@SubSection
    @Tag { defs.impl }
    @Title { Implementation of definitions }
@Begin
@PP
Input is processed by a hybrid parser which employs operator precedence
for objects and simple recursive descent for the headers of
definitions.  A symbol table stores the body of each definition as a
parse tree, except for macros which are lists of tokens, and manages the
usual stack of static scopes, accepting @I PushScope and @I PopScope
operations as the parser enters and leaves scope regions, including
actual body parameters and the right parameter of the @Code "@Open"
operator.
@PP
As the parse proceeds, a complete call graph is constructed, recording,
for each symbol, which symbols are invoked within its body.  Immediately
after the last definition is read, the transitive closure of the call
graph is computed, and used to determine whether each non-parameter
symbol is recursive or receptive (Section {@NumberOf galleys}), and
whether each parameter is invoked exactly once or not.
@PP
Purely functional systems may evaluate symbol invocations in applicative
order (where parameters are evaluated before substitution into bodies),
or in normal order (substitution before evaluation), and they may also
share the value of a parameter among all uses of it.  But in Basser
Lout, the presence of context-sensitive style information (Section
{@NumberOf style}) forces normal order evaluation and prevents sharing
of parameter values.
@PP
To evaluate an unsized object (pure parse tree), its {@I environment},
the equivalent of the stack frames in Algol-like languages, must be
available, containing the actual values of all formal parameters
that are visible within the unsized object.  Environment handling is
a well-known implementation technique, so it will be discussed
only briefly here.
@PP
Environments are extra subtrees hung from the objects they refer
to.  This organization makes excellent use of the ordered dag to
permit environments to be shared, and deleted when the last
reference to them is removed.  Several optimizations have been
implemented.  Actual parameters known to be invoked only once are moved
in from the environment, not copied; copying could lead to quadratic time
complexity.  Actual parameters of the form @Code "@Next" @I object
receive an applicative pre-evaluation which prevents long chains of
@Code "@Next" symbols from forming during the generation of large page
numbers.  Some environments which provably contribute nothing are
deleted, most notably when a symbol invocation has no symbols within its
actual parameters and no import list, so that only the environment of its
body need be kept; this saves a great deal of space when objects with
environments are written to auxiliary files (Section {@NumberOf cross}).
@End @SubSection