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Commit | Line | Data |
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6780ca7a DM |
1 | Bison News |
2 | ---------- | |
3af4feb2 | 3 | |
74553c98 AD |
4 | * Changes in version ?.? (????-??-??): |
5 | ||
2055a44e AD |
6 | ** Additional yylex/yyparse arguments |
7 | ||
8 | The new directive %param declare additional argument to both yylex | |
9 | and yyparse. The %lex-param, %parse-param, and %param directive | |
10 | support one or more arguments. Instead of | |
11 | ||
12 | %lex-param {arg1_type *arg1} | |
13 | %lex-param {arg2_type *arg2} | |
14 | %parse-param {arg1_type *arg1} | |
15 | %parse-param {arg2_type *arg2} | |
16 | ||
17 | one may now declare | |
18 | ||
19 | %param {arg1_type *arg1} {arg2_type *arg2} | |
20 | ||
21 | ** Java skeleton improvements | |
0ea583d2 AD |
22 | |
23 | The constants for token names were moved to the Lexer interface. | |
24 | Also, it is possible to add code to the parser's constructors using | |
25 | "%code init" and "%define init_throws". | |
26 | ||
4c6622c2 | 27 | ** Variable api.tokens.prefix |
99c08fb6 | 28 | |
4c6622c2 | 29 | The variable api.tokens.prefix changes the way tokens are identified in |
99c08fb6 AD |
30 | the generated files. This is especially useful to avoid collisions |
31 | with identifiers in the target language. For instance | |
32 | ||
33 | %token FILE for ERROR | |
4c6622c2 | 34 | %define api.tokens.prefix "TOK_" |
99c08fb6 AD |
35 | %% |
36 | start: FILE for ERROR; | |
37 | ||
38 | will generate the definition of the symbols TOK_FILE, TOK_for, and | |
39 | TOK_ERROR in the generated sources. In particular, the scanner must | |
40 | use these prefixed token names, although the grammar itself still | |
41 | uses the short names (as in the sample rule given above). | |
42 | ||
67501061 AD |
43 | ** Variable api.namespace |
44 | ||
45 | The "namespace" variable is renamed "api.namespace". Backward | |
46 | compatibility is ensured, but upgrading is recommended. | |
47 | ||
31b850d2 AD |
48 | ** Variable parse.error |
49 | ||
50 | The variable error controls the verbosity of error messages. The | |
51 | use of the %error-verbose directive is deprecated in favor of | |
52 | %define parse.error "verbose". | |
53 | ||
50cca368 JD |
54 | * Changes in version 2.5 (????-??-??): |
55 | ||
66381412 AR |
56 | ** Named References Support |
57 | ||
58 | Historically, Yacc and Bison have supported positional references | |
59 | ($n, $$) to allow access to symbol values from inside of semantic | |
60 | actions code. | |
61 | ||
62 | Starting from this version, Bison can also accept named references. | |
63 | When no ambiguity is possible, original symbol names may be used | |
64 | as named references: | |
65 | ||
66 | if_stmt : 'if' cond_expr 'then' then_stmt ';' | |
67 | { $if_stmt = mk_if_stmt($cond_expr, $then_stmt); } | |
68 | ||
69 | In the more common case, explicit names may be declared: | |
70 | ||
71 | stmt[res] : 'if' expr[cond] 'then' stmt[then] 'else' stmt[else] ';' | |
72 | { $res = mk_if_stmt($cond, $then, $else); } | |
73 | ||
5b1ff423 | 74 | Location information is also accessible using @name syntax. When |
66381412 AR |
75 | accessing symbol names containing dots or dashes, explicit bracketing |
76 | ($[sym.1]) must be used. | |
77 | ||
5b1ff423 | 78 | These features are experimental in this version. More user feedback |
66381412 AR |
79 | will help to stabilize them. |
80 | ||
eb45ef3b JD |
81 | ** IELR(1) and Canonical LR(1) Support |
82 | ||
83 | IELR(1) is a minimal LR(1) parser table generation algorithm. That | |
84 | is, given any context-free grammar, IELR(1) generates parser tables | |
85 | with the full language recognition power of canonical LR(1) but with | |
86 | nearly the same number of parser states as LALR(1). This reduction in | |
87 | parser states is often an order of magnitude. More importantly, | |
88 | because canonical LR(1)'s extra parser states may contain duplicate | |
89 | conflicts in the case of non-LR(1) grammars, the number of conflicts | |
90 | for IELR(1) is often an order of magnitude less as well. This can | |
91 | significantly reduce the complexity of developing of a grammar. | |
92 | ||
93 | Bison can now generate IELR(1) and canonical LR(1) parser tables in | |
94 | place of its traditional LALR(1) parser tables, which remain the | |
95 | default. You can specify the type of parser tables in the grammar | |
96 | file with these directives: | |
97 | ||
cf499cff JD |
98 | %define lr.type lalr |
99 | %define lr.type ielr | |
100 | %define lr.type canonical-lr | |
eb45ef3b | 101 | |
110ef36a | 102 | The default reduction optimization in the parser tables can also be |
5bab9d08 JD |
103 | adjusted using `%define lr.default-reductions'. See the documentation |
104 | for `%define lr.type' and `%define lr.default-reductions' in the | |
110ef36a JD |
105 | section `Bison Declaration Summary' in the Bison manual for the |
106 | details. | |
eb45ef3b JD |
107 | |
108 | These features are experimental. More user feedback will help to | |
109 | stabilize them. | |
110 | ||
c6abeab1 JD |
111 | ** Unrecognized %code qualifiers are now an error not a warning. |
112 | ||
cf499cff | 113 | ** %define improvements. |
0b6d43c5 | 114 | |
c6abeab1 JD |
115 | *** Unrecognized variables are now an error not a warning. |
116 | ||
cf499cff JD |
117 | *** Multiple invocations for any variable is now an error not a warning. |
118 | ||
119 | *** Can now be invoked via the command line. | |
50cca368 | 120 | |
de5ab940 | 121 | Each of these command-line options |
50cca368 | 122 | |
de5ab940 JD |
123 | -D NAME[=VALUE] |
124 | --define=NAME[=VALUE] | |
125 | ||
126 | -F NAME[=VALUE] | |
127 | --force-define=NAME[=VALUE] | |
50cca368 JD |
128 | |
129 | is equivalent to this grammar file declaration | |
130 | ||
de5ab940 | 131 | %define NAME ["VALUE"] |
50cca368 | 132 | |
de5ab940 JD |
133 | except that the manner in which Bison processes multiple definitions |
134 | for the same NAME differs. Most importantly, -F and --force-define | |
135 | quietly override %define, but -D and --define do not. For further | |
136 | details, see the section "Bison Options" in the Bison manual. | |
50cca368 | 137 | |
cf499cff | 138 | *** Variables renamed. |
67212941 JD |
139 | |
140 | The following %define variables | |
141 | ||
142 | api.push_pull | |
143 | lr.keep_unreachable_states | |
144 | ||
145 | have been renamed to | |
146 | ||
147 | api.push-pull | |
148 | lr.keep-unreachable-states | |
149 | ||
150 | The old names are now deprecated but will be maintained indefinitely | |
151 | for backward compatibility. | |
152 | ||
cf499cff JD |
