> If anyone knows of a better path to get from here (can't design my own language) to there (clarity and understanding) I would love to hear your ideas.
http://www.hokstad.com/compiler was what made it make sense to me. I found the dragon book approach (where you start with this 4-stage design and you're supposed to implement a parser and lexer and all this because I said so) hopelessly confusing and unmotivated. Hokstad takes you through writing a compiler in a way that makes sense, the same way you'd write any other program.
http://www.hokstad.com/compiler was what made it make sense to me. I found the dragon book approach (where you start with this 4-stage design and you're supposed to implement a parser and lexer and all this because I said so) hopelessly confusing and unmotivated. Hokstad takes you through writing a compiler in a way that makes sense, the same way you'd write any other program.