module Netulex:Support module for Alain Frisch'ssig..end
ulex lexer generator
Contents
The sub moduleULB is a Unicode-based lexing buffer that
reads encoded strings and makes them available to the lexer
as both Unicode arrays and UTF-8 strings.
The sub module Ulexing is a replacement for the module
in ulex with the same name. It uses ULB to represent
the main lexing buffer. It is much faster than the original
Ulexing implementation when the scanned text is UTF-8
encoded and Ulexing.utf8_lexeme is frequently called to
get the lexeme strings. Furthermore, it can process input
data of all encodings available to Netconversion. It is,
however, no drop-in replacement as it has a different
signature.
To enable this version of Ulexing, simply put an
open Netulex before using the ulex lexers.
module ULB:sig..end
module Ulexing:sig..end
Of course, you need Alain Frisch's ulex utility first. It installs
itself under the name ulex as findlib library.
Next, write your lexer, e.g. (line numbers in brackets):
[1] open Netulex
[2] let digits = lexer
[3] | ['0'-'9']+ -> `Number(int_of_string(Ulexing.utf8_lexeme lexbuf))
[4] | 8364 -> `Euro_sign (* Code point #8364 in Unicode *)
This is a very trivial example. The lexer accepts sequences of digits,
and returns them as `Number tokens. Furthermore, the euro sign is
recognized and returned as `Euro_sign. Note that in the first case
Netulex.Ulexing.utf8_lexeme
is called to retrieve the current lexeme as UTF-8 string. (Well,
digits are a bad example, as they are only ASCII, and UTF-8 is not
really needed. Imagine you want to extend the scanner to other
number systems represented in the Unicode character set.)
Line 1 is quite important. If you don't open Netulex, the generated
ulex code will use the version of the Ulexing module coming with ulex,
and not this one.
Call the lexer as follows (line numbers in brackets):
[5] let sample = "42543\226\130\172";;
[6] let ulb = Netulex.ULB.from_string `Enc_utf8 sample;;
[7] let lexbuf = Netulex.Ulexing.from_ulb_lexbuf ulb;;
[8] let first_token = digits lexbuf;;
Now, first_token is `Number 42543. After
[9] let second_token = digits lexbuf;;
this variable is set to `Euro_sign, because the three-byte sequence
"\226\130\172" represents the euro sign in UTF-8.
In line 6, the encoding `Enc_utf8 selects that sample is an
UTF-8 string. You can pass here any encoding the Netconversion
module understands.
If you would like to scan from another source, just change line 6, e.g.
[6'] let ulb = Netulex.ULB.from_in_obj_channel ch
where ch is any input channel the Netchannels module supports.
For example, to read from a file:
let ch = new Netchannels.input_channel (open_in "filename")
You should compile the examples with
ocamlfind ... -package ulex,netstring -syntax camlp4o ...
For the syntax of the lexer rules, see the documentation coming
with ulex.