On 4/20/09 2:35 PM, "J. King" <jk...@jkingweb.ca> wrote: > On Mon, 20 Apr 2009 06:53:37 -0400, D. Richard Hipp <d...@hwaci.com> wrote: > >> http://wiki.tcl.tk/21708 > > It's a shame: I far preferred the BNF: more compact, not to mention you > could copy and paste as well as search the text of the syntax itself.
"shame"? Are you sure that's the word you wanted to use? I personally think those syntax diagrams are *better* than BNF (though no shame either way). - compactness: very weak argument, maybe even a strawman. - copy & paste: the last time I wanted to copy & paste the formal syntax of any language was... about right around when dinosaurs went extinct. - search: I don't think there is any valid or interesting search of BNF except for the keywords of the language, which *are* searchable with the syntax diagrams. Now *what are* the actual real-life uses of a formal specification of SQLite's grammar? Realistically, there are few: - look up the features of the language, typically to get a quick grasp of the features, or to compare with another dialect of SQL - check whether some [more or less obscure] construct is supported in the grammar - understand why some statement is rejected by SQLite (debugging). In all these "read-only" situations, you want the grammar to be very fast to read and understand. This is where syntax diagrams excel: the cognitive load to understand them is far less than BNF (for the majority of people). I personally am rather experienced with formal grammars and BNF, but a relative newbie with SQL and SQLite. I welcome the syntax diagrams. Regards, Jean-Denis _______________________________________________ sqlite-users mailing list sqlite-users@sqlite.org http://sqlite.org:8080/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/sqlite-users
