Parsing wiki markup using a state machine

Question

I would like to parse a simple grammar such as wiki markup using state machines. I have never written or played with one. I would like to lean how to implement a simple one. I am thinking of using Clojure for this. My question is can you point me to some good tutorials that are for complete newbies on this topic such as my self?

Answer 1

Try Miro Samek's Book on State Machines. Practical UML Statecharts in C/C++

Answer 2

You should look at the state machine compiler, to avoid a lot of boring code. It will produce Jars and Clojure - Java interop is good.

Answer 3

Take a look at fnparse. It is a Clojure library for functional parsing and contains a really good example of JSON parsing. Parser is another library that might be helpful also. Even if you don't wish to use them, they provide some great insights into parsing.