BNF
     In semantic 1.4, a BNF file represented ``Bovine Normal Form'', the grammar file used for the 1.4 parser generator.  This was a play on Backus-Naur Form which proved too confusing.

bovinate
     A verb representing what happens when a bovine parser parsers a file.

bovine lambda
     In a bovine, or LL parser, the bovine lambda is a function to execute when a specific set of match rules has succeeded in matches text from the buffer.

bovine parser
     A parser using the bovine parser generator.  It is an LL parser suitible for small simple languages.

context

LALR

lexer
     A program which converts text into a stream of tokens by analyzing them lexially.  Lexers will commonly create strings, symbols, keywords and punctuation, and strip whitespace and comments.

LL

nonterminal

overloadable
     Some functions are defined via define-overload. These can be overloaded via ....

parser
     A program that converts tokens to tags.

tag
     A tag is a representation of some entity in a language file, such as a functin, variable, or include statement.  In semantic, the word tag is used the same way it is used for the etags or ctags tools.

token
     A single atomic item returned from a lexer.  It represents some set of characters found in a buffer.

token stream
     The output of the lexer as well as the input to the parser.

wisent parser
     A parser using the wisent parser generator.  It is a port of bison to Emacs Lisp.  It is an LALR parser suitable for complex languages.