COSC 170
COMPILER CONSTRUCTION
Syllabus
Spring, 1996

Instructor: Dr. Michael Slattery
Office: CU 309
Phone: 288-6595
Email: mikes (a) mscs.mu.edu

Office hours: M 11AM-12, W 2-3PM, Th 10-11AM, or by appointment.

Text: Aho, Sethi, and Ullman, Compilers: Principles, Techniques, and Tools.

Grading:

  • 10% in-class mid-term exam on Mon, Feb 26
  • 20% 2 hour final exam on Fri, May 10 at 8:00AM
  • 70% Homework - programming and writing

    There will be some written assignments on material in the book and some programming assignments. Several of the programming assignments will be related to writing an interpreter and compiler for a simple programming language.

    In general, a grade of B will be given for papers which satisfy the assignment nicely. The grades of A and AB are reserved for outstanding solutions which display extra effort. Late assignments will receive a lower grade than they would if received on time.

    Graduate Students: Those students taking this course for graduate credit will be expected to hand in six reports on research articles related to compiler construction. The detailed format of these reports and completion deadlines can be found on the graduate literature page.

    Approximate order of topics:

  • Introduction (Chapter 1)
  • X Window Graphics
  • Intro to Parsing/Yacc (Sections 2.2, 2.3, 4.9)
  • Color Graphics
  • Lexical Analysis (Sections 3.1-3.5)
  • Syntax Analysis (Chapter 4)
  • Run-Time Environments (Chapter 7)
    • Comments: Outside reading may help you to understand various topics better. There are often good articles in BYTE magazine and Dr. Dobb's Journal. Additional information can be found in the references provided in the text as well as current journal articles.

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