Tiny turtle graphics interpreter

A program turtle is an example with the combination of TfeTextView and GtkDrawingArea objects. It is a very small interpreter but you can draw fractal curves with it. The following diagram is a Koch curve, which is one of the famous fractal curves.

The following is a snow-crystal-shaped curve. It is composed of six Koch curves.

This program uses flex and bison. Flex is a lexical analyzer. Bison is a parser generator. These two programs are similar to lex and yacc which are proprietary software developed in Bell Laboratory. However, flex and bison are open source software. This section describes them and they are not the topics about GTK 4. So, readers can skip this section.

How to use turtle

The turtle document is here. I’ll show you a simple example.

fc (1,0,0) # Foreground color is red, rgb = (1,0,0).
pd         # Pen down.
rp (4) {   # Repeat four times.
  fd 100   # Go forward by 100 pixels.
  tr 90    # Turn right by 90 degrees.
}

1. Compile and install turtle (See the documentation above). Then, run turtle.
2. Type the program above in the editor (left part of the window).
3. Click on the Run button, then a red square appears on the right part of the window. The side of the square is 100 pixels long.

In the same way, you can draw other curves. The turtle document includes some fractal curves such as tree, snow and square-koch. The source codes are located at src/turtle/example directory. You can read these files into turtle editor by clicking on the Open button.

Combination of TfeTextView and GtkDrawingArea objects

Turtle uses TfeTextView and GtkDrawingArea.

1. A user inputs/reads a turtle program into the buffer in the TfeTextView instance.
2. The user clicks on the “Run” button.
3. The parser reads the program and generates tree-structured data.
4. The interpriter reads the data and executes it step by step. And it draws shapes on a surface. The surface isn’t the one in the GtkDrawingArea widget.
5. The widget is added to the queue. It will be redrawn with the drawing function, which just copies the surface into the one in the GtkDrawingArea.

The body of the interpreter is written with flex and bison. The codes are not thread safe. So the callback function run_cb, which is the handler of “clicked” signal on the Run button, prevents reentering.

void
run_cb (GtkWidget *btnr) {
  GtkTextBuffer *tb = gtk_text_view_get_buffer (GTK_TEXT_VIEW (tv));
  GtkTextIter start_iter;
  GtkTextIter end_iter;
  char *contents;
  int stat;
  static gboolean busy = FALSE; /* initialized only once */
  cairo_t *cr;

  /* yyparse() and run() are NOT thread safe. */
  /* The variable busy avoids reentrance. */
  if (busy)
    return;
  busy = TRUE;
  gtk_text_buffer_get_bounds (tb, &start_iter, &end_iter);
  contents = gtk_text_buffer_get_text (tb, &start_iter, &end_iter, FALSE);
  if (surface && contents[0] != '\0') {
    init_flex (contents);
    stat = yyparse ();
    if (stat == 0) { /* No error */
      run ();
    }
    finalize_flex ();
  } else if (surface) {
    cr = cairo_create (surface);
    cairo_set_source_rgb (cr, 1.0, 1.0, 1.0);
    cairo_paint (cr);
    cairo_destroy (cr);
  }
  g_free (contents);
  gtk_widget_queue_draw (GTK_WIDGET (da));
  busy = FALSE;
}

static void
resize_cb (GtkDrawingArea *drawing_area, int width, int height, gpointer user_data) {

  if (surface)
    cairo_surface_destroy (surface);
  surface = cairo_image_surface_create (CAIRO_FORMAT_ARGB32, width, height);
  run_cb (NULL); // NULL is a fake (run button).
}

• 8, 13-15: The static value busy holds a status of the interpreter. If it is TRUE, the interpreter is running and it is not possible to call the interpreter because it’s not a re-entrant program. If it is FALSE, it is safe to call the interpreter and set the variable busy to TRUE.
• 16-17: Gets the contents of tb.
• 18-30: The variable surface is a static variable. It points to a cairo_surface_t instance. It is created when the GtkDrawingArea instance is realized and whenever it is resized. Therefore, surface isn’t NULL usually. But if it is NULL, the interpreter won’t be called.
• 18-24: If surface points a surface instance and the string contents isn’t empty, it calls the interpreter.
  • Initializes the lexical analyzer.
  • Calls the parser. The parser analyzes the program codes syntactically and generates a tree structured data.
  • If the parser successfully parsed, it calls the runtime routine ‘run’.
  • Finalizes the lexical analyzer.
• 25-29: If surface points a surface instance and the string contents is empty, it clears the surface surface.
• 31: Frees contents.
• 32: Adds the drawing area widget to the queue to draw.
• 33: Sets the variable busy to FALSE.
• 36-43: The “resized” signal handler. If the surface isn’t NULL, it is destroyed. A new surface is created. Its size is the same as the surface of the GtkDrawingArea instance. It calls the callback function run_cb to redraw the shape on the drawing area.

If the open button is clicked and a file is read, the filename will be shown on the header bar.

static void
show_filename (TfeTextView *tv) {
  GFile *file;
  char *filename;
  char *title;

  file = tfe_text_view_get_file (tv);
  if (G_IS_FILE (file)) {
    filename = g_file_get_basename (file);
    title = g_strdup_printf ("Turtle (%s)", filename);
    g_free (filename);
    g_object_unref (file);
  } else
    title = g_strdup ("Turtle");
  gtk_window_set_title (GTK_WINDOW (win), title);
  g_free (title);
}

This function is the callback function of the “change-file” signal on the TfeTextView instance. It calls tfe_text_view_get_file.

• If the return value is a GFile instance, the title will be “Turtle (the filename)”.
• Otherwise, the title will be “Turtle”.

Other part of turtleapplication.c is very simple and similar to the codes in the former applications. The codes of turtleapplication.c is in the turtle directory.

What does the interpreter do?

Suppose that the turtle application runs with the following program.

distance = 100
fd distance*2

The application recognizes the program and works as follows.

• Generally, a program consists of tokens. Tokens are “distance”, “=”, “100”, “fd”, “*” and “2” in the above example..
• The parser calls a function yylex to read a token in the source file. yylex returns a code which is called “token kind” and sets a global variable yylval to a value, which is called a semantic value. The type of yylval is union. The type of yylval.ID and yylval.NUM are string and double respectively. There are seven tokens in the program so yylex is called seven times.

• The function yylex returns a token kind every time, but it doesn’t set yylval.ID or yylval.NUM every time. It is because keywords (FD) and symbols (= and *) don’t have any semantic values. The function yylex is called lexical analyzer or scanner.
• The application turtle makes a tree structured data. This part of turtle is called parser.

• Turtle analyzes the tree and executes it. This part of turtle is called runtime routine or interpreter. The tree consists of rectangles and line segments between the rectangles. The rectangles are called nodes. For example, N_PROGRAM, N_ASSIGN, N_FD and N_MUL are nodes.
  1. Goes down from N_PROGRAM to N_ASSIGN.
  2. N_ASSIGN node has two children, ID and NUM. This node comes from “distance = 100” which is “ID = NUM” syntactically. First, turtle checks if the first child is ID. If it’s ID, then turtle looks for the variable in the variable table. If it doesn’t exist, it registers the ID (distance) to the table. Then go back to the N_ASSIGN node.
  3. Turtle calculates the second child. In this case its a number 100. Saves 100 to the variable table at the distance record.
  4. Turtle goes back to N_PROGRAM then go to the next node N_FD. It has only one child. Goes down to the child N_MUL.
  5. The first child is ID (distance). Searches the variable table for the variable distance and gets the value 100. The second child is a number 2. Multiplies 100 by 2 and gets 200. Then turtle goes back to N_FD.
  6. Now turtle knows the distance is 200. It moves the cursor forward by 200 pixels. The segment is drawn on the surface.
  7. There are no node follows. Runtime routine returns to the function run_cb.
• The function run_cb calls gtk_widget_queue_draw and put the GtkDrawingArea widget to the queue.
• The system redraws the widget. At that time drawing function draw_func is called. The function copies the surface to the surface in the GtkDrawingArea.

