Learn how to build your own parser-combinators library using Scala!
Back at our very first Scala in the City, Bastien Louërat gave us an exciting insight into the world of Parsing and how much of an issue is can be. Don't worry though as by the end of this talk you'll be making the most of the Scala language and using all sorts of tricks.
Parsing is a truly fundamental problem. How can we extract and refine intelligible information out of the chaotic and hostile world we operate in? The absurd nature of the task and the breadth of possible solutions can quickly turn into an obsession, watch out. The composability of first-class functions paired with powerful types can offer an extremely elegant and satisfying approach to parsing. In this talk, we will build our own parser-combinators library from scratch using Scala. We will make the most of the language by using all kinds of types, data structures, and other tricks. May contain traces of Idris, it depends.
Bastien found out about functional programming because of Scala, spent over five years trying to get to the bottom of it but recently gave up to move onto Haskell and purescript. He is also extremely enthusiastic about hummous. Tl;dr of his talk: more functions and more types.
Don't forget you can watch all of our Scala in the City talks on our YouTube channel.
This talk was given by Bastien Louërat at Scala in the City.