153 | *** Values no longer need to be quoted in grammar file. |
154 | ||
155 | If a %define value is an identifier, it no longer needs to be placed | |
156 | within quotations marks. For example, | |
157 | ||
158 | %define api.push-pull "push" | |
159 | ||
160 | can be rewritten as | |
161 | ||
162 | %define api.push-pull push | |
163 | ||
164 | ** Symbol names. | |
cdf3f113 AD |
165 | |
166 | Consistently with directives (such as %error-verbose) and variables | |
167 | (e.g. push-pull), symbol names may include dashes in any position, | |
168 | similarly to periods and underscores. This is GNU extension over | |
169 | POSIX Yacc whose use is reported by -Wyacc, and rejected in Yacc | |
170 | mode (--yacc). | |
171 | ||
4395a9ff JD |
172 | ** YYFAIL now produces warnings and Java parsers no longer implement it. |
173 | ||
174 | YYFAIL has existed for many years as an undocumented feature of | |
175 | deterministic parsers in C generated by Bison. More recently, it was | |
176 | a documented feature of Bison's experimental Java parsers. As | |
177 | promised in Bison 2.4.2's NEWS entry, any appearance of YYFAIL in a | |
178 | semantic action now produces a deprecation warning, and Java parsers | |
179 | no longer implement YYFAIL at all. For further details, including a | |
180 | discussion of how to suppress C preprocessor warnings about YYFAIL | |
181 | being unused, see the Bison 2.4.2 NEWS entry. | |
182 | ||
197b82ba JD |
183 | ** Temporary hack for adding a semicolon to the user action. |
184 | ||
185 | Previously, Bison appended a semicolon to every user action for | |
186 | reductions when the output language defaulted to C (specifically, when | |
187 | neither %yacc, %language, %skeleton, or equivalent command-line | |
188 | options were specified). This allowed actions such as | |
189 | ||
190 | exp: exp "+" exp { $$ = $1 + $3 }; | |
191 | ||
192 | instead of | |
193 | ||
194 | exp: exp "+" exp { $$ = $1 + $3; }; | |
195 | ||
196 | As a first step in removing this misfeature, Bison now issues a | |
197 | warning when it appends a semicolon. Moreover, in cases where Bison | |
198 | cannot easily determine whether a semicolon is needed (for example, an | |
199 | action ending with a cpp directive or a braced compound initializer), | |
200 | it no longer appends one. Thus, the C compiler might now complain | |
201 | about a missing semicolon where it did not before. Future releases of | |
202 | Bison will cease to append semicolons entirely. | |
203 | ||
3208e3f4 JD |
204 | ** Character literals not of length one. |
205 | ||
206 | Previously, Bison quietly converted all character literals to length | |
207 | one. For example, without warning, Bison interpreted the operators in | |
208 | the following grammar to be the same token: | |
209 | ||
210 | exp: exp '++' | |
211 | | exp '+' exp | |
212 | ; | |
213 | ||
214 | Bison now warns when a character literal is not of length one. In | |
215 | some future release, Bison will report an error instead. | |
216 | ||
53f036ce JD |
217 | ** Verbose error messages fixed for nonassociative tokens. |
218 | ||
219 | When %error-verbose is specified, syntax error messages produced by | |
220 | the generated parser include the unexpected token as well as a list of | |
221 | expected tokens. Previously, this list erroneously included tokens | |
222 | that would actually induce a syntax error because conflicts for them | |
223 | were resolved with %nonassoc. Such tokens are now properly omitted | |
224 | from the list. | |
225 | ||
df222dfa JD |
226 | ** Destructor calls fixed for lookaheads altered in semantic actions. |
227 | ||
228 | Previously for deterministic parsers in C, if a user semantic action | |
229 | altered yychar, the parser in some cases used the old yychar value to | |
230 | determine which destructor to call for the lookahead upon a syntax | |
231 | error or upon parser return. This bug has been fixed. | |
232 | ||
8b9e021f JD |
233 | * Changes in version 2.4.3 (????-??-??): |
234 | ||
235 | ** Problems with spawning M4 on at least FreeBSD 8 and FreeBSD 9 have | |
236 | been fixed. | |
237 | ||
4ad3921d JD |
238 | ** Failures in the test suite for GCC 4.5 have been fixed. |
239 | ||
06cb07d5 JD |
240 | ** Failures in the test suite for some versions of Sun Studio C++ have |
241 | been fixed. | |
242 | ||
e19a049c | 243 | * Changes in version 2.4.2 (2010-03-20): |
74553c98 | 244 | |
f39ab286 JD |
245 | ** Some portability problems that resulted in failures and livelocks |
246 | in the test suite on some versions of at least Solaris, AIX, HP-UX, | |
e19a049c JD |
247 | RHEL4, and Tru64 have been addressed. As a result, fatal Bison |
248 | errors should no longer cause M4 to report a broken pipe on the | |
f39ab286 JD |
249 | affected platforms. |
250 | ||
8bb3a2e7 JD |
251 | ** `%prec IDENTIFIER' requires IDENTIFIER to be defined separately. |
252 | ||
253 | POSIX specifies that an error be reported for any identifier that does | |
254 | not appear on the LHS of a grammar rule and that is not defined by | |
255 | %token, %left, %right, or %nonassoc. Bison 2.3b and later lost this | |
256 | error report for the case when an identifier appears only after a | |
257 | %prec directive. It is now restored. However, for backward | |
258 | compatibility with recent Bison releases, it is only a warning for | |
259 | now. In Bison 2.5 and later, it will return to being an error. | |
260 | ||
d8911864 EB |
261 | ** Detection of GNU M4 1.4.6 or newer during configure is improved. |
262 | ||
a603c6e0 JD |
263 | ** Warnings from gcc's -Wundef option about undefined YYENABLE_NLS, |
264 | YYLTYPE_IS_TRIVIAL, and __STRICT_ANSI__ in C/C++ parsers are now | |
265 | avoided. | |
c938d650 | 266 | |
98a345a2 JD |
267 | ** %code is now a permanent feature. |
268 | ||
269 | A traditional Yacc prologue directive is written in the form: | |
270 | ||
271 | %{CODE%} | |
272 | ||
273 | To provide a more flexible alternative, Bison 2.3b introduced the | |
274 | %code directive with the following forms for C/C++: | |
275 | ||
276 | %code {CODE} | |
277 | %code requires {CODE} | |
278 | %code provides {CODE} | |
279 | %code top {CODE} | |
280 | ||
281 | These forms are now considered permanent features of Bison. See the | |
282 | %code entries in the section "Bison Declaration Summary" in the Bison | |
283 | manual for a summary of their functionality. See the section | |
284 | "Prologue Alternatives" for a detailed discussion including the | |
285 | advantages of %code over the traditional Yacc prologue directive. | |
286 | ||
287 | Bison's Java feature as a whole including its current usage of %code | |
288 | is still considered experimental. | |
289 | ||
1625df5b JD |
