# Ruby lexer/parser package? **URL:** \ **Category:** Ruby\ **Created:** [November 20, 2005, 5:25am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/ruby-lexer-parser-package/48424 "2005-11-20T05:25:03Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 6\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![didier.prophete](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/d/71c47a/32.png) [@didier.prophete](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/didier.prophete)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2005, 5:25am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/ruby-lexer-parser-package/48424/1 "2005-11-20T05:25:03Z")
a quick question: is there a lex/yacc package for ruby ? or actually anything to implement a lexer/parser in ruby ? for some reason I can’t seem to find anything like that out there… thanks for your help. -Didier ---
**Author:** ![didier.prophete](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/d/71c47a/32.png) [@didier.prophete](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/didier.prophete)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2005, 5:41am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/ruby-lexer-parser-package/48424/2 "2005-11-20T05:41:07Z")
Hi Didier, Check out Racc. It comes with ruby in the standard library. Cheers, Dave ---
**Author:** ![didier.prophete](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/d/71c47a/32.png) [@didier.prophete](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/didier.prophete)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2005, 7:13am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/ruby-lexer-parser-package/48424/3 "2005-11-20T07:13:56Z")
On Nov 19, 2005, at 10:37 PM, David B. wrote: > Hi Didier, > > Check out Racc. It comes with ruby in the standard library. Tiny clarification, the Racc _runtime_ is a standard library. James Edward G. II ---
**Author:** ![didier.prophete](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/d/71c47a/32.png) [@didier.prophete](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/didier.prophete)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2005, 6:46pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/ruby-lexer-parser-package/48424/4 "2005-11-20T18:46:28Z")
David, James, Eric, Thanks a lot guys. Now, I didn’t see any obvious lexer package out there, but maybe I need to spend more time looking at the examples. -Didier ---
**Author:** ![didier.prophete](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/d/71c47a/32.png) [@didier.prophete](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/didier.prophete)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2005, 7:13am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/ruby-lexer-parser-package/48424/5 "2005-11-20T07:13:56Z")
On 11/19/05, removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid [removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid) wrote: > a quick question: is there a lex/yacc package for ruby ? or actually > anything to implement a lexer/parser in ruby ? > for some reason I can’t seem to find anything like that out there… Here are the general parser (and sometimes lexer) packages I found on raa and rubyforge: LR parsers: [http://raa.ruby-lang.org/project/racc/](http://raa.ruby-lang.org/project/racc/) (run-time extension in ruby 1.8) [http://raa.ruby-lang.org/project/rockit/](http://raa.ruby-lang.org/project/rockit/) (doesn’t work on 1.8?) LL parsers: [http://raa.ruby-lang.org/project/coco-rb/](http://raa.ruby-lang.org/project/coco-rb/) [http://rubyforge.org/projects/tdp4r/](http://rubyforge.org/projects/tdp4r/) [http://rubyforge.org/projects/coco-ruby/](http://rubyforge.org/projects/coco-ruby/) [http://rubyforge.org/projects/grammar/](http://rubyforge.org/projects/grammar/) Of course I’m biased toward my package (grammar) and think it is the best out there. You should take a look at all these if you are interested in the topic. ---
**Author:** ![didier.prophete](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/d/71c47a/32.png) [@didier.prophete](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/didier.prophete)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2005, 8:23pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/ruby-lexer-parser-package/48424/6 "2005-11-20T20:23:01Z")
On 11/20/05, removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid [removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid) wrote: > David, James, Eric, > > Thanks a lot guys. > Now, I didn’t see any obvious lexer package out there, but maybe I need > to spend more time looking at the examples. > > -Didier For mine, a lexer and parser are made identically - one parses characters and the other tokens. On one extreme, you can make a lexer-free parser and on the other you could make multi-level (more than just lexer/parser) language transformer/compiler.