[ckok]

I fully agree. I wrote my elements compilers this way. Slowly from a tokenizer, parser up to .net backend, Java backend. Bit by bit. The only way to learn is by doing.

I'd even go as far as saying the literature on the subject is overrated or out of date.

And not everything is set in stone. Not all compilers have a single symbol table. Sometimes it makes sense to have a type/global table and local table, and check the current class scope on the fly. Sometimes not. It doesn't really.

Abstraction doesn't make sense until you actually have multiple implementations. And you might have rewritten it four times by then.

My advice like above. Just start writing