SCLM allows you to replace an SCLM-supplied source parser with a user-defined source parser. This option is important when you are defining a new language for a project because such a language is likely to have a syntax unlike any of the languages that the SCLM-supplied parsers can recognize.

When you write a new parser for a language, you must:

1. Define the information tracked by SCLM in terms of the syntax of the language you want to support.
2. Write a program, based on the information you defined, that passes the statistical and dependency information for a member written in this new language to SCLM. This program is called a parser.
3. Tell SCLM how to invoke your parser.

Figure 2 to Figure 11 contain a parser, written in PL/I, for the ISPF skeleton (SKELS) language. This section works through the three preceding steps using the SKELS parser as an example.

Several user-modifiable parsers, written in REXX, are included with SCLM. FLMLRASM (Assembler), FLMLRCBL (COBOL), FLMRC2 (workstation C/C++ and resource files), FLMLRIPF (workstation help files), FLMLRC37 (C/370™), and FLMLRCIS(C/C++ for MVS™ with include set support) are described in SCLM translators. Understanding and using the customizable parsers contains information on modifying the REXX parsers.