What is the primary purpose of lexical analysis in a compiler?
Practice Questions
Q1
What is the primary purpose of lexical analysis in a compiler?
To generate intermediate code
To convert source code into tokens
To optimize the code
To perform syntax checking
Questions & Step-by-Step Solutions
What is the primary purpose of lexical analysis in a compiler?
Step 1: Understand that a compiler is a program that translates source code written in a programming language into machine code.
Step 2: Know that the first stage of this translation process is called lexical analysis.
Step 3: Realize that lexical analysis takes the raw source code (text) and breaks it down into smaller parts.
Step 4: These smaller parts are called tokens, which represent basic elements like keywords, operators, and identifiers.
Step 5: The purpose of creating tokens is to simplify the next stages of the compilation process, making it easier for the compiler to understand the code.
