Counter-One-Pass Features in One-Pass Compilation: A Formalization Using Attribute Grammars

In this note, we would like to present a formal example that illustrates the nature of certain problems that occur in the design of one-pass compilation. There are language features that appear malsuited for one-pass implementation. Tht jr can be handled in one pass, but at the price of some eve-head merely induced by forcing them into a one-pass scheme. We call such features countercm-pass fearUres. We present an example where both syntactic and semantic processing fit a natural one-pass scheme, but where it is impossible to combine these two schemes to yield a on+pass compiler. This impossibility can be established formally by applying the one-pass criteria developed for attribute grammars.