290 | ** YYFAIL is deprecated and will eventually be removed. |
291 | ||
292 | YYFAIL has existed for many years as an undocumented feature of | |
293 | deterministic parsers in C generated by Bison. Previously, it was | |
294 | documented for Bison's experimental Java parsers. YYFAIL is no longer | |
295 | documented for Java parsers and is formally deprecated in both cases. | |
296 | Users are strongly encouraged to migrate to YYERROR, which is | |
297 | specified by POSIX. | |
298 | ||
299 | Like YYERROR, you can invoke YYFAIL from a semantic action in order to | |
300 | induce a syntax error. The most obvious difference from YYERROR is | |
301 | that YYFAIL will automatically invoke yyerror to report the syntax | |
302 | error so that you don't have to. However, there are several other | |
303 | subtle differences between YYERROR and YYFAIL, and YYFAIL suffers from | |
304 | inherent flaws when %error-verbose or `#define YYERROR_VERBOSE' is | |
305 | used. For a more detailed discussion, see: | |
306 | ||
307 | http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/bison-patches/2009-12/msg00024.html | |
308 | ||
309 | The upcoming Bison 2.5 will remove YYFAIL from Java parsers, but | |
310 | deterministic parsers in C will continue to implement it. However, | |
311 | because YYFAIL is already flawed, it seems futile to try to make new | |
312 | Bison features compatible with it. Thus, during parser generation, | |
313 | Bison 2.5 will produce a warning whenever it discovers YYFAIL in a | |
314 | rule action. In a later release, YYFAIL will be disabled for | |
315 | %error-verbose and `#define YYERROR_VERBOSE'. Eventually, YYFAIL will | |
316 | be removed altogether. | |
317 | ||
318 | There exists at least one case where Bison 2.5's YYFAIL warning will | |
319 | be a false positive. Some projects add phony uses of YYFAIL and other | |
320 | Bison-defined macros for the sole purpose of suppressing C | |
321 | preprocessor warnings (from GCC cpp's -Wunused-macros, for example). | |
322 | To avoid Bison's future warning, such YYFAIL uses can be moved to the | |
323 | epilogue (that is, after the second `%%') in the Bison input file. In | |
324 | this release (2.4.2), Bison already generates its own code to suppress | |
325 | C preprocessor warnings for YYFAIL, so projects can remove their own | |
326 | phony uses of YYFAIL if compatibility with Bison releases prior to | |
327 | 2.4.2 is not necessary. | |
328 | ||
2755de8f AD |
329 | ** Internationalization. |
330 | ||
331 | Fix a regression introduced in Bison 2.4: Under some circumstances, | |
332 | message translations were not installed although supported by the | |
333 | host system. | |
334 | ||
74553c98 | 335 | * Changes in version 2.4.1 (2008-12-11): |
c9ba9e59 | 336 | |
0ea583d2 AD |
337 | ** In the GLR defines file, unexpanded M4 macros in the yylval and yylloc |
338 | declarations have been fixed. | |
1979121c | 339 | |
0ea583d2 AD |
340 | ** Temporary hack for adding a semicolon to the user action. |
341 | ||
342 | Bison used to prepend a trailing semicolon at the end of the user | |
343 | action for reductions. This allowed actions such as | |
344 | ||
345 | exp: exp "+" exp { $$ = $1 + $3 }; | |
346 | ||
347 | instead of | |
348 | ||
349 | exp: exp "+" exp { $$ = $1 + $3; }; | |
350 | ||
351 | Some grammars still depend on this `feature'. Bison 2.4.1 restores | |
352 | the previous behavior in the case of C output (specifically, when | |
353 | neither %language or %skeleton or equivalent command-line options | |
354 | are used) to leave more time for grammars depending on the old | |
355 | behavior to be adjusted. Future releases of Bison will disable this | |
356 | feature. | |
357 | ||
358 | ** A few minor improvements to the Bison manual. | |
c9ba9e59 | 359 | |
402b123d | 360 | * Changes in version 2.4 (2008-11-02): |
7bd1665a | 361 | |
402b123d | 362 | ** %language is an experimental feature. |
ed4d67dc JD |
363 | |
364 | We first introduced this feature in test release 2.3b as a cleaner | |
365 | alternative to %skeleton. Since then, we have discussed the possibility of | |
366 | modifying its effect on Bison's output file names. Thus, in this release, | |
367 | we consider %language to be an experimental feature that will likely evolve | |
368 | in future releases. | |
7bd1665a | 369 | |
402b123d | 370 | ** Forward compatibility with GNU M4 has been improved. |
241fda7a | 371 | |
402b123d | 372 | ** Several bugs in the C++ skeleton and the experimental Java skeleton have been |
241fda7a JD |
373 | fixed. |
374 | ||
402b123d | 375 | * Changes in version 2.3b (2008-05-27): |
35fe0834 | 376 | |
402b123d | 377 | ** The quotes around NAME that used to be required in the following directive |
d9df47b6 JD |
378 | are now deprecated: |
379 | ||
380 | %define NAME "VALUE" | |
381 | ||
402b123d | 382 | ** The directive `%pure-parser' is now deprecated in favor of: |
d9df47b6 JD |
383 | |
384 | %define api.pure | |
385 | ||
386 | which has the same effect except that Bison is more careful to warn about | |
387 | unreasonable usage in the latter case. | |
388 | ||
402b123d | 389 | ** Push Parsing |
c373bf8b JD |
390 | |
391 | Bison can now generate an LALR(1) parser in C with a push interface. That | |
ef1b4273 | 392 | is, instead of invoking `yyparse', which pulls tokens from `yylex', you can |
c373bf8b JD |
393 | push one token at a time to the parser using `yypush_parse', which will |
394 | return to the caller after processing each token. By default, the push | |
395 | interface is disabled. Either of the following directives will enable it: | |
396 | ||
397 | %define api.push_pull "push" // Just push; does not require yylex. | |
398 | %define api.push_pull "both" // Push and pull; requires yylex. | |
399 | ||
400 | See the new section `A Push Parser' in the Bison manual for details. | |
401 | ||
59da312b JD |
402 | The current push parsing interface is experimental and may evolve. More user |
403 | feedback will help to stabilize it. | |
404 | ||
402b123d | 405 | ** The -g and --graph options now output graphs in Graphviz DOT format, |
8e55b3aa JD |
406 | not VCG format. Like --graph, -g now also takes an optional FILE argument |
407 | and thus cannot be bundled with other short options. | |
c373bf8b | 408 | |
402b123d | 409 | ** Java |
59da312b JD |
410 | |
411 | Bison can now generate an LALR(1) parser in Java. The skeleton is | |
412 | `data/lalr1.java'. Consider using the new %language directive instead of | |
413 | %skeleton to select it. | |
414 | ||
415 | See the new section `Java Parsers' in the Bison manual for details. | |
416 | ||
417 | The current Java interface is experimental and may evolve. More user | |
