What is a compiler - description

If you are just starting to learn programming or just interested in this issue, you must have come across the mysterious word "compiler". It looks like a terrible concept can scare people away. In this article, we will try to find out if everything is terrible. What is a compiler?

Definition and history of appearance

In simple words, the compiler is a program that converts the text of a program written by a user into a form that is suitable for execution on a computer.

There were such programs together with the origin of the first programming languages. It happened in the late 50's. It turns out that the history, which is associated with compilers and programming languages, has already been more than six decades. Despite such a serious time, this direction of computer science can by no means be called obsolete or established. On the contrary, with the passage of time, with the advent of new industries and tasks for which computers are being applied, there is a need to develop new, more convenient programming languages. Accordingly, for these languages, compilers are needed. Windows, Linux, MacOS - for each platform there are developments.

Principle of operation

The source code written by the developer in a high-level language is converted into a program in a special machine language. The resulting code is called an executable program. It can be installed and run on any computer, without any further transformations.

Simple, but difficult

By tradition, compilers in computer science are one of the basic things together with operating systems, as well as databases. What is a compiler? It is in a sense the basis of computer science.

From another point of view, the very theme of creating such programs implies a large number of theoretical and technological aspects that are related to programming. Many developers believe that this topic is generally the most attractive in all computer science. When a programmer develops a program that solves a problem, he writes it in a specific language. In the process of development, he operates with terms that are close to the area that he has to deal with. The computer does not understand what a person tells him. He is able to understand only simple enough things, which include numbers and variables, cells and registers, permanent and temporary memory. What is a compiler? This is a program whose task is to translate concepts that are close to the subject domain of the developer in terms that the computer can manipulate.

This is the task that the Java compiler or any other programming language does. With each appearance of a new language, there is a need to translate the code written on it into a form that the computer can understand. Otherwise, he will not fulfill it. There is always a semantic gap between the concepts of human and computer. It is for its overcoming and the compilers of the programming language are intended.

Difficulties in creating

The creators of such programs face a wide variety of problems. These are the scientific problems that are associated with the correct mapping of the concepts of the applied field. This is both engineering and technological problems associated with the implementation of this very mapping.

The task of creating a compiler consists of many different subtasks. This is a complex, but very exciting industry, which many programmers devote their lives to. And do not regret.

Class and compiler

Probably, many heard about such languages as C and C ++. After all, they are among the most popular and common. These are very serious programming languages that contain powerful concepts that are convenient for displaying the concepts of application areas in which developers work. For example, there is the concept of classes, functions. They are fundamental for many languages, but for C ++ they are particularly characteristic.

It is much more convenient for a programmer to create models using such concepts. The C compiler for Windows or another operating system helps to display such high-level things in a form that the computer will understand. Only then can he manipulate them.

Any computer, no matter how powerful and complex it may be, operates with very simple concepts. But the concept of a class is difficult, because with its help it is very convenient to display many things from real life. The compiler converts complex concepts into primitive ones.

Developing compilers as a work

In recent years, there has been a trend in which any large company associated with information technology releases its own programming language, which is then promoted to the broad masses of developers.

Of course, for each language you need a compiler. And firms, as a rule, create them together with languages. But there is also a large number of independent programmers and firms who for one reason or another want to have their own compilers for languages, or they develop new languages and, accordingly, compilers to them. It can be confidently asserted that a specialist who has devoted himself to this sphere will definitely not be left without work.

So, now you need to understand what a compiler is. This is a program-translator between the developer and the computer, without which in the field of computer science anywhere.