In
computer science
Computer science is the study of computation, automation, and information. Computer science spans theoretical disciplines (such as algorithms, theory of computation, information theory, and automation) to practical disciplines (includin ...
, a compiler-compiler or compiler generator is a programming tool that creates a
parser,
interpreter, or
compiler
In computing, a compiler is a computer program that translates computer code written in one programming language (the ''source'' language) into another language (the ''target'' language). The name "compiler" is primarily used for programs that ...
from some form of formal description of a
programming language
A programming language is a system of notation for writing computer programs. Most programming languages are text-based formal languages, but they may also be graphical. They are a kind of computer language.
The description of a programming l ...
and machine.
The most common type of compiler-compiler is more precisely called a parser generator. It only handles syntactic analysis.
The input of a parser generator is a
grammar
In linguistics, the grammar of a natural language is its set of structure, structural constraints on speakers' or writers' composition of clause (linguistics), clauses, phrases, and words. The term can also refer to the study of such constraint ...
file, typically written in
Backus–Naur form (BNF) or
extended Backus–Naur form (EBNF) that defines the
syntax of a target programming language.
The output is the
source code
In computing, source code, or simply code, is any collection of code, with or without comment (computer programming), comments, written using a human-readable programming language, usually as plain text. The source code of a Computer program, p ...
of a parser for the programming language. The output of the (compiled) parser source code is a parser. It may be either standalone or embedded. This parser takes as an input the source code of the target programming language source and performs some action or outputs an
abstract syntax tree
In computer science, an abstract syntax tree (AST), or just syntax tree, is a tree representation of the abstract syntactic structure of text (often source code) written in a formal language