14. Introduction to Parsing

Parsing is a fundamental activity in many programs, and for all but the most trivial cases, it is a challenging topic. Parsing is often done when we need to read data that is stored in a custom format so that we can process it or perform queries on it. Or we may be required to parse a DSL (Domain-Specific Language)—these are mini task-specific languages that appear to be growing in popularity. Whether we need to read data in a custom format or code written using a DSL, we will need to create a suitable parser. This can be done by handcrafting, or by using one of Python’s generic ...

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