Formal grammar

o Formal grammar is a set of rules. It is used to identify correct or incorrect strings of tokens in a
language. The formal grammar is represented as G.
o Formal grammar is used to generate all possible strings over the alphabet that is syntactically
correct in the language.
o Formal grammar is used mostly in the syntactic analysis phase (parsing) particularly during the
compilation.

Constitute Of Grammar :
Grammar is basically composed of two basic elements –
o Terminal Symbols –
Terminal symbols are those which are the components of the sentences generated using a
grammar and are represented using small case letter like a, b, c etc.
o Non-Terminal Symbols –
Non-Terminal Symbols are those symbols which take part in the generation of the sentence
but are not the component of the sentence. Non-Terminal Symbols are also called Auxiliary
Symbols and Variables. These symbols are represented using a capital letter like A, B, C, etc.

o Formal Definition of Grammar :

Any Grammar can be represented by 4 tuples – <N, T, P, S>

N describes a finite set of non-terminal symbols.

T describes a finite set of terminal symbols.
P describes a set of production rules
S is the start symbol. (Symbol from where we start producing our sentences or strings).

Example: L = {a, b}, N = {S, R, B}  

Example
Grammar G1 −
({S, A, B}, {a, b}, S, {S → AB, A → a, B → b})
Here,
 S, A, and B are Non-terminal symbols;
 a and b are Terminal symbols
 S is the Start symbol, S ∈ N
 Productions, P : S → AB, A → a, B → b
 Example
Grammar G2 − (({S, A}, {a, b}, S,{S → aAb, aA → aaAb, A → ε } )
Here,
 S and A are Non-terminal symbols.
 a and b are Terminal symbols.
 ε is an empty string.
 S is the Start symbol, S ∈ N
 Production P : S → aAb, aA → aaAb, A → ε

Production rules:

 S = bR  
 R = aR  
 R = aB   
 B = b  
1. Through this production we can produce some strings like: bab, baab, baaab etc.

2. This production describes the string of shape banab.  

Fig: Forsmal grammar