Making a Programming Language From Scratch/Localizing
Functions and scope
[edit | edit source]Before we do anything with functions we must localize the variables. Note that in case of procedures variables are not local but are global.
Scope
[edit | edit source]Anything that is declared within a function remains within the function. This essential rule called the Scope rule has governed the creation of programming languages since the time of C.
In the case of automatic or local variables it is easy . All variables that are declared with the LOCAL keyword are by default limited to the procedure only. Thus parameters are also to be declared as LOCAL however this is already done by the PROC keyword
For static variables there is no such facility and thus the localizing must be done manually. One cheap and easy method is to simply append the name of the function to the variable. But this method requires that you must convert the name of each and every static variable every where it is used. The final algorithm totally depends on you.