Features

These are the main features parboiled offers:

1. Grammar definition directly in Java or Scala source
   • No external, custom format non-Java/non-Scala files
   • No proprietary syntax to learn
   • No break in IDE support (syntax highlighting, code navigation, refactoring, etc.)
2. Real-world ready
   • Full expressive power of Parsing Expression Grammars
   • Support for powerful and flexible parser actions
   • Excellent parse error reporting and recovery
   • Good performance
3. Very easy integration
   • No external parser generator tools to manage
   • No special steps complicating your build process
   • No “untouchable”, generated source files in your project structure
   • Open and flexible architecture to integrate easily into existing structures
4. Light-weight, easy-to-use
   • Just one parsing phase (no lexer code required)
   • Small, simple API
   • Library is ca. 300/450 KB for Java/Scala with few dependencies

Even though parboiled was originally designed less for speed than for ease-of-use and manageability its parsing performance has improved significantly since its early releases and is now more than sufficient for most applications. It can parse its own Java 5 sources (see the Java Parser example) at a rate of approx. 55,000 lines or 2.0 million characters per second on one core of a 2.4 GHz Intel Core i5 (under OS/X Java 6).