418 | feedback will help to stabilize it. | |
419 | ||
402b123d | 420 | ** %language |
59da312b JD |
421 | |
422 | This new directive specifies the programming language of the generated | |
d43f77e7 PB |
423 | parser, which can be C (the default), C++, or Java. Besides the skeleton |
424 | that Bison uses, the directive affects the names of the generated files if | |
425 | the grammar file's name ends in ".y". | |
59da312b | 426 | |
402b123d | 427 | ** XML Automaton Report |
59da312b JD |
428 | |
429 | Bison can now generate an XML report of the LALR(1) automaton using the new | |
430 | `--xml' option. The current XML schema is experimental and may evolve. More | |
431 | user feedback will help to stabilize it. | |
c373bf8b | 432 | |
402b123d | 433 | ** The grammar file may now specify the name of the parser header file using |
c373bf8b JD |
434 | %defines. For example: |
435 | ||
436 | %defines "parser.h" | |
437 | ||
402b123d | 438 | ** When reporting useless rules, useless nonterminals, and unused terminals, |
d80fb37a JD |
439 | Bison now employs the terms "useless in grammar" instead of "useless", |
440 | "useless in parser" instead of "never reduced", and "unused in grammar" | |
441 | instead of "unused". | |
cff03fb2 | 442 | |
402b123d | 443 | ** Unreachable State Removal |
c373bf8b JD |
444 | |
445 | Previously, Bison sometimes generated parser tables containing unreachable | |
31984206 JD |
446 | states. A state can become unreachable during conflict resolution if Bison |
447 | disables a shift action leading to it from a predecessor state. Bison now: | |
75ad86ee JD |
448 | |
449 | 1. Removes unreachable states. | |
450 | ||
451 | 2. Does not report any conflicts that appeared in unreachable states. | |
452 | WARNING: As a result, you may need to update %expect and %expect-rr | |
453 | directives in existing grammar files. | |
454 | ||
455 | 3. For any rule used only in such states, Bison now reports the rule as | |
cff03fb2 | 456 | "useless in parser due to conflicts". |
75ad86ee | 457 | |
31984206 JD |
458 | This feature can be disabled with the following directive: |
459 | ||
460 | %define lr.keep_unreachable_states | |
461 | ||
462 | See the %define entry in the `Bison Declaration Summary' in the Bison manual | |
463 | for further discussion. | |
464 | ||
402b123d | 465 | ** Lookahead Set Correction in the `.output' Report |
b1cc23c4 | 466 | |
c373bf8b | 467 | When instructed to generate a `.output' file including lookahead sets |
88c78747 JD |
468 | (using `--report=lookahead', for example), Bison now prints each reduction's |
469 | lookahead set only next to the associated state's one item that (1) is | |
470 | associated with the same rule as the reduction and (2) has its dot at the end | |
471 | of its RHS. Previously, Bison also erroneously printed the lookahead set | |
472 | next to all of the state's other items associated with the same rule. This | |
473 | bug affected only the `.output' file and not the generated parser source | |
474 | code. | |
475 | ||
402b123d | 476 | ** --report-file=FILE is a new option to override the default `.output' file |
59da312b | 477 | name. |
1bb2bd75 | 478 | |
402b123d | 479 | ** The `=' that used to be required in the following directives is now |
02975b9a JD |
480 | deprecated: |
481 | ||
482 | %file-prefix "parser" | |
483 | %name-prefix "c_" | |
484 | %output "parser.c" | |
485 | ||
402b123d | 486 | ** An Alternative to `%{...%}' -- `%code QUALIFIER {CODE}' |
c373bf8b JD |
487 | |
488 | Bison 2.3a provided a new set of directives as a more flexible alternative to | |
8e0a5e9e JD |
489 | the traditional Yacc prologue blocks. Those have now been consolidated into |
490 | a single %code directive with an optional qualifier field, which identifies | |
491 | the purpose of the code and thus the location(s) where Bison should generate | |
492 | it: | |
493 | ||
16dc6a9e JD |
494 | 1. `%code {CODE}' replaces `%after-header {CODE}' |
495 | 2. `%code requires {CODE}' replaces `%start-header {CODE}' | |
496 | 3. `%code provides {CODE}' replaces `%end-header {CODE}' | |
497 | 4. `%code top {CODE}' replaces `%before-header {CODE}' | |
8e0a5e9e | 498 | |
61fee93e JD |
499 | See the %code entries in section `Bison Declaration Summary' in the Bison |
500 | manual for a summary of the new functionality. See the new section `Prologue | |
8e0a5e9e JD |
501 | Alternatives' for a detailed discussion including the advantages of %code |
502 | over the traditional Yacc prologues. | |
503 | ||
504 | The prologue alternatives are experimental. More user feedback will help to | |
505 | determine whether they should become permanent features. | |
506 | ||
402b123d | 507 | ** Revised warning: unset or unused mid-rule values |
17bd8a73 JD |
508 | |
509 | Since Bison 2.2, Bison has warned about mid-rule values that are set but not | |
510 | used within any of the actions of the parent rule. For example, Bison warns | |
511 | about unused $2 in: | |
512 | ||
513 | exp: '1' { $$ = 1; } '+' exp { $$ = $1 + $4; }; | |
514 | ||
515 | Now, Bison also warns about mid-rule values that are used but not set. For | |
516 | example, Bison warns about unset $$ in the mid-rule action in: | |
517 | ||
518 | exp: '1' { $1 = 1; } '+' exp { $$ = $2 + $4; }; | |
519 | ||
520 | However, Bison now disables both of these warnings by default since they | |
521 | sometimes prove to be false alarms in existing grammars employing the Yacc | |
522 | constructs $0 or $-N (where N is some positive integer). | |
523 | ||
59da312b | 524 | To enable these warnings, specify the option `--warnings=midrule-values' or |
17bd8a73 JD |
525 | `-W', which is a synonym for `--warnings=all'. |
526 | ||
402b123d | 527 | ** Default %destructor or %printer with `<*>' or `<>' |
c373bf8b JD |
528 | |
529 | Bison now recognizes two separate kinds of default %destructor's and | |
12e35840 JD |
530 | %printer's: |
531 | ||
532 | 1. Place `<*>' in a %destructor/%printer symbol list to define a default | |
533 | %destructor/%printer for all grammar symbols for which you have formally | |
534 | declared semantic type tags. | |
535 | ||
3ebecc24 | 536 | 2. Place `<>' in a %destructor/%printer symbol list to define a default |
12e35840 JD |
537 | %destructor/%printer for all grammar symbols without declared semantic |
538 | type tags. | |
539 | ||
540 | Bison no longer supports the `%symbol-default' notation from Bison 2.3a. | |
3ebecc24 | 541 | `<*>' and `<>' combined achieve the same effect with one exception: Bison no |
12e35840 JD |
542 | longer applies any %destructor to a mid-rule value if that mid-rule value is |
543 | not actually ever referenced using either $$ or $n in a semantic action. | |