Actual turtle program is more complicated than the example above. However, what turtle does is basically the same. Interpretation consists of three parts.

• Lexical analysis
• Syntax Parsing and tree generation
• Interpretation and execution of the tree.

Compilation flow

The source files are:

• flex source file => turtle.lex
• bison source file => turtle.y
• C header file => turtle_lex.h
• C source file => turtleapplication.c
• other files => turtle.ui, turtle.gresources.xml and meson.build

The compilation process is a bit complicated.

1. glib-compile-resources compiles turtle.ui to resources.c according to turtle.gresource.xml. It also generates resources.h.
2. bison compiles turtle.y to turtle_parser.c and generates turtle_parser.h
3. flex compiles turtle.lex to turtle_lex.c.
4. gcc compiles application.c, resources.c, turtle_parser.c and turtle_lex.c with turtle_lex.h, resources.h and turtle_parser.h. It generates an executable file turtle.

Meson controls the process. The instruction is described in meson.build.

project('turtle', 'c')

compiler = meson.get_compiler('c')
mathdep = compiler.find_library('m', required : true)

gtkdep = dependency('gtk4')

gnome=import('gnome')
resources = gnome.compile_resources('resources','turtle.gresource.xml')

flex = find_program('flex')
bison = find_program('bison')
turtleparser = custom_target('turtleparser', input: 'turtle.y', output: ['turtle_parser.c', 'turtle_parser.h'], command: [bison, '-d', '-o', 'turtle_parser.c', '@INPUT@'])
turtlelexer = custom_target('turtlelexer', input: 'turtle.lex', output: 'turtle_lex.c', command: [flex, '-o', '@OUTPUT@', '@INPUT@'])

sourcefiles=files('turtleapplication.c', '../tfetextview/tfetextview.c')

executable('turtle', sourcefiles, resources, turtleparser, turtlelexer, turtleparser[1], dependencies: [mathdep, gtkdep], export_dynamic: true, install: true)

• 1: The project name is “turtle” and the program language is C.
• 3: Gets C compiler. It is usually gcc in linux.
• 4: Gets math library. This program uses trigonometric functions. They are defined in the math library, but the library is optional. So, it is necessary to include it by #include <math.h> and also link the library with the linker.
• 6: Gets gtk4 library.
• 8: Gets gnome module.See Meson build system website – GNOME module for further information.
• 9: Compiles ui file to C source file according to the XML file turtle.gresource.xml.
• 11: Gets flex.
• 12: Gets bison.
• 13: Compiles turtle.y to turtle_parser.c and turtle_parser.h by bison. The function custom_target creates a custom top level target. See Meson build system website – custom target for further information.
• 14: Compiles turtle.lex to turtle_lex.c by flex.
• 16: The variable sourcefiles is a file object created with the C source files.
• 18: Compiles C source files including generated files by glib-compile-resources, bison and flex. The argument turtleparser[1] refers to tirtle_parser.h which is the second output in the line 13.

Turtle.lex

What does flex do?

Flex creates lexical analyzer from flex source file. Flex source file is a text file. Its syntactic rule will be explained later. Generated lexical analyzer is a C source file. It is also called scanner. It reads a text file, which is a source file of a program language, and gets variable names, numbers and symbols. Suppose here is a turtle source file.

fc (1,0,0) # Foreground color is red, rgb = (1,0,0).
pd         # Pen down.
distance = 100
angle = 90
fd distance    # Go forward by distance (100) pixels.
tr angle     # Turn right by angle (90) degrees.

The content of the text file is separated into fc, (, 1 and so on. The words fc, pd, distance, angle, tr, 1, 0, 100 and 90 are called tokens. The characters ‘(’ (left parenthesis), ‘,’ (comma), ‘)’ (right parenthesis) and ‘=’ (equal sign) are called symbols. ( Sometimes those symbols called tokens, too.)

Flex reads turtle.lex and generates the C source file of a scanner. The file turtle.lex specifies tokens, symbols and the behavior which corresponds to each token or symbol. Turtle.lex isn’t a big program.

%top{
#include <string.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
#include <glib.h>
#include "turtle_parser.h"

  static int nline = 1;
  static int ncolumn = 1;
  static void get_location (char *text);

  /* Dinamically allocated memories are added to the single list. They will be freed in the finalize function. */
  extern GSList *list;
}

%option noyywrap

REAL_NUMBER (0|[1-9][0-9]*)(\.[0-9]+)?
IDENTIFIER [a-zA-Z][a-zA-Z0-9]*
%%
  /* rules */
#.*               ; /* comment. Be careful. Dot symbol (.) matches any character but new line. */
[ ]               ncolumn++; /* white space. [ and ] is a "character class". */
\t                ncolumn += 8; /* assume that tab is 8 spaces. */
\n                nline++; ncolumn = 1;
  /* reserved keywords */
pu                get_location (yytext); return PU; /* pen up */
pd                get_location (yytext); return PD; /* pen down */
pw                get_location (yytext); return PW; /* pen width = line width */
fd                get_location (yytext); return FD; /* forward */
tr                get_location (yytext); return TR; /* turn right */
tl                get_location (yytext); return TL; /* turn left, since ver 0.5 */
bc                get_location (yytext); return BC; /* background color */
fc                get_location (yytext); return FC; /* foreground color */
dp                get_location (yytext); return DP; /* define procedure */
if                get_location (yytext); return IF; /* if statement */
rt                get_location (yytext); return RT; /* return statement */
rs                get_location (yytext); return RS; /* reset the status */
rp                get_location (yytext); return RP; /* repeat, since ver 0.5 */
  /* constant */
{REAL_NUMBER}     get_location (yytext); yylval.NUM = atof (yytext); return NUM;
  /* identifier */
{IDENTIFIER}      { get_location (yytext); yylval.ID = g_strdup(yytext);
                    list = g_slist_prepend (list, yylval.ID);
                    return ID;
                  }
"="               get_location (yytext); return '=';
">"               get_location (yytext); return '>';
"<"               get_location (yytext); return '<';
"+"               get_location (yytext); return '+';
"-"               get_location (yytext); return '-';
"*"               get_location (yytext); return '*';
"/"               get_location (yytext); return '/';
"("               get_location (yytext); return '(';
")"               get_location (yytext); return ')';
"{"               get_location (yytext); return '{';
"}"               get_location (yytext); return '}';
","               get_location (yytext); return ',';
.                 ncolumn++;             return YYUNDEF;
%%

static void
get_location (char *text) {
  yylloc.first_line = yylloc.last_line = nline;
  yylloc.first_column = ncolumn;
  yylloc.last_column = (ncolumn += strlen(text)) - 1;
}

static YY_BUFFER_STATE state;

void
init_flex (const char *text) {
  state = yy_scan_string (text);
}

void
finalize_flex (void) {
  yy_delete_buffer (state);
}

The file consists of three sections which are separated by “%%” (line 19 and 59). They are definitions, rules and user code sections.

