[Python-Dev] CML2 compiler speedup

[Eric S. Raymond]

I bit the bullet and hand-rolled a recursive-descent expression parser
for CML2 to replace the Earley-algorithm parser described in my
previous note.  It is a little more than twice as fast as the SPARK
code, cutting the CML2 compiler runtime almost exactly in half.

Sigh.  I had been intending to recommend SPARK for the Python standard
library -- as I pointed out in my PC9 paper, it would be the last
piece stock Python needs to be an effective workbench for
minilanguage construction.  Unfortunately I'm now convinced Paul
Prescod is right and it's too slow for production use, at least at
version 0.6.1.  

John Aycock says 0.7 will be substantially faster; I'll keep an eye on
this.
-- 
		<a href="http://www.tuxedo.org/~esr/">Eric S. Raymond</a>

The price of liberty is, always has been, and always will be blood.  The person
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	-- Andrew Ford