
The agentic SEO stack - context over prompts
schlessera
0
820
How To Speak Unicorn (iThemes Webinar)
marktimemedia
1
490
Refactoring Trust on Your Teams (GOTO; Chicago 2020)
rmw
35
3.5k
The SEO Collaboration Effect
kristinabergwall1
1
490
Transcript
Parsing with Blocks CocoaHeads Hamburg Chris Eidhof
Warning All of this is a bit crazy
Building languages is magical
stylesheet { multiplier = if(slide.onlyHeader, 2, 1), baseFontSize = 45
* multiplier, splitBaseFontSize = 25, backgroundColor = colorScheme.backgroundColor, bodyFont = { family = "Apercu", color = colorScheme.textColor, size = baseFontSize } }
DSLs → SQL → AutoLayout → NSPredicate → Regular Expressions
→ ActiveRecord
DSLs External vs. Internal
DSLs: External → SQL → CSS → NSPredicate format syntax
DSLs: Internal [view1 mas_makeConstraints:^(MASConstraintMaker *make) { make.top.equalTo(superview.mas_top).with.offset(padding.top); make.left.equalTo(superview.mas_left).with.offset(padding.left); make.bottom.equalTo(superview.mas_bottom).with.offset(-padding.bottom); make.right.equalTo(superview.mas_right).with.offset(-padding.right);
}] Source: Masonry
V:[topField]-10-[bottomField] [flexibleButton(>=70,<=100)] |-[find]-[findNext]-[findField(>=20)]-|
None
Building an external DSL
None
Parsing 1. String → Stream of tokens 2. Stream of
tokens → Syntax Tree 3. Interpret Syntax Tree
Existing approaches → Hand-rolled parsers → Parser generators → ParseKit
/ CoreParse
An alternative approach → Based on functional programming → Backtracking
→ Immutable objects
The language
1 + 2 * 3 Expr ← Sum Sum ←
Product '+' Product Product ← Atom '*' Atom Atom ← Number
1 + 2 * 3 Expr ← Sum Sum ←
Product '+' Product | Product Product ← Atom '*' Atom | Atom Atom ← Number
(1 + 2) * 3
(1 + 2) * 3 Expr ← Sum Sum ←
Product '+' Product | Product Product ← Atom '*' Atom | Atom Atom ← Number | '(' Expr ')'
Block Syntax returnType (^blockName)(parameterTypes) = ^returnType(parameters) {...}; Source: http://goshdarnblocksyntax.com
Live Coding
A stylesheet language
stylesheet { multiplier = if(slide.onlyHeader, 2, 1), baseFontSize = 45
* multiplier, splitBaseFontSize = 25, backgroundColor = colorScheme.backgroundColor, bodyFont = { family = "Apercu", color = colorScheme.textColor, size = baseFontSize } }
Rule stylesheet = ^(State *p) { __block NSArray *functions =
nil; return p.identifier().token(@"{"). manySepBy(method, comma).bind(to(functions)). token(@"}").yield(^id { return [[StylesheetObject alloc] initWithFunctions:functions]; }); };
Rule method = ^(State * p) { __block NSString* name
= nil; __block id body= nil; __block NSArray *parameters = nil; return p.identifier().bind(to(name)). optional(parameterList).bind(to(parameters)). token(@"="). rule(self.expression).bind(to(body)). yield(^id { return [[StylesheetFunction alloc] initWithName:name body:body parameters:parameters]; }); };
Rule mulExpression = infix(@"*", infix(@"/", functionCallExpression)); Rule addExpression = infix(@"+",
infix(@"-", mulExpression));
API
typedef State *(^Rule)(State *p);
@interface State : NSObject @property (nonatomic, strong) id result; @property
(nonatomic) BOOL failed; @property (nonatomic) NSString *errorMessage; @property (nonatomic) State *(^token)(NSString *); @property (nonatomic) State *(^identifier)(); @property (nonatomic) State *(^yield)(id (^)()); @property (nonatomic) State *(^bind)(void(^)(id result)); @property (nonatomic) State *(^oneOf)(NSArray *); @property (nonatomic) State *(^optional)(Rule); @property (nonatomic) State *(^eof)(); @property (nonatomic) State *(^rule)(Rule); @end
State Internals @interface State () @property (nonatomic) NSArray *tokens; @property
(nonatomic) NSUInteger tokenIndex; @end
self.token = ^(NSString* token) { if (self.failed) return self; NSString*
peek = self.peek; if ([token isEqual:peek]) { return [self next:peek]; } else { NSString* msg = [NSString stringWithFormat:@"Expected '%@', saw '%@'", token, peek]; return [self fail:msg]; } };
- (State *)next:(id)result { if (self.failed) return self; State *next
= [self copy]; next.failed = NO; next.result = result; next.tokenIndex++; return next; }
We created two DSLs → One for parsing (embedded) →
One external https://github.com/chriseidhof/parsingwithblocks
Thanks → @chriseidhof → http://www.objc.io → http://www.uikonf.com → http://www.decksetapp.com