Definitions section

• 1-12: Lines between “%top{” and “}” are C source codes. They will be copied to the top of the generated C source file.
• 2-3: This program uses two functions strlen (l.65) and atof (l.40). They are defined in string.h and stdlib.h respectively. These two header files are included here.
• 4: This program uses some GLib functions and structures like g_strdup and GSList. GLib header file is glib.h and it is included here.
• 5: The header file “turtle_parser.h” is generated from “turtle.y” by bison. It defines some constants and functions like PU and yylloc. The header file is included here.
• 7-9: The current input position is pointed by nline and ncolumn. The function get_location is declared here so that it can be called before the function is defined (l.61-65).
• 12: GSlist is a structure for a singly-linked list. The variable list is defined in turtle.y so its class is extern. It is the start point of the list. The list is used to keep allocated memories.
• 15: This option %option noyywrap must be specified when you have only single source file to the scanner. Refer to “9 The Generated Scanner” in the flex documentation in your distribution. (The documentation is not on the internet.)
• 17-18: REAL_NUMBER and IDENTIFIER are names. A name begins with a letter or an underscore followed by zero or more letters, digits, underscores (_) or dashes (-). They are followed by regular expressions which are their definitions. They will be used in rules section and will expand to the definition.

Rules section

This section is the most important part. Rules consist of patterns and actions. The patterns are regular expressions or names surrounded by braces. The names must be defined in the definitions section. The definition of the regular expression is written in the flex documentation.

For example, line 40 is a rule.

• {REAL_NUMBER} is a pattern
• get_location (yytext); yylval.NUM = atof (yytext); return NUM; is an action.

{REAL_NUMBER} is defined in the line 17, so it expands to (0|[1-9][0-9]*)(\.[0-9]+)?. This regular expression matches numbers like 0, 12 and 1.5. If an input is a number, it matches the pattern in line 40. Then the matched text is assigned to yytext and corresponding action is executed. A function get_location changes the location variables to the position at the text. It assigns atof (yytext), which is double sized number converted from yytext, to yylval.NUM and return NUM. NUM is a token kind and it represents (double type) numbers. It is defined in turtle.y.

The scanner generated by flex has yylex function. If yylex is called and the input is “123.4”, then it works as follows.

1. A string “123.4” matches {REAL_NUMBER}.
2. Updates the location variable ncolumn. The structure yylloc is set by get_location.
3. The function atof converts the string “123.4” to double type number 123.4.
4. It is assigned to yylval.NUM.
5. yylex returns NUM to the caller.

Then the caller knows the input is a number (NUM), and its value is 123.4.

• 20-58: Rules section.
• 21: The symbol . (dot) matches any character except newline. Therefore, a comment begins # followed by any characters except newline. No action happens. That means that comments are ignored.
• 22: White space just increases the variable ncolumn by one.
• 23: Tab is assumed to be equal to eight spaces.
• 24: New line increases a variable nline by one and resets ncolumn.
• 26-38: Keywords updates the location variables ncolumn and yylloc, and returns the token kinds of the keywords.
• 40: Real number constant. The action converts the textyytext to a double type number, puts it into yylval.NUM and returns NUM.
• 42: IDENTIFIER is defined in line 18. The identifier is a name of variable or procedure. It begins with a letter and followed by letters or digits. The location variables are updated and the name of the identifier is assigned to yylval.ID. The memory of the name is allocated by the function g_strdup. The memory is registered to the list (GSlist type list). The memory will be freed after the runtime routine finishes. A token kind ID is returned.
• 46-57: Symbols update the location variable and return the token kinds. The token kind is the same as the symbol itself.
• 58: If the input doesn’t match the patterns, then it is an error. A special token kind YYUNDEF is returned.

User code section

This section is just copied to C source file.

• 61-66: A function get_location. The location of the input is recorded to nline and ncolumn. A variable yylloc is referred by the parser. It is a C structure and has four members, first_line, first_column, last_line and last_column. They point the start and end of the current input text.
• 68: YY_BUFFER_STATE is a pointer points the input buffer. Flex makes the definition of YY_BUFFER_STATE in the C file (scanner source file turtle_lex.c). See your flex document, section 11 Multiple Input Buffers, for further information.
• 70-73: A function init_flex is called by run_cb which is a “clicked” signal handler on the Run button. It has one string type parameter. The caller assigns it with the content of the GtkTextBuffer instance. A function yy_scan_string sets the input buffer for the scanner.
• 75-78: A function finalize_flex is called after runtime routine finishes. It deletes the input buffer.

Turtle.y

Turtle.y has more than 800 lines so it is difficult to explain all the source code. So I will explain the key points and leave out other less important parts.

What does bison do?

Bison creates C source file of a parser from a bison source file. The bison source file is a text file. A parser analyzes a program source code according to its grammar. Suppose here is a turtle source file.

fc (1,0,0) # Foreground color is red, rgb = (1,0,0).
pd         # Pen down.
distance = 100
angle = 90
fd distance    # Go forward by distance (100) pixels.
tr angle     # Turn right by angle (90) degrees.

The parser calls yylex to get a token. The token consists of its type (token kind) and value (semantic value). So, the parser gets items in the following table whenever it calls yylex.

Bison source code specifies the grammar rules of turtle language. For example, fc (1,0,0) is called primary procedure. A procedure is like a void type C function. It doesn’t return any values. Programmers can define their own procedures. On the other hand, fc is a built-in procedure. Such procedures are called primary procedures. It is described in bison source code like:

primary_procedure: FC '(' expression ',' expression ',' expression ')';
expression: ID | NUM;

This means:

• Primary procedure is FC followed by ‘(’, expression, ‘,’, expression, ‘,’, expression and ‘)’.
• expression is ID or NUM.

The description above is called BNF (Backus-Naur form). Precisely speaking, it is not exactly the same as BNF. But the difference is small.

The first line is:

FC '(' NUM ',' NUM ',' NUM ')';

The parser analyzes the turtle source code and if the input matches the definition above, the parser recognizes it as a primary procedure.

The grammar of turtle is described in the Turtle manual. The following is an extract from the document.

program:
  statement
| program statement
;

statement:
  primary_procedure
| procedure_definition
;

primary_procedure:
  PU
| PD
| PW expression
| FD expression
| TR expression
| TL expression
| BC '(' expression ',' expression ',' expression ')'
| FC '(' expression ',' expression ',' expression ')'
| ID '=' expression
| IF '(' expression ')' '{' primary_procedure_list '}'
| RT
| RS
| RP '(' expression ')' '{' primary_procedure_list '}'
| ID '(' ')'
| ID '(' argument_list ')'
;

procedure_definition:
  DP ID '('  ')' '{' primary_procedure_list '}'
| DP ID '(' parameter_list ')' '{' primary_procedure_list '}'
;

parameter_list:
  ID
| parameter_list ',' ID
;

argument_list:
  expression
| argument_list ',' expression
;

primary_procedure_list:
  primary_procedure
| primary_procedure_list primary_procedure
;

expression:
  expression '=' expression
| expression '>' expression
| expression '<' expression
| expression '+' expression
| expression '-' expression
| expression '*' expression
| expression '/' expression
| '-' expression %prec UMINUS
| '(' expression ')'
| ID
| NUM
;

The grammar rule defines program first.

• program is a statement or a program followed by a statement.

The definition is recursive.

• statement is program.
• statement statement is program statement. Therefore, it is program.
• statement statement statement is program statement because the first two statements are program. Therefore, it is program.

You can find that a sequence of statements is program as well.

The symbols program and statement aren’t tokens. They don’t appear in the input. They are called non terminal symbols. On the other hand, tokens are called terminal symbols. The word “token” used here has wide meaning, it includes tokens and symbols which appear in the input. Non terminal symbols are often shortened to nterm.