544 | ||
85894313 JD |
545 | The default %destructor's and %printer's are experimental. More user |
546 | feedback will help to determine whether they should become permanent | |
547 | features. | |
548 | ||
12e35840 JD |
549 | See the section `Freeing Discarded Symbols' in the Bison manual for further |
550 | details. | |
551 | ||
402b123d | 552 | ** %left, %right, and %nonassoc can now declare token numbers. This is required |
ab7f29f8 JD |
553 | by POSIX. However, see the end of section `Operator Precedence' in the Bison |
554 | manual for a caveat concerning the treatment of literal strings. | |
555 | ||
402b123d | 556 | ** The nonfunctional --no-parser, -n, and %no-parser options have been |
b1cc23c4 JD |
557 | completely removed from Bison. |
558 | ||
402b123d | 559 | * Changes in version 2.3a, 2006-09-13: |
742e4900 | 560 | |
402b123d | 561 | ** Instead of %union, you can define and use your own union type |
ddc8ede1 PE |
562 | YYSTYPE if your grammar contains at least one <type> tag. |
563 | Your YYSTYPE need not be a macro; it can be a typedef. | |
564 | This change is for compatibility with other Yacc implementations, | |
565 | and is required by POSIX. | |
566 | ||
402b123d | 567 | ** Locations columns and lines start at 1. |
cd48d21d AD |
568 | In accordance with the GNU Coding Standards and Emacs. |
569 | ||
402b123d | 570 | ** You may now declare per-type and default %destructor's and %printer's: |
ec5479ce JD |
571 | |
572 | For example: | |
573 | ||
b2a0b7ca JD |
574 | %union { char *string; } |
575 | %token <string> STRING1 | |
576 | %token <string> STRING2 | |
577 | %type <string> string1 | |
578 | %type <string> string2 | |
579 | %union { char character; } | |
580 | %token <character> CHR | |
581 | %type <character> chr | |
582 | %destructor { free ($$); } %symbol-default | |
583 | %destructor { free ($$); printf ("%d", @$.first_line); } STRING1 string1 | |
584 | %destructor { } <character> | |
585 | ||
586 | guarantees that, when the parser discards any user-defined symbol that has a | |
587 | semantic type tag other than `<character>', it passes its semantic value to | |
588 | `free'. However, when the parser discards a `STRING1' or a `string1', it | |
589 | also prints its line number to `stdout'. It performs only the second | |
590 | `%destructor' in this case, so it invokes `free' only once. | |
ec5479ce | 591 | |
85894313 JD |
592 | [Although we failed to mention this here in the 2.3a release, the default |
593 | %destructor's and %printer's were experimental, and they were rewritten in | |
594 | future versions.] | |
595 | ||
402b123d | 596 | ** Except for LALR(1) parsers in C with POSIX Yacc emulation enabled (with `-y', |
b931235e JD |
597 | `--yacc', or `%yacc'), Bison no longer generates #define statements for |
598 | associating token numbers with token names. Removing the #define statements | |
599 | helps to sanitize the global namespace during preprocessing, but POSIX Yacc | |
600 | requires them. Bison still generates an enum for token names in all cases. | |
601 | ||
402b123d | 602 | ** Handling of traditional Yacc prologue blocks is now more consistent but |
34f98f46 | 603 | potentially incompatible with previous releases of Bison. |
9bc0dd67 JD |
604 | |
605 | As before, you declare prologue blocks in your grammar file with the | |
606 | `%{ ... %}' syntax. To generate the pre-prologue, Bison concatenates all | |
34f98f46 JD |
607 | prologue blocks that you've declared before the first %union. To generate |
608 | the post-prologue, Bison concatenates all prologue blocks that you've | |
ddc8ede1 | 609 | declared after the first %union. |
9bc0dd67 | 610 | |
34f98f46 | 611 | Previous releases of Bison inserted the pre-prologue into both the header |
9bc0dd67 JD |
612 | file and the code file in all cases except for LALR(1) parsers in C. In the |
613 | latter case, Bison inserted it only into the code file. For parsers in C++, | |
614 | the point of insertion was before any token definitions (which associate | |
615 | token numbers with names). For parsers in C, the point of insertion was | |
616 | after the token definitions. | |
617 | ||
618 | Now, Bison never inserts the pre-prologue into the header file. In the code | |
619 | file, it always inserts it before the token definitions. | |
620 | ||
402b123d | 621 | ** Bison now provides a more flexible alternative to the traditional Yacc |
34f98f46 JD |
622 | prologue blocks: %before-header, %start-header, %end-header, and |
623 | %after-header. | |
624 | ||
625 | For example, the following declaration order in the grammar file reflects the | |
626 | order in which Bison will output these code blocks. However, you are free to | |
627 | declare these code blocks in your grammar file in whatever order is most | |
628 | convenient for you: | |
629 | ||
630 | %before-header { | |
631 | /* Bison treats this block like a pre-prologue block: it inserts it into | |
632 | * the code file before the contents of the header file. It does *not* | |
633 | * insert it into the header file. This is a good place to put | |
634 | * #include's that you want at the top of your code file. A common | |
635 | * example is `#include "system.h"'. */ | |
636 | } | |
637 | %start-header { | |
638 | /* Bison inserts this block into both the header file and the code file. | |
639 | * In both files, the point of insertion is before any Bison-generated | |
640 | * token, semantic type, location type, and class definitions. This is a | |
641 | * good place to define %union dependencies, for example. */ | |
9bc0dd67 JD |
642 | } |
643 | %union { | |
34f98f46 JD |
644 | /* Unlike the traditional Yacc prologue blocks, the output order for the |
645 | * new %*-header blocks is not affected by their declaration position | |
646 | * relative to any %union in the grammar file. */ | |
9bc0dd67 | 647 | } |
34f98f46 JD |
648 | %end-header { |
649 | /* Bison inserts this block into both the header file and the code file. | |
650 | * In both files, the point of insertion is after the Bison-generated | |
651 | * definitions. This is a good place to declare or define public | |
652 | * functions or data structures that depend on the Bison-generated | |
653 | * definitions. */ | |
9bc0dd67 | 654 | } |
34f98f46 JD |
655 | %after-header { |
656 | /* Bison treats this block like a post-prologue block: it inserts it into | |
657 | * the code file after the contents of the header file. It does *not* | |
658 | * insert it into the header file. This is a good place to declare or | |
659 | * define internal functions or data structures that depend on the | |
660 | * Bison-generated definitions. */ | |
661 | } | |
662 | ||
