Leaving aside the trivialities of specific implementation details[^1], what are the fundamental problems a parser must confront and solve[^2]?

Let’s consider the input: 1 + 2 * 3. Suppose a grammar dictates that this input should be structured as 1 + (2 * 3). As a parser reads the input from left to right, it reaches 1 + 2 and recognizes that the next token is *. At this point, it must decide whether to group the preceding part into a single unit or continue. This challenge is independent of how the parser is implemented; it's a universal problem inherent to parsing itself.

In this session, I will highlight several such problems within the parsing domain and explore how different parser implementations try to solve them.

[^1]: In truth, the "how" is where the real struggle lies… [^2]: I will limit my scope to one-way, non-backtracking parsers that read input from left to right. [^3]: Of course, the discussion won't end with simply observing how those problems are addressed…