Let’s analyze the program above as bison does.

The right most column shows shift/reduce. Shift is appending an input to the buffer. Reduce is substituting a higher nterm for the pattern in the buffer. For example, NUM is replaced by expression in the forth row. This substitution is “reduce”.

Bison repeats shift and reduction until the end of the input. If the result is reduced to program, the input is syntactically valid. Bison executes an action whenever reduction occurs. Actions build a tree. The tree is analyzed and executed by runtime routine later.

Bison source files are called bison grammar files. A bison grammar file consists of four sections, prologue, declarations, rules and epilogue. The format is as follows.

%{
prologue
%}
declarations
%%
rules
%%
epilogue

Prologue

Prologue section consists of C codes and the codes are copied to the parser implementation file. You can use %code directives to qualify the prologue and identifies the purpose explicitly. The following is an extract from turtle.y.

%code top{
  #include <stdarg.h>
  #include <setjmp.h>
  #include <math.h>
  #include <glib.h>
  #include <cairo.h>
  #include "turtle_parser.h"

  /* The following line defines 'debug' so that debug information is printed out during the run time. */
  /* However it makes the program slow. */
  /* If you want to debug on, uncomment the line. */

  /* #define debug 1 */

  extern cairo_surface_t *surface;

  /* error reporting */
  static void yyerror (char const *s) { /* for syntax error */
    g_printerr ("%s from line %d, column %d to line %d, column %d\n",s, yylloc.first_line, yylloc.first_column, yylloc.last_line, yylloc.last_column);
  }
  /* Node type */
  enum {
    N_PU,
    N_PD,
    N_PW,
 ... ... ...
  };
}

The directive %code top copies its contents to the top of the parser implementation file. It usually includes #include directives, declarations of functions and definitions of constants. A function yyerror reports a syntax error and is called by the parser. Node type identifies a node in the tree.

Another directive %code requires copies its contents to both the parser implementation file and header file. The header file is read by the scanner C source file and other files.

%code requires {
  int yylex (void);
  int yyparse (void);
  void run (void);

  /* semantic value type */
  typedef struct _node_t node_t;
  struct _node_t {
    int type;
    union {
      struct {
        node_t *child1, *child2, *child3;
      } child;
      char *name;
      double value;
    } content;
  };
}

• yylex is shared by the parser implementation file and scanner file.
• yyparse and run is called by run_cb in turtleapplication.c.
• node_t is the type of the semantic value of nterms. The header file defines YYSTYPE, which is the semantic value type, with all the token and nterm value types. The following is extracted from the header file.

/* Value type.  */
#if ! defined YYSTYPE && ! defined YYSTYPE_IS_DECLARED
union YYSTYPE
{
  char * ID;                               /* ID  */
  double NUM;                              /* NUM  */
  node_t * program;                        /* program  */
  node_t * statement;                      /* statement  */
  node_t * primary_procedure;              /* primary_procedure  */
  node_t * primary_procedure_list;         /* primary_procedure_list  */
  node_t * procedure_definition;           /* procedure_definition  */
  node_t * parameter_list;                 /* parameter_list  */
  node_t * argument_list;                  /* argument_list  */
  node_t * expression;                     /* expression  */
};

Other useful macros and declarations are put into the %code directive.

%code {
/* The following macro is convenient to get the member of the node. */
  #define child1(n) (n)->content.child.child1
  #define child2(n) (n)->content.child.child2
  #define child3(n) (n)->content.child.child3
  #define name(n) (n)->content.name
  #define value(n) (n)->content.value

  /* start of nodes */
  static node_t *node_top = NULL;
  /* functions to generate trees */
  static node_t *tree1 (int type, node_t *child1, node_t *child2, node_t *child3);
  static node_t *tree2 (int type, double value);
  static node_t *tree3 (int type, char *name);
}

Bison declarations

Bison declarations defines terminal and non-terminal symbols. It also specifies some directives.

%locations
%define api.value.type union /* YYSTYPE, the type of semantic values, is union of following types */
 /* key words */
%token PU
%token PD
%token PW
%token FD
%token TR
%token TL /* ver 0.5 */
%token BC
%token FC
%token DP
%token IF
%token RT
%token RS
%token RP /* ver 0.5 */
 /* constant */
%token <double> NUM
 /* identifier */
%token <char *> ID
 /* non terminal symbol */
%nterm <node_t *> program
%nterm <node_t *> statement
%nterm <node_t *> primary_procedure
%nterm <node_t *> primary_procedure_list
%nterm <node_t *> procedure_definition
%nterm <node_t *> parameter_list
%nterm <node_t *> argument_list
%nterm <node_t *> expression
 /* logical relation symbol */
%left '=' '<' '>'
 /* arithmetic symbol */
%left '+' '-'
%left '*' '/'
%precedence UMINUS /* unary minus */

%locations directive inserts the location structure into the header file. It is like this.

typedef struct YYLTYPE YYLTYPE;
struct YYLTYPE
{
  int first_line;
  int first_column;
  int last_line;
  int last_column;
};

This type is shared by the scanner file and the parser implementation file. The error report function yyerror uses it so that it can inform the location that error occurs.

%define api.value.type union generates semantic value type with tokens and nterms and inserts it to the header file. The inserted part is shown in the previous subsection as the extracts that shows the value type (YYSTYPE).

%token and %nterm directives define tokens and non terminal symbols respectively.

%token PU
... ...
%token <double> NUM

These directives define a token PU and NUM. The values of token kinds PU and NUM are defined as an enumeration constant in the header file.

  enum yytokentype
  {
  ... ... ...
    PU = 258,                      /* PU  */
  ... ... ...
    NUM = 269,                     /* NUM  */
  ... ... ...
  };
  typedef enum yytokentype yytoken_kind_t;

In addition, the type of the semantic value of NUM is defined as double in the header file because of <double> tag.

union YYSTYPE
{
  char * ID;                               /* ID  */
  double NUM;                              /* NUM  */
  ... ...
}

All the nterm symbols have the same type *node_t of the semantic value.

%left and %precedence directives define the precedence of operation symbols.

 /* logical relation symbol */
%left '=' '<' '>'
 /* arithmetic symbol */
%left '+' '-'
%left '*' '/'
%precedence UMINUS /* unary minus */

%left directive defines the following symbols as left-associated operators. If an operator + is left-associated, then

A + B + C = (A + B) + C

That is, the calculation is carried out the left operator first, then the right operator. If an operator * is right-associated, then:

A * B * C = A * (B * C)

The definition above decides the behavior of the parser. Addition and multiplication hold associative law so the result of (A+B)+C and A+(B+C) are equal in terms of mathematics. However, the parser will be confused if left (or right) associativity is not specified.

%left and %precedence directives show the precedence of operators. Later declared operators have higher precedence than former declared ones. The declaration above says, for example,

v=w+z*5+7 is the same as v=((w+(z*5))+7)

Be careful. The operator = above is an assignment. Assignment is not expression in turtle language. It is primary_procedure. But if = appears in an expression, it is a logical operator, not an assignment. The logical equal ‘=’ usually used in the conditional expression, for example, in if statement. (Turtle language uses ‘=’ instead of ‘==’ in C language).

Grammar rules

Grammar rules section defines the syntactic grammar of the language. It is similar to BNF form.

result: components { action };

• result is a nterm.
• components are list of tokens or nterms.
• action is C codes. It is executed whenever the components are reduced to the result. Action can be left out.

