Nobody here has mentioned language workbench tools, the best of which is probably Jetbrains MPS: https://www.jetbrains.com/mps/ https://www.jetbrains.com/mps/

Nobody here has mentioned language workbench tools, the best of which is probably Jetbrains MPS: https://www.jetbrains.com/mps/ https://www.jetbrains.com/mps/ These language workbench tools make it easy to switch between graphical and textual representations. Also you get intelligent IDE support and typechecking for free. The primary alternatives to MPS are Xtext and Microsoft's language workbench (formerly known as Intentional Software, Microsoft just bought them).