663 | If you have multiple occurrences of any one of the above declarations, Bison | |
664 | will concatenate the contents in declaration order. | |
9bc0dd67 | 665 | |
85894313 JD |
666 | [Although we failed to mention this here in the 2.3a release, the prologue |
667 | alternatives were experimental, and they were rewritten in future versions.] | |
668 | ||
402b123d | 669 | ** The option `--report=look-ahead' has been changed to `--report=lookahead'. |
9e6e7ed2 PE |
670 | The old spelling still works, but is not documented and may be removed |
671 | in a future release. | |
742e4900 | 672 | |
402b123d | 673 | * Changes in version 2.3, 2006-06-05: |
4ad3ed84 | 674 | |
402b123d | 675 | ** GLR grammars should now use `YYRECOVERING ()' instead of `YYRECOVERING', |
4ad3ed84 PE |
676 | for compatibility with LALR(1) grammars. |
677 | ||
402b123d | 678 | ** It is now documented that any definition of YYSTYPE or YYLTYPE should |
4ad3ed84 PE |
679 | be to a type name that does not contain parentheses or brackets. |
680 | ||
402b123d | 681 | * Changes in version 2.2, 2006-05-19: |
193d7c70 | 682 | |
402b123d | 683 | ** The distribution terms for all Bison-generated parsers now permit |
193d7c70 PE |
684 | using the parsers in nonfree programs. Previously, this permission |
685 | was granted only for Bison-generated LALR(1) parsers in C. | |
5f4236a0 | 686 | |
402b123d | 687 | ** %name-prefix changes the namespace name in C++ outputs. |
aa08666d | 688 | |
402b123d | 689 | ** The C++ parsers export their token_type. |
5f4236a0 | 690 | |
402b123d | 691 | ** Bison now allows multiple %union declarations, and concatenates |
d6ca7905 PE |
692 | their contents together. |
693 | ||
402b123d | 694 | ** New warning: unused values |
4d7bc38c PE |
695 | Right-hand side symbols whose values are not used are reported, |
696 | if the symbols have destructors. For instance: | |
affac613 | 697 | |
8f3596a6 | 698 | exp: exp "?" exp ":" exp { $1 ? $1 : $3; } |
721be13c PE |
699 | | exp "+" exp |
700 | ; | |
affac613 | 701 | |
8f3596a6 AD |
702 | will trigger a warning about $$ and $5 in the first rule, and $3 in |
703 | the second ($1 is copied to $$ by the default rule). This example | |
4e26c69e | 704 | most likely contains three errors, and could be rewritten as: |
affac613 | 705 | |
4e26c69e PE |
706 | exp: exp "?" exp ":" exp |
707 | { $$ = $1 ? $3 : $5; free ($1 ? $5 : $3); free ($1); } | |
708 | | exp "+" exp | |
709 | { $$ = $1 ? $1 : $3; if ($1) free ($3); } | |
721be13c | 710 | ; |
affac613 | 711 | |
4e26c69e PE |
712 | However, if the original actions were really intended, memory leaks |
713 | and all, the warnings can be suppressed by letting Bison believe the | |
714 | values are used, e.g.: | |
721be13c | 715 | |
8f3596a6 | 716 | exp: exp "?" exp ":" exp { $1 ? $1 : $3; (void) ($$, $5); } |
721be13c PE |
717 | | exp "+" exp { $$ = $1; (void) $3; } |
718 | ; | |
719 | ||
84866159 AD |
720 | If there are mid-rule actions, the warning is issued if no action |
721 | uses it. The following triggers no warning: $1 and $3 are used. | |
722 | ||
723 | exp: exp { push ($1); } '+' exp { push ($3); sum (); }; | |
724 | ||
721be13c PE |
725 | The warning is intended to help catching lost values and memory leaks. |
726 | If a value is ignored, its associated memory typically is not reclaimed. | |
affac613 | 727 | |
402b123d | 728 | ** %destructor vs. YYABORT, YYACCEPT, and YYERROR. |
9d9b8b70 PE |
729 | Destructors are now called when user code invokes YYABORT, YYACCEPT, |
730 | and YYERROR, for all objects on the stack, other than objects | |
731 | corresponding to the right-hand side of the current rule. | |
a85284cf | 732 | |
402b123d | 733 | ** %expect, %expect-rr |
035aa4a0 PE |
734 | Incorrect numbers of expected conflicts are now actual errors, |
735 | instead of warnings. | |
736 | ||
402b123d | 737 | ** GLR, YACC parsers. |
4e26c69e PE |
738 | The %parse-params are available in the destructors (and the |
739 | experimental printers) as per the documentation. | |
4b367315 | 740 | |
402b123d | 741 | ** Bison now warns if it finds a stray `$' or `@' in an action. |
ad6a9b97 | 742 | |
402b123d | 743 | ** %require "VERSION" |
4e26c69e PE |
744 | This specifies that the grammar file depends on features implemented |
745 | in Bison version VERSION or higher. | |
b50d2359 | 746 | |
402b123d | 747 | ** lalr1.cc: The token and value types are now class members. |
e14d0ab6 AD |
748 | The tokens were defined as free form enums and cpp macros. YYSTYPE |
749 | was defined as a free form union. They are now class members: | |
fb9712a9 AD |
750 | tokens are enumerations of the `yy::parser::token' struct, and the |
751 | semantic values have the `yy::parser::semantic_type' type. | |
752 | ||
753 | If you do not want or can update to this scheme, the directive | |
754 | `%define "global_tokens_and_yystype" "1"' triggers the global | |
b50d2359 AD |
755 | definition of tokens and YYSTYPE. This change is suitable both |
756 | for previous releases of Bison, and this one. | |
fb9712a9 | 757 | |
b50d2359 | 758 | If you wish to update, then make sure older version of Bison will |
ab8d9dc5 | 759 | fail using `%require "2.2"'. |
fb9712a9 | 760 | |
402b123d | 761 | ** DJGPP support added. |
193d7c70 | 762 | \f |
402b123d | 763 | * Changes in version 2.1, 2005-09-16: |
1ce59070 | 764 | |
402b123d | 765 | ** The C++ lalr1.cc skeleton supports %lex-param. |
e14d0ab6 | 766 | |
402b123d | 767 | ** Bison-generated parsers now support the translation of diagnostics like |
baf785db PE |
768 | "syntax error" into languages other than English. The default |
769 | language is still English. For details, please see the new | |
0410a6e0 PE |
770 | Internationalization section of the Bison manual. Software |
771 | distributors should also see the new PACKAGING file. Thanks to | |
772 | Bruno Haible for this new feature. | |
1ce59070 | 773 | |
402b123d | 774 | ** Wording in the Bison-generated parsers has been changed slightly to |
1a059451 PE |
775 | simplify translation. In particular, the message "memory exhausted" |
776 | has replaced "parser stack overflow", as the old message was not | |
777 | always accurate for modern Bison-generated parsers. | |
778 | ||
402b123d | 779 | ** Destructors are now called when the parser aborts, for all symbols left |
258b75ca PE |
780 | behind on the stack. Also, the start symbol is now destroyed after a |
781 | successful parse. In both cases, the behavior was formerly inconsistent. | |
782 | ||
402b123d | 783 | ** When generating verbose diagnostics, Bison-generated parsers no longer |
72f000b0 PE |
784 | quote the literal strings associated with tokens. For example, for |
785 | a syntax error associated with '%token NUM "number"' they might | |