The following is a part of the grammar rule in turtle.y. But it is not exactly the same.

program:
  statement { node_top = $$ = $1; }
;
statement:
  primary_procedure
;
primary_procedure:
  FD expression    { $$ = tree1 (N_FD, $2, NULL, NULL); }
;
expression:
  NUM   { $$ = tree2 (N_NUM, $1); }
;

• The first two lines tell that program is statement.
• Whenever statement is reduced to program, an action node_top=$$=$1; is executed.
• node_top is a static variable. It points the top node of the tree.
• The symbol $$ is a semantic value of the result. For example, $$ in line 2 is the semantic value of program. It is a pointer to a node_t type structure.
• The symbol $1 is a semantic value of the first component. For example, $1 in line 2 is the semantic value of statement. It is also a pointer to node_t.
• The next rule is that statement is primary_procedure. There’s no action specified. Then, the default action $$ = $1 is executed.
• The next rule is that primary_procedure is FD followed by expression. The action calls tree1 and assigns its return value to $$. The function tree1 makes a tree node. The tree node has type and union of three pointers to children nodes, string or double.

node --+-- type
       +-- union contents
                    +---struct {node_t *child1, *child2, *child3;};
                    +---char *name
                    +---double value

• tree1 assigns the four arguments to type, child1, child2 and child3 members.
• The last rule is that expression is NUM.
• tree2 makes a tree node. The paremeters of tree2 are a type and a semantic value.

Suppose the parser reads the following program.

fd 100

What does the parser do?

1. The parser recognizes the input is FD. Maybe it is the start of primary_procedure, but parser needs to read the next token.
2. yylex returns the token kind NUM and sets yylval.NUM to 100.0 (the type is double). The parser reduces NUM to expression. At the same time, it sets the semantic value of the expression to point a new node. The node has the type N_NUM and a semantic value 100.0.
3. After the reduction, the buffer has FD and expression. The parser reduces it to primary_procedure. And it sets the semantic value of the primary_procedure to point a new node. The node has the type N_FD and its member child1 points the node of expression, whose type is N_NUM.
4. The parser reduces primary_procedure to statement. The semantic value of statement is the same as the one of primary_procedure, which points to the node N_FD.
5. The parser reduces statement to program. The semantic value of statement is assigned to the one of program and the static variable node_top.
6. Finally node_top points the node N_FD and the node N_FD points the node N_NUM.

The following is the grammar rule extracted from turtle.y. The rules there are based on the same idea above. I don’t want to explain the whole rules below. Please look into each line carefully so that you will understand all the rules and actions.

program:
  statement { node_top = $$ = $1; }
| program statement {
        node_top = $$ = tree1 (N_program, $1, $2, NULL);
#ifdef debug
if (node_top == NULL) g_printerr ("program: node_top is NULL.\n"); else g_printerr ("program: node_top is NOT NULL.\n");
#endif
        }
;

statement:
  primary_procedure
| procedure_definition
;

primary_procedure:
  PU    { $$ = tree1 (N_PU, NULL, NULL, NULL); }
| PD    { $$ = tree1 (N_PD, NULL, NULL, NULL); }
| PW expression    { $$ = tree1 (N_PW, $2, NULL, NULL); }
| FD expression    { $$ = tree1 (N_FD, $2, NULL, NULL); }
| TR expression    { $$ = tree1 (N_TR, $2, NULL, NULL); }
| TL expression    { $$ = tree1 (N_TL, $2, NULL, NULL); } /* ver 0.5 */
| BC '(' expression ',' expression ',' expression ')' { $$ = tree1 (N_BC, $3, $5, $7); }
| FC '(' expression ',' expression ',' expression ')' { $$ = tree1 (N_FC, $3, $5, $7); }
 /* assignment */
| ID '=' expression   { $$ = tree1 (N_ASSIGN, tree3 (N_ID, $1), $3, NULL); }
 /* control flow */
| IF '(' expression ')' '{' primary_procedure_list '}' { $$ = tree1 (N_IF, $3, $6, NULL); }
| RT    { $$ = tree1 (N_RT, NULL, NULL, NULL); }
| RS    { $$ = tree1 (N_RS, NULL, NULL, NULL); }
| RP '(' expression ')' '{' primary_procedure_list '}'    { $$ = tree1 (N_RP, $3, $6, NULL); }
 /* user defined procedure call */
| ID '(' ')'  { $$ = tree1 (N_procedure_call, tree3 (N_ID, $1), NULL, NULL); }
| ID '(' argument_list ')'  { $$ = tree1 (N_procedure_call, tree3 (N_ID, $1), $3, NULL); }
;

procedure_definition:
  DP ID '('  ')' '{' primary_procedure_list '}'  {
         $$ = tree1 (N_procedure_definition, tree3 (N_ID, $2), NULL, $6);
        }
| DP ID '(' parameter_list ')' '{' primary_procedure_list '}'  {
         $$ = tree1 (N_procedure_definition, tree3 (N_ID, $2), $4, $7);
        }
;

parameter_list:
  ID { $$ = tree3 (N_ID, $1); }
| parameter_list ',' ID  { $$ = tree1 (N_parameter_list, $1, tree3 (N_ID, $3), NULL); }
;

argument_list:
  expression
| argument_list ',' expression { $$ = tree1 (N_argument_list, $1, $3, NULL); }
;

primary_procedure_list:
  primary_procedure
| primary_procedure_list primary_procedure {
         $$ = tree1 (N_primary_procedure_list, $1, $2, NULL);
        }
;

expression:
  expression '=' expression { $$ = tree1 (N_EQ, $1, $3, NULL); }
| expression '>' expression { $$ = tree1 (N_GT, $1, $3, NULL); }
| expression '<' expression { $$ = tree1 (N_LT, $1, $3, NULL); }
| expression '+' expression { $$ = tree1 (N_ADD, $1, $3, NULL); }
| expression '-' expression { $$ = tree1 (N_SUB, $1, $3, NULL); }
| expression '*' expression { $$ = tree1 (N_MUL, $1, $3, NULL); }
| expression '/' expression { $$ = tree1 (N_DIV, $1, $3, NULL); }
| '-' expression %prec UMINUS { $$ = tree1 (N_UMINUS, $2, NULL, NULL); }
| '(' expression ')' { $$ = $2; }
| ID    { $$ = tree3 (N_ID, $1); }
| NUM   { $$ = tree2 (N_NUM, $1); }
;

Epilogue

The epilogue is written in C language and copied to the parser implementation file. Generally, you can put anything into the epilogue. In the case of turtle interpreter, the runtime routine and some other functions are in the epilogue.

Functions to create tree nodes

There are three functions, tree1, tree2 and tree3.

• tree1 creates a node and sets the node type and pointers to its three children (NULL is possible).
• tree2 creates a node and sets the node type and a value (double).
• tree3 creates a node and sets the node type and a pointer to a string.

Each function gets memories first and build a node on them. The memories are inserted to the list. They will be freed when runtime routine finishes.

The three functions are called in the actions in the rules section.

/* Dynamically allocated memories are added to the single list. They will be freed in the finalize function. */
GSList *list = NULL;

node_t *
tree1 (int type, node_t *child1, node_t *child2, node_t *child3) {
  node_t *new_node;

  list = g_slist_prepend (list, g_malloc (sizeof (node_t)));
  new_node = (node_t *) list->data;
  new_node->type = type;
  child1(new_node) = child1;
  child2(new_node) = child2;
  child3(new_node) = child3;
  return new_node;
}

node_t *
tree2 (int type, double value) {
  node_t *new_node;

  list = g_slist_prepend (list, g_malloc (sizeof (node_t)));
  new_node = (node_t *) list->data;
  new_node->type = type;
  value(new_node) = value;
  return new_node;
}

node_t *
tree3 (int type, char *name) {
  node_t *new_node;

  list = g_slist_prepend (list, g_malloc (sizeof (node_t)));
  new_node = (node_t *) list->data;
  new_node->type = type;
  name(new_node) = name;
  return new_node;
}

Symbol table

Variables and user defined procedures are registered in the symbol table. This table is a C array. It should be replaced by better algorithm and data structure, for example hash, in the future version

• Variables are registered with its name and value.
• Procedures are registered with its name and a pointer to the node of the procedure.

