Declarative specification of references in DSLs

Abstract

The occurrence of identifiers and references in computer languages is a common issue. The same applies for domain specific languages, whose popularity is increasing and there is a need for aid in their design process. This paper analyses the problem of identifiers and references in computer languages. Current methods use an imperative approach for supporting references in languages; therefore a language designer is required to manually write reference resolving. The method proposed in this paper perceives references and identifiers as language patterns, which can be specified in a declarative manner with much less knowledge about the problem of resolving references in computer languages.