Parse::Nibbler - Parse huge files using grammars written in pure perl.
Copyright (C) 2001  Greg London

This library is free software; you can redistribute it and/or
modify it under the terms of the GNU Lesser General Public
License as published by the Free Software Foundation; either
version 2.1 of the License, or (at your option) any later version.

This library is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.  See the GNU
Lesser General Public License for more details.

You should have received a copy of the GNU Lesser General Public
License along with this library; if not, write to the Free Software
Foundation, Inc., 59 Temple Place, Suite 330, Boston, MA  02111-1307  USA

contact the author via http://www.greglondon.com


Parse::Nibbler is a  parser that allows you to write grammars in pure perl.

It is a parser designed to parse HUGE files, a little bit at a time.
Basically, it nibbles at a file while it parses.

Grammars are written in pure perl using subroutines defined
in the Parse::Nibbler package. 


installation instructions are:
gunzip (tarball).tar.gz
tar -xf (tarball).tar
cd Parse
cd Nibbler
perl Makefile.PL
make
make test
make install


After you've done the install, you can cd into the 
t/ subdirectory and take a look at the test examples.

The main documentation is POD at the end of the 
Parse::Nibbler.pm file itself.

Contained in the t/ subdirectory is a grammar for
parsing gate level verilog netlists, VerilogGrammar.pm.
The test t/big_verilog.t runs a benchmarking test which
times how long it takes to parse a large piece of verilog
gate level code. 6000 lines of verilog in test file. 

On a P3 @ 750 MHZ, it currently parses gate level verilog at about 

*** 1420 *** lines per second.


Current state of package: Alpha

Any of the interfaces to the package may change at 
the next version. I've swapped from object oriented
to subroutine calls, so nothing is sacred at this point.
Hope things will settle down at some point though...
trying to get the speediest approach possible, then
I'll iron out the details.