"... The reason I chose to go in the opposite direction, though, was in large part because starting with the syntax tree etc. has been done to death, and a lot

"... The reason I chose to go in the opposite direction, though, was in large part because starting with the syntax tree etc. has been done to death, and a lot of people hit the wall long before getting something that generates a program that can run. ..." If there's any reason to write a compiler that's a good reason. More examples the better.