Therefore the table has the following fields.

• type to identify variable or procedure
• name
• value or pointer to a node

#define MAX_TABLE_SIZE 100
enum {
  PROC,
  VAR
};

struct {
  int type;
  char *name;
  union {
    node_t *node;
    double value;
  } object;
} table[MAX_TABLE_SIZE];
int tp;

void
init_table (void) {
  tp = 0;
}

The function init_table initializes the table. This must be called before registrations.

There are five functions to access the table,

• proc_install installs a procedure.
• var_install installs a variable.
• proc_lookup looks up a procedure. If the procedure is found, it returns a pointer to the node. Otherwise it returns NULL.
• var_lookup looks up a variable. If the variable is found, it returns TRUE and sets the pointer (argument) to point the value. Otherwise it returns FALSE.
• var_replace replaces the value of a variable. If the variable hasn’t registered yet, it installs the variable.

int
tbl_lookup (int type, char *name) {
  int i;

  if (tp == 0)
    return -1;
  for (i=0; i<tp; ++i)
    if (type == table[i].type && strcmp(name, table[i].name) == 0)
      return i;
  return -1;
}

void
tbl_install (int type, char *name, node_t *node, double value) {
  if (tp >= MAX_TABLE_SIZE)
    runtime_error ("Symbol table overflow.\n");
  else if (tbl_lookup (type, name) >= 0)
    runtime_error ("Name %s is already registered.\n", name);
  else {
    table[tp].type = type;
    table[tp].name = name;
    if (type == PROC)
      table[tp++].object.node = node;
    else
      table[tp++].object.value = value;
  }
}

void
proc_install (char *name, node_t *node) {
  tbl_install (PROC, name, node, 0.0);
}

void
var_install (char *name, double value) {
  tbl_install (VAR, name, NULL, value);
}

void
var_replace (char *name, double value) {
  int i;
  if ((i = tbl_lookup (VAR, name)) >= 0)
    table[i].object.value = value;
  else
    var_install (name, value);
}

node_t *
proc_lookup (char *name) {
  int i;
  if ((i = tbl_lookup (PROC, name)) < 0)
    return NULL;
  else
    return table[i].object.node;
}

gboolean
var_lookup (char *name, double *value) {
  int i;
  if ((i = tbl_lookup (VAR, name)) < 0)
    return FALSE;
  else {
    *value = table[i].object.value;
    return TRUE;
  }
}

Stack for parameters and arguments

Stack is a last-in first-out data structure. It is shortened to LIFO. Turtle uses a stack to keep parameters and arguments. They are like auto class variables in C language. They are pushed to the stack whenever the procedure is called. LIFO structure is useful for recursive calls.

Each element of the stack has name and value.

#define MAX_STACK_SIZE 500
struct {
  char *name;
  double value;
} stack[MAX_STACK_SIZE];
int sp, sp_biggest;

void
init_stack (void) {
  sp = sp_biggest = 0;
}

sp is a stack pointer. It is an index of the array stack and it always points an element of the array to store the next data. sp_biggest is the biggest number assigned to sp. We can know the amount of elements used in the array during the runtime. The purpose of the variable is to find appropriate MAX_STACK_SIZE. It will be unnecessary in the future version if the stack is implemented with better data structure and memory allocation.

The runtime routine push data to the stack when it executes a node of a procedure call. (The type of the node is N_procedure_call.)

dp drawline (angle, distance) { ... ... ... }
drawline (90, 100)

• The first line defines a procedure drawline. The runtime routine stores the name drawline and the node of the procedure to the symbol table.
• The second line calls the procedure. First, it looks for the procedure in the symbol table and gets its node. Then it searches the node for the parameters and gets angle and distance.
• It pushes (“angle”, 90.0) to the stack.
• It pushes (“distance”, 100.0) to the stack.
• It pushes (NULL, 2.0) to the stack. The number 2.0 is the number of parameters (or arguments). It is used when the procedure returns.

The following diagram shows the structure of the stack. First, procedure 1 is called. The procedure has two parameters. In the procedure 1, another procedure procedure 2 is called. It has one parameter. In the procedure 2, another procedure procedure 3 is called. It has three parameters. These three procedures are nested.

Programs push data to a stack from a low address memory to a high address memory. In the following diagram, the lowest address is at the top and the highest address is at the bottom. That is the order of the address. However, “the top of the stack” is the last pushed data and “the bottom of the stack” is the first pushed data. Therefore, “the top of the stack” is the bottom of the rectangle in the diagram and “the bottom of the stack” is the top of the rectangle.

There are four functions to access the stack.

• stack_push pushes data to the stack.
• stack_lookup searches the stack for the variable given its name as an argument. It searches only the parameters of the latest procedure. It returns TRUE and sets the argument value to point the value, if the variable has been found. Otherwise it returns FALSE.
• stack_replace replaces the value of the variable in the stack. If it succeeds, it returns TRUE. Otherwise returns FALSE.
• stack_return throws away the latest parameters. The stack pointer goes back to the point before the latest procedure call so that it points to parameters of the previous called procedure.

void
stack_push (char *name, double value) {
  if (sp >= MAX_STACK_SIZE)
    runtime_error ("Stack overflow.\n");
  else {
    stack[sp].name = name;
    stack[sp++].value = value;
    sp_biggest = sp > sp_biggest ? sp : sp_biggest;
  }
}

int
stack_search (char *name) {
  int depth, i;

  if (sp == 0)
    return -1;
  depth = (int) stack[sp-1].value;
  if (depth + 1 > sp) /* something strange */
    runtime_error ("Stack error.\n");
  for (i=0; i<depth; ++i)
    if (strcmp(name, stack[sp-(i+2)].name) == 0) {
      return sp-(i+2);
    }
  return -1;
}

gboolean
stack_lookup (char *name, double *value) {
  int i;

  if ((i = stack_search (name)) < 0)
    return FALSE;
  else {
    *value = stack[i].value;
    return TRUE;
  }
}

gboolean
stack_replace (char *name, double value) {
  int i;

  if ((i = stack_search (name)) < 0)
    return FALSE;
  else {
    stack[i].value = value;
    return TRUE;
  }
}

void
stack_return(void) {
  int depth;

  if (sp <= 0)
    return;
  depth = (int) stack[sp-1].value;
  if (depth + 1 > sp) /* something strange */
    runtime_error ("Stack error.\n");
  sp -= depth + 1;
}

Surface and cairo

A global variable surface is shared by turtleapplication.c and turtle.y. It is initialized in turtleapplication.c.

The runtime routine has its own cairo context. This is different from the cairo in the GtkDrawingArea instance. The runtime routine draws a shape on the surface with the cairo context. After runtime routine returns to run_cb, run_cb adds the GtkDrawingArea widget to the queue to redraw. When the widget is redraw,the drawing function draw_func is called. It copies the surface to the surface in the GtkDrawingArea object.

turtle.y has two functions init_cairo and destroy_cairo.

