MetaCET: An Object Oriented Tool for Language Design

Programming language design is one of the most difficult tasks in software design. Nowadays, it is an open research area, with a great impact on the further development of the computer science. In this paper, we present MetaCET, a new approach for language design. It allows developers to model and design a target language by means of Java. When modeling, the first step consists of giving a high level language design by a diagram, for instance, UML. Then, in MetaCET, the model is rewritten into Java classes. Inside these Java classes the syntax (or target language textual representation) is specified as metadata (standard Java annotations). Finally, MetaCET automatically generates a Java code which recognizes a program written in the target language