786 | print 'syntax error, unexpected number' instead of 'syntax error, | |
787 | unexpected "number"'. | |
193d7c70 | 788 | \f |
402b123d | 789 | * Changes in version 2.0, 2004-12-25: |
efeed023 | 790 | |
402b123d | 791 | ** Possibly-incompatible changes |
d7e14fc0 | 792 | |
82de6b0d PE |
793 | - Bison-generated parsers no longer default to using the alloca function |
794 | (when available) to extend the parser stack, due to widespread | |
795 | problems in unchecked stack-overflow detection. You can "#define | |
796 | YYSTACK_USE_ALLOCA 1" to require the use of alloca, but please read | |
797 | the manual to determine safe values for YYMAXDEPTH in that case. | |
8dd162d3 | 798 | |
82de6b0d PE |
799 | - Error token location. |
800 | During error recovery, the location of the syntax error is updated | |
801 | to cover the whole sequence covered by the error token: it includes | |
802 | the shifted symbols thrown away during the first part of the error | |
803 | recovery, and the lookahead rejected during the second part. | |
18d192f0 | 804 | |
82de6b0d PE |
805 | - Semicolon changes: |
806 | . Stray semicolons are no longer allowed at the start of a grammar. | |
807 | . Semicolons are now required after in-grammar declarations. | |
e342c3be | 808 | |
82de6b0d PE |
809 | - Unescaped newlines are no longer allowed in character constants or |
810 | string literals. They were never portable, and GCC 3.4.0 has | |
811 | dropped support for them. Better diagnostics are now generated if | |
812 | forget a closing quote. | |
8dd162d3 | 813 | |
82de6b0d | 814 | - NUL bytes are no longer allowed in Bison string literals, unfortunately. |
f74b6f91 | 815 | |
402b123d | 816 | ** New features |
1452af69 | 817 | |
82de6b0d | 818 | - GLR grammars now support locations. |
4febdd96 | 819 | |
82de6b0d PE |
820 | - New directive: %initial-action. |
821 | This directive allows the user to run arbitrary code (including | |
822 | initializing @$) from yyparse before parsing starts. | |
1452af69 | 823 | |
82de6b0d PE |
824 | - A new directive "%expect-rr N" specifies the expected number of |
825 | reduce/reduce conflicts in GLR parsers. | |
1452af69 | 826 | |
82de6b0d PE |
827 | - %token numbers can now be hexadecimal integers, e.g., `%token FOO 0x12d'. |
828 | This is a GNU extension. | |
4febdd96 | 829 | |
82de6b0d | 830 | - The option `--report=lookahead' was changed to `--report=look-ahead'. |
9e6e7ed2 | 831 | [However, this was changed back after 2.3.] |
1452af69 | 832 | |
82de6b0d | 833 | - Experimental %destructor support has been added to lalr1.cc. |
1452af69 | 834 | |
82de6b0d PE |
835 | - New configure option --disable-yacc, to disable installation of the |
836 | yacc command and -ly library introduced in 1.875 for POSIX conformance. | |
6040d338 | 837 | |
402b123d | 838 | ** Bug fixes |
d5a3fe37 | 839 | |
82de6b0d PE |
840 | - For now, %expect-count violations are now just warnings, not errors. |
841 | This is for compatibility with Bison 1.75 and earlier (when there are | |
842 | reduce/reduce conflicts) and with Bison 1.30 and earlier (when there | |
843 | are too many or too few shift/reduce conflicts). However, in future | |
844 | versions of Bison we plan to improve the %expect machinery so that | |
845 | these violations will become errors again. | |
3473d0f8 | 846 | |
82de6b0d PE |
847 | - Within Bison itself, numbers (e.g., goto numbers) are no longer |
848 | arbitrarily limited to 16-bit counts. | |
d600ee67 | 849 | |
82de6b0d | 850 | - Semicolons are now allowed before "|" in grammar rules, as POSIX requires. |
d600ee67 | 851 | \f |
402b123d | 852 | * Changes in version 1.875, 2003-01-01: |
963fcc17 | 853 | |
402b123d | 854 | ** The documentation license has been upgraded to version 1.2 |
dc546b0f | 855 | of the GNU Free Documentation License. |
75eb3bc4 | 856 | |
402b123d | 857 | ** syntax error processing |
75eb3bc4 | 858 | |
dc546b0f PE |
859 | - In Yacc-style parsers YYLLOC_DEFAULT is now used to compute error |
860 | locations too. This fixes bugs in error-location computation. | |
75eb3bc4 | 861 | |
dc546b0f PE |
862 | - %destructor |
863 | It is now possible to reclaim the memory associated to symbols | |
864 | discarded during error recovery. This feature is still experimental. | |
20daca06 | 865 | |
dc546b0f PE |
866 | - %error-verbose |
867 | This new directive is preferred over YYERROR_VERBOSE. | |
74724a70 | 868 | |
dc546b0f PE |
869 | - #defining yyerror to steal internal variables is discouraged. |
870 | It is not guaranteed to work forever. | |
d1de5372 | 871 | |
402b123d | 872 | ** POSIX conformance |
d1de5372 | 873 | |
dc546b0f PE |
874 | - Semicolons are once again optional at the end of grammar rules. |
875 | This reverts to the behavior of Bison 1.33 and earlier, and improves | |
876 | compatibility with Yacc. | |
74724a70 | 877 | |
dc546b0f PE |
878 | - `parse error' -> `syntax error' |
879 | Bison now uniformly uses the term `syntax error'; formerly, the code | |
880 | and manual sometimes used the term `parse error' instead. POSIX | |
881 | requires `syntax error' in diagnostics, and it was thought better to | |
882 | be consistent. | |
74724a70 | 883 | |
dc546b0f PE |
884 | - The documentation now emphasizes that yylex and yyerror must be |
885 | declared before use. C99 requires this. | |
d1de5372 | 886 | |
dc546b0f PE |
887 | - Bison now parses C99 lexical constructs like UCNs and |
888 | backslash-newline within C escape sequences, as POSIX 1003.1-2001 requires. | |
d1de5372 | 889 | |
dc546b0f PE |
890 | - File names are properly escaped in C output. E.g., foo\bar.y is |
891 | output as "foo\\bar.y". | |
6780ca7a | 892 | |
dc546b0f PE |
893 | - Yacc command and library now available |
894 | The Bison distribution now installs a `yacc' command, as POSIX requires. | |
895 | Also, Bison now installs a small library liby.a containing | |
896 | implementations of Yacc-compatible yyerror and main functions. | |
897 | This library is normally not useful, but POSIX requires it. | |
6e649e65 | 898 | |
dc546b0f | 899 | - Type clashes now generate warnings, not errors. |
6e649e65 | 900 | |
dc546b0f PE |
901 | - If the user does not define YYSTYPE as a macro, Bison now declares it |
902 | using typedef instead of defining it as a macro. | |
903 | For consistency, YYLTYPE is also declared instead of defined. | |
9501dc6e | 904 | |
402b123d | 905 | ** Other compatibility issues |
886a425c | 906 | |
dc546b0f PE |
907 | - %union directives can now have a tag before the `{', e.g., the |
908 | directive `%union foo {...}' now generates the C code | |
909 | `typedef union foo { ... } YYSTYPE;'; this is for Yacc compatibility. | |