• init_cairo initializes static variables and cairo context. The variables keep pen status (up or down), direction, initial location, line width and color. The size of the surface changes according to the size of the window. Whenever a user drags and resizes the window, the surface is also resized. init_cairo gets the size first and sets the initial location of the turtle (center of the surface) and the transformation matrix.
• destroy_cairo just destroys the cairo context.

Turtle has its own coordinate. The origin is at the center of the surface, and positive direction of x and y axes are right and up respectively. But surfaces have its own coordinate. Its origin is at the top-left corner of the surface and positive direction of x and y are right and down respectively. A plane with the turtle’s coordinate is called user space, which is the same as cairo’s user space. A plane with the surface’s coordinate is called device space.

Cairo provides a transformation which is an affine transformation. It transforms a user-space coordinate (x, y) into a device-space coordinate (z, w).

The function init_cairo gets the width and height of the surface (See the program below).

• The center of the surface is (0,0) with regard to the user-space coordinate and (width/2, height/2) with regard to the device-space coordinate.
• The positive direction of x axis in the two spaces are the same. So, (1,0) is transformed into (1+width/2,height/2).
• The positive direction of y axis in the two spaces are opposite. So, (0,1) is transformed into (width/2,-1+height/2).

You can determine a, b, c, d, p and q by substituting the numbers above for x, y, z and w in the equation above. The solution of the simultaneous equations is:

a = 1, b = 0, c = 0, d = -1, p = width/2, q = height/2

Cairo provides a structure cairo_matrix_t. The function init_cairo uses it and sets the cairo transformation (See the program below). Once the matrix is set, the transformation always performs whenever cairo_stroke function is invoked.

/* status of the surface */
static gboolean pen = TRUE;
static double angle = 90.0; /* angle starts from x axis and measured counterclockwise */
                   /* Initially facing to the north */
static double cur_x = 0.0;
static double cur_y = 0.0;
static double line_width = 2.0;

struct color {
  double red;
  double green;
  double blue;
};
static struct color bc = {0.95, 0.95, 0.95}; /* white */
static struct color fc = {0.0, 0.0, 0.0}; /* black */

/* cairo */
static cairo_t *cr;
gboolean
init_cairo (void) {
  int width, height;
  cairo_matrix_t matrix;

  pen = TRUE;
  angle = 90.0;
  cur_x = 0.0;
  cur_y = 0.0;
  line_width = 2.0;
  bc.red = 0.95; bc.green = 0.95; bc.blue = 0.95;
  fc.red = 0.0; fc.green = 0.0; fc.blue = 0.0;

  if (surface) {
    width = cairo_image_surface_get_width (surface);
    height = cairo_image_surface_get_height (surface);
    matrix.xx = 1.0; matrix.xy = 0.0; matrix.x0 = (double) width / 2.0;
    matrix.yx = 0.0; matrix.yy = -1.0; matrix.y0 = (double) height / 2.0;

    cr = cairo_create (surface);
    cairo_transform (cr, &matrix);
    cairo_set_source_rgb (cr, bc.red, bc.green, bc.blue);
    cairo_paint (cr);
    cairo_set_source_rgb (cr, fc.red, fc.green, fc.blue);
    cairo_move_to (cr, cur_x, cur_y);
    return TRUE;
  } else
    return FALSE;
}

void
destroy_cairo () {
  cairo_destroy (cr);
}

Eval function

A function eval evaluates an expression and returns the value of the expression. It calls itself recursively. For example, if the node is N_ADD, then:

1. Calls eval(child1(node)) and gets the value1.
2. Calls eval(child2(node)) and gets the value2.
3. Returns value1+value2.

This is performed by a macro calc defined in the sixth line in the following program.

double
eval (node_t *node) {
double value = 0.0;
  if (node == NULL)
    runtime_error ("No expression to evaluate.\n");
#define calc(op) eval (child1(node)) op eval (child2(node))
  switch (node->type) {
    case N_EQ:
      value = (double) calc(==);
      break;
    case N_GT:
      value = (double) calc(>);
      break;
    case N_LT:
      value = (double) calc(<);
      break;
    case N_ADD:
      value = calc(+);
      break;
    case N_SUB:
      value = calc(-);
      break;
    case N_MUL:
      value = calc(*);
      break;
    case N_DIV:
      if (eval (child2(node)) == 0.0)
        runtime_error ("Division by zerp.\n");
      else
        value = calc(/);
      break;
    case N_UMINUS:
      value = -(eval (child1(node)));
      break;
    case N_ID:
      if (! (stack_lookup (name(node), &value)) && ! var_lookup (name(node), &value) )
        runtime_error ("Variable %s not defined.\n", name(node));
      break;
    case N_NUM:
      value = value(node);
      break;
    default:
      runtime_error ("Illegal expression.\n");
  }
  return value;
}

Execute function

Primary procedures and procedure definitions are analyzed and executed by the function execute. It doesn’t return any values. It calls itself recursively. The process of N_RT and N_procedure_call is complicated. It will explained after the following program. Other parts are not so difficult. Read the program below carefully so that you will understand the process.

/* procedure - return status */
static int proc_level = 0;
static int ret_level = 0;

void
execute (node_t *node) {
  double d, x, y;
  char *name;
  int n, i;

