Declarative Rule-Based Composition, Validation, and Improvement of EBNF Grammars for the Management of Language Extensions

Nowadays there often exists the need to adapt a language to address the needs of a specific area of application. Language extensions provide a way to add this functionality conditionally; while preserving the core of the language intact. In this thesis we present a methodology that supports the work with language syntax extensions in the form of EBNF grammars. We introduce two new grammar types that can make the work with extension grammars automated and yet customizable. We also explore several methods that ease the maintenance of EBNF grammars. Finally, we disuss algorithms that support the proposed methodology and present them in the context of a prototype implementation for the Eclipse Platform.