How to obtain an AST from a source file?

[IanTrudel]

Discussed in #455

^{Originally posted by IanTrudel May 2, 2024}
Would it be possible to obtain the AST (or S-Exp) from a given source file in Unicon?

[Don-Ward]

There is a way (now) after some work I did late last year. It's not documented and may yet be removed. Look at the procedure Progend in .../uni/unicon/unigram.y for details.

[IanTrudel]

This is a special case, isn't it? Not only it happens after the big inhale but it's hidden behind yacc. That most likely means there is no way to use this in a normal Unicon program. Or is there? It might be difficult to replicate because there is a lot of magic from x1 to classes.

[Don-Ward]

As of 24th March, there is now a -printAST option in the compiler. To get access to the AST from a normal Unicon program you could run the compiler in a child process and capture the standard output.

[IanTrudel]

Thank you! I'm looking forward trying this new feature.