How would I go about making a programming language?

Question

I've got a name for it, I know what it would be for, but how would I go about letting execute on Windows machines? Do I need to know C to let it get executed? Anything in depth on how this would work is an instant 10 points.

It would be called Napoleon.

Answer 1

Formally, you would need to define a grammar first. The grammar defines the language. After that, then you would have to build a compiler. There are really no easy steps to do it. There are people that make careers out of what you are asking and entire college curricula involved. This is not really the right forum to ask that question. If you have specific questions, I might be able to help you out. By the way, you don't need to know C. But it wouldn't hurt to know how C works if you are looking to build an iterative language. Getting your new language to work on Windows or any other platform is a job for your compiler as it will be interpreting your code and creating the executable for it.

Good luck. BTW, what it gonna be called. I want to say that I heard of it first after you make your first million on it. 8-)

Answer 2

Probably the best way to get started is to find a language similar to what you want and search for an Open Source implementation of it using Google.

You can then see how the keywords and syntax is represented and make the necessary modifications to allow for your enhancements.

Writing a language is a very large project but by starting from an existing language you can cut months or years off of your development time.

I included a reference pointing you to about 75 OpenSource language projects.

Answer 3

Generally speaking you should try and write a program that can compile itself. That way you know that all the requirements that you want to be built in work at a very basic level. If you do not want to write the programming language from scratch then go for something like C to write the compiler. good luck.