  if (node == NULL)
    runtime_error ("Node is NULL.\n");
  if (proc_level > ret_level)
    return;
  switch (node->type) {
    case N_program:
      execute (child1(node));
      execute (child2(node));
      break;
    case N_PU:
      pen = FALSE;
      break;
    case N_PD:
      pen = TRUE;
      break;
    case N_PW:
      line_width = eval (child1(node)); /* line width */
      break;
    case N_FD:
      d = eval (child1(node)); /* distance */
      x = d * cos (angle*M_PI/180);
      y = d * sin (angle*M_PI/180);
      /* initialize the current point = start point of the line */
      cairo_move_to (cr, cur_x, cur_y);
      cur_x += x;
      cur_y += y;
      cairo_set_line_width (cr, line_width);
      cairo_set_source_rgb (cr, fc.red, fc.green, fc.blue);
      if (pen)
        cairo_line_to (cr, cur_x, cur_y);
      else
        cairo_move_to (cr, cur_x, cur_y);
      cairo_stroke (cr);
      break;
    case N_TR:
      angle -= eval (child1(node));
      for (; angle < 0; angle += 360.0);
      for (; angle>360; angle -= 360.0);
      break;
    case N_BC:
      bc.red = eval (child1(node));
      bc.green = eval (child2(node));
      bc.blue = eval (child3(node));
#define fixcolor(c)  c = c < 0 ? 0 : (c > 1 ? 1 : c)
      fixcolor (bc.red);
      fixcolor (bc.green);
      fixcolor (bc.blue);
      /* clear the shapes and set the background color */
      cairo_set_source_rgb (cr, bc.red, bc.green, bc.blue);
      cairo_paint (cr);
      break;
    case N_FC:
      fc.red = eval (child1(node));
      fc.green = eval (child2(node));
      fc.blue = eval (child3(node));
      fixcolor (fc.red);
      fixcolor (fc.green);
      fixcolor (fc.blue);
      break;
    case N_ASSIGN:
      name = name(child1(node));
      d = eval (child2(node));
      if (! stack_replace (name, d)) /* First, tries to replace the value in the stack (parameter).*/
        var_replace (name, d); /* If the above fails, tries to replace the value in the table. If the variable isn't in the table, installs it, */
      break;
    case N_IF:
      if (eval (child1(node)))
        execute (child2(node));
      break;
    case N_RT:
      ret_level--;
      break;
    case N_RS:
      pen = TRUE;
      angle = 90.0;
      cur_x = 0.0;
      cur_y = 0.0;
      line_width = 2.0;
      fc.red = 0.0; fc.green = 0.0; fc.blue = 0.0;
      /* To change background color, use bc. */
      break;
    case N_procedure_call:
      name = name(child1(node));
node_t *proc = proc_lookup (name);
      if (! proc)
        runtime_error ("Procedure %s not defined.\n", name);
      if (strcmp (name, name(child1(proc))) != 0)
        runtime_error ("Unexpected error. Procedure %s is called, but invoked procedure is %s.\n", name, name(child1(proc)));
/* make tuples (parameter (name), argument (value)) and push them to the stack */
node_t *param_list;
node_t *arg_list;
      param_list = child2(proc);
      arg_list = child2(node);
      if (param_list == NULL) {
        if (arg_list == NULL) {
          stack_push (NULL, 0.0); /* number of argument == 0 */
        } else
          runtime_error ("Procedure %s has different number of argument and parameter.\n", name);
      }else {
/* Don't change the stack until finish evaluating the arguments. */
#define TEMP_STACK_SIZE 20
        char *temp_param[TEMP_STACK_SIZE];
        double temp_arg[TEMP_STACK_SIZE];
        n = 0;
        for (; param_list->type == N_parameter_list; param_list = child1(param_list)) {
          if (arg_list->type != N_argument_list)
            runtime_error ("Procedure %s has different number of argument and parameter.\n", name);
          if (n >= TEMP_STACK_SIZE)
            runtime_error ("Too many parameters. the number must be %d or less.\n", TEMP_STACK_SIZE);
          temp_param[n] = name(child2(param_list));
          temp_arg[n] = eval (child2(arg_list));
          arg_list = child1(arg_list);
          ++n;
        }
        if (param_list->type == N_ID && arg_list -> type != N_argument_list) {
          temp_param[n] = name(param_list);
          temp_arg[n] = eval (arg_list);
          if (++n >= TEMP_STACK_SIZE)
            runtime_error ("Too many parameters. the number must be %d or less.\n", TEMP_STACK_SIZE);
          temp_param[n] = NULL;
          temp_arg[n] = (double) n;
          ++n;
        } else
          runtime_error ("Unexpected error.\n");
        for (i = 0; i < n; ++i)
          stack_push (temp_param[i], temp_arg[i]);
      }
      ret_level = ++proc_level;
      execute (child3(proc));
      ret_level = --proc_level;
      stack_return ();
      break;
    case N_procedure_definition:
      name = name(child1(node));
      proc_install (name, node);
      break;
    case N_primary_procedure_list:
      execute (child1(node));
      execute (child2(node));
      break;
    default:
      runtime_error ("Unknown statement.\n");
  }
}

A node N_procedure_call is created by the parser when it has found a user defined procedure call. The procedure has been defined in the prior statement. Suppose the parser reads the following example code.

dp drawline (angle, distance) {
  tr angle
  fd distance
}
drawline (90, 100)
drawline (90, 100)
drawline (90, 100)
drawline (90, 100)

This example draws a square.

When The parser reads the lines from one to four, it creates nodes like this:

Runtime routine just stores the procedure to the symbol table with its name and node.

When the parser reads the fifth line in the example, it creates nodes like this:

When the runtime routine meets N_procedure_call node, it behaves like this:

1. Searches the symbol table for the procedure with the name.
2. Gets pointers to the node to parameters and the node to the body.
3. Creates a temporary stack. Makes a tuple of each parameter name and argument value. Pushes the tuples into the stack, and (NULL, number of parameters) finally. If no error occurs, copies them from the temporary stack to the parameter stack.
4. Increases prc_level by one. Sets ret_level to the same value as proc_level. proc_level is zero when runtime routine runs on the main routine. If it goes into a procedure, proc_level increases by one. Therefore, proc_level is the depth of the procedure call. ret_level is the level to return. If it is the same as proc_level, runtime routine executes commands in order of the commands in the procedure. If it is smaller than proc_level, runtime routine doesn’t execute commands until it becomes the same level as proc_level. ret_level is used to return the procedure.
5. Executes the node of the body of the procedure.
6. Decreases proc_level by one. Sets ret_level to the same value as proc_level. Calls stack_return.

When the runtime routine meets N_RT node, it decreases ret_level by one so that the following commands in the procedure are ignored by the runtime routine.

Runtime entry and error functions

A function run is the entry of the runtime routine. A function runtime_error reports an error occurred during the runtime routine runs. (Errors which occur during the parsing are called syntax error and reported by yyerror.) After runtime_error reports an error, it stops the command execution and goes back to run to exit.

Setjmp and longjmp functions are used. They are declared in <setjmp.h>. setjmp (buf) saves state information in buf and returns zero. longjmp(buf, 1) restores the state information from buf and returns 1 (the second argument). Because the information is the status at the time setjmp is called, so longjmp resumes the execution at the next of setjmp function call. In the following program, longjmp resumes at the assignment to the variable i. When setjmp is called, 0 is assigned to i and execute(node_top) is called. On the other hand, when longjmp is called, 1 is assigned to i and execute(node_top) is not called..

g_slist_free_full frees all the allocated memories.

static jmp_buf buf;

void
run (void) {
  int i;

  if (! init_cairo()) {
    g_print ("Cairo not initialized.\n");
    return;
  }
  init_table();
  init_stack();
  ret_level = proc_level = 1;
  i = setjmp (buf);
  if (i == 0)
    execute(node_top);
  /* else ... get here by calling longjmp */
  destroy_cairo ();
  g_slist_free_full (g_steal_pointer (&list), g_free);
}

/* format supports only %s, %f and %d */
static void
runtime_error (char *format, ...) {
  va_list args;
  char *f;
  char b[3];
  char *s;
  double v;
  int i;

  va_start (args, format);
  for (f = format; *f; f++) {
    if (*f != '%') {
      b[0] = *f;
      b[1] = '\0';
      g_print ("%s", b);
      continue;
    }
    switch (*++f) {
      case 's':
        s = va_arg(args, char *);
        g_print ("%s", s);
        break;
      case 'f':
        v = va_arg(args, double);
        g_print("%f", v);
        break;
      case 'd':
        i = va_arg(args, int);
        g_print("%d", i);
        break;
      default:
        b[0] = '%';
        b[1] = *f;
        b[2] = '\0';
        g_print ("%s", b);
        break;
    }
  }
  va_end (args);

  longjmp (buf, 1);
}

A function runtime_error has a variable-length argument list.

void runtime_error (char *format, ...)

This is implemented with <stdarg.h> header file. The va_list type variable args will refer to each argument in turn. A function va_start initializes args. A function va_arg returns an argument and moves the reference of args to the next. A function va_end cleans up everything necessary at the end.

The function runtime_error has a similar format of printf standard function. But its format has only %s, %f and %d.

The functions declared in <setjmp.h> and <stdarg.h> are explained in the very famous book “The C programming language” written by Brian Kernighan and Dennis Ritchie. I referred to the book to write the program above.

The program turtle is unsophisticated and unpolished. If you want to make your own language, you need to know more and more. I don’t know any good textbook about compilers and interpreters. If you know a good book, please let me know.

However, the following information is very useful (but old).

• Bison documentation
• Flex documentation
• Software tools written by Brian W. Kernighan & P. J. Plauger (1976)
• Unix programming environment written by Brian W. Kernighan and Rob Pike (1984)
• Source code of a language, for example, ruby.

Lately, lots of source codes are in the internet. Maybe reading source codes is the most useful for programmers.