Comment by vidarh

> A "sufficiently smart" compiler must be capable of fusing the lowering passes straight into a parser.

Given the state of compiler-generation tools (i.e. they're not even viable for generating parsers for production quality compilers), I have little hope of seeing a tool like that in the next couple of decades at least. Probably longer. At least in a form I'll be able to use for anything.

> Ideally, one pass = one language. Nanopass handles it nicely.

That was exactly what I see as a nightmare of a maintenance problem. Even with half a dozen or so variations at most, I find it annoying.