Compiler (Parser/Lexer) - Exception handling

About

exception handling in a parser.

By default, parser will stop matching on any failure.

But they may have a sort of recovery mode that allows to define an alternate rule or match .

Example

extendedPin mode

For idea, it's called the extendedPin mode that defines the pin position (ie the token position in the rule).

Everything after the pin position is collected:

• as long as the rest of the rule components match;
• or a alternate rule (recoverWhile) holds true;
• or until the end of the file is reached.

The collected data will show up as:

• either expected token
• or an error block.

For instance:

property ::= id '=' expr  {pin=2 recoverWhile=rule_recover}
private rule_recover ::= !(';' | id '=')

means:

• The matching of the property rule is considered successful if we get through the = part (due to pin=2)
• If there is a failure, skip all the tokens while rule_recover matches, i.e. while the parser doesn't encounter:
  • ;
  • or a rule start (id and =)

Note that recovery rule is always a predicate (a NOT predicate usually) hence it doesn't consume anything from the input.

Note that:

• the rule will not match at all until you get to the pin position
• the default value of pin is 1

Documentation / Reference

• https://intellij-support.jetbrains.com/hc/en-us/community/posts/360000081950-Code-completion-and-syntax-error-recovery
• https://github.com/JetBrains/Grammar-Kit/blob/master/TUTORIAL.md