Abstract

The ability to extend a language with new syntactic forms is a powerful tool. A sufficiently flexible macro system allows programmers to build from a common base towards a language designed specifically for their problem domain. However, macro facilities that are integrated, capable, and at the same time simple enough to be widely used have been limited to the Lisp family of languages to date. In this paper we introduce a macro facility, called the Java Syntactic Extender (JSE), with the superior power and ease of use of Lisp macro sytems, but for Java, a language with a more conventional algebraic syntax. The design is based on the Dylan macro system, but exploits Java’s compilation model to offer a full procedural macro engine. In other words, syntax expanders may be implemented in, and so use all the facilities of, the full Java language