From: Bob Hutchison Date: 2006-03-05T06:27:05+09:00 Subject: Re: Can Anyone Recommend A Good DSL Book? On Mar 1, 2006, at 10:06 AM, Sean Mountcastle wrote: > I apologize if this has been asked on this list before (I did a quick > search using Namazu and didn't find any specific books; perhaps that's > because they don't exist): > > Are there any good books on domain specific languages (preferably in > Ruby)? I've read Fowler's article on DSLs, I attended Glenn > Vanderburg's "Metaprogramming Ruby" talk at OSCON, I also listened to > Rich Kilmer speak at a NoVARUG meeting about a DSL he wrote for the > USAF/BBN and I've listened to the recording of Domain Specific > Languages by Jim Weirich from RubyConf 2005 -- but I still don't "get" > it. It seems like black magic to me, so I'm hoping there's a book out > there devoted to implementing DSLs using Ruby that can help me better > understand this useful technique. > > Does anyone know of such a book? > > Many thanks in advance, > Sean > I don't know of anything specific. Some of the lisp books, for example Peter Seibel's book 'Practical Common Lisp' ( the pdf is freely available) touches on the subject but in CL the idea is kind of fundamental so it is sometimes not specifically named as DSL and it is all through the book (in CL you basically program by building DSLs). Same with Paul Graham's book 'On Lisp' also with a freely available pdf version. Both books are excellent, Graham's is in my short-list of Important Software Books. In the Ruby world, the best I've read is David Black's 'Ruby for Rails'. It isn't available yet (it is being released chapter by chapter at Manning). It also isn't explicitly about DSLs but it is one of the best that I've seen on the subject and discusses Rails as a DSL. Cheers, Bob ---- Bob Hutchison -- blogs at Recursive Design Inc. -- Raconteur -- xampl for Ruby --