910 | The default union tag is `YYSTYPE', for compatibility with Solaris 9 Yacc. | |
911 | For consistency, YYLTYPE's struct tag is now `YYLTYPE' not `yyltype'. | |
912 | This is for compatibility with both Yacc and Bison 1.35. | |
72f889cc | 913 | |
dc546b0f PE |
914 | - `;' is output before the terminating `}' of an action, for |
915 | compatibility with Bison 1.35. | |
886a425c | 916 | |
dc546b0f PE |
917 | - Bison now uses a Yacc-style format for conflict reports, e.g., |
918 | `conflicts: 2 shift/reduce, 1 reduce/reduce'. | |
437c2d80 | 919 | |
dc546b0f PE |
920 | - `yystype' and `yyltype' are now obsolescent macros instead of being |
921 | typedefs or tags; they are no longer documented and are planned to be | |
922 | withdrawn in a future release. | |
2a8d363a | 923 | |
402b123d | 924 | ** GLR parser notes |
2a8d363a | 925 | |
dc546b0f PE |
926 | - GLR and inline |
927 | Users of Bison have to decide how they handle the portability of the | |
928 | C keyword `inline'. | |
959e5f51 | 929 | |
dc546b0f PE |
930 | - `parsing stack overflow...' -> `parser stack overflow' |
931 | GLR parsers now report `parser stack overflow' as per the Bison manual. | |
900c5db5 | 932 | |
402b123d | 933 | ** Bison now warns if it detects conflicting outputs to the same file, |
dc546b0f PE |
934 | e.g., it generates a warning for `bison -d -o foo.h foo.y' since |
935 | that command outputs both code and header to foo.h. | |
6e40b4eb | 936 | |
402b123d | 937 | ** #line in output files |
dc546b0f | 938 | - --no-line works properly. |
6e40b4eb | 939 | |
402b123d | 940 | ** Bison can no longer be built by a K&R C compiler; it requires C89 or |
6e40b4eb AD |
941 | later to be built. This change originally took place a few versions |
942 | ago, but nobody noticed until we recently asked someone to try | |
943 | building Bison with a K&R C compiler. | |
d600ee67 | 944 | \f |
402b123d | 945 | * Changes in version 1.75, 2002-10-14: |
7933f2b5 | 946 | |
402b123d | 947 | ** Bison should now work on 64-bit hosts. |
7933f2b5 | 948 | |
402b123d | 949 | ** Indonesian translation thanks to Tedi Heriyanto. |
7933f2b5 | 950 | |
402b123d | 951 | ** GLR parsers |
f50adbbd AD |
952 | Fix spurious parse errors. |
953 | ||
402b123d | 954 | ** Pure parsers |
f50adbbd AD |
955 | Some people redefine yyerror to steal yyparse' private variables. |
956 | Reenable this trick until an official feature replaces it. | |
957 | ||
402b123d | 958 | ** Type Clashes |
d90c934c AD |
959 | In agreement with POSIX and with other Yaccs, leaving a default |
960 | action is valid when $$ is untyped, and $1 typed: | |
961 | ||
962 | untyped: ... typed; | |
963 | ||
964 | but the converse remains an error: | |
965 | ||
966 | typed: ... untyped; | |
967 | ||
402b123d | 968 | ** Values of mid-rule actions |
d90c934c AD |
969 | The following code: |
970 | ||
971 | foo: { ... } { $$ = $1; } ... | |
972 | ||
973 | was incorrectly rejected: $1 is defined in the second mid-rule | |
974 | action, and is equal to the $$ of the first mid-rule action. | |
d600ee67 | 975 | \f |
402b123d | 976 | * Changes in version 1.50, 2002-10-04: |
adc8c848 | 977 | |
402b123d | 978 | ** GLR parsing |
676385e2 PH |
979 | The declaration |
980 | %glr-parser | |
981 | causes Bison to produce a Generalized LR (GLR) parser, capable of handling | |
982 | almost any context-free grammar, ambiguous or not. The new declarations | |
e8832397 | 983 | %dprec and %merge on grammar rules allow parse-time resolution of |
676385e2 PH |
984 | ambiguities. Contributed by Paul Hilfinger. |
985 | ||
7933f2b5 | 986 | Unfortunately Bison 1.50 does not work properly on 64-bit hosts |
420f93c8 PE |
987 | like the Alpha, so please stick to 32-bit hosts for now. |
988 | ||
402b123d | 989 | ** Output Directory |
8c165d89 | 990 | When not in Yacc compatibility mode, when the output file was not |
e88dbdbf | 991 | specified, running `bison foo/bar.y' created `foo/bar.c'. It |
8c165d89 AD |
992 | now creates `bar.c'. |
993 | ||
402b123d | 994 | ** Undefined token |
007a50a4 | 995 | The undefined token was systematically mapped to 2 which prevented |
e88dbdbf | 996 | the use of 2 by the user. This is no longer the case. |
007a50a4 | 997 | |
402b123d | 998 | ** Unknown token numbers |
e88dbdbf | 999 | If yylex returned an out of range value, yyparse could die. This is |
007a50a4 AD |
1000 | no longer the case. |
1001 | ||
402b123d | 1002 | ** Error token |
e88dbdbf | 1003 | According to POSIX, the error token must be 256. |
23c5a174 AD |
1004 | Bison extends this requirement by making it a preference: *if* the |
1005 | user specified that one of her tokens is numbered 256, then error | |
1006 | will be mapped onto another number. | |
1007 | ||
402b123d | 1008 | ** Verbose error messages |
e88dbdbf | 1009 | They no longer report `..., expecting error or...' for states where |
217598da AD |
1010 | error recovery is possible. |
1011 | ||
402b123d | 1012 | ** End token |
217598da AD |
1013 | Defaults to `$end' instead of `$'. |
1014 | ||
402b123d | 1015 | ** Error recovery now conforms to documentation and to POSIX |
68cd8af3 PE |
1016 | When a Bison-generated parser encounters a syntax error, it now pops |
1017 | the stack until it finds a state that allows shifting the error | |
1018 | token. Formerly, it popped the stack until it found a state that | |
1019 | allowed some non-error action other than a default reduction on the | |
1020 | error token. The new behavior has long been the documented behavior, | |
1021 | and has long been required by POSIX. For more details, please see | |
337116ba PE |
1022 | Paul Eggert, "Reductions during Bison error handling" (2002-05-20) |
1023 | <http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/bug-bison/2002-05/msg00038.html>. | |
68cd8af3 | 1024 | |
402b123d | 1025 | ** Traces |
5504898e AD |
1026 | Popped tokens and nonterminals are now reported. |
1027 | ||
402b123d | 1028 | ** Larger grammars |
a861a339 PE |
1029 | Larger grammars are now supported (larger token numbers, larger grammar |
1030 | size (= sum of the LHS and RHS lengths), larger LALR tables). | |
1031 | Formerly, many of these numbers ran afoul of 16-bit limits; | |
1032 | now these limits are 32 bits on most hosts. | |
355e7c1c | 1033 | |
402b123d | 1034 | ** Explicit initial rule |
643a5994 AD |
1035 | Bison used to play hacks with the initial rule, which the user does |
1036 | not write. It is now explicit, and visible in the reports and | |
1037 | graphs as rule 0. | |
23c5a174 | 1038 | |
402b123d | 1039 | ** Useless rules |
643a5994 | 1040 | Before, Bison reported the useless rules, but, although not used, |
77714df2 | 1041 | included them in the parsers. They are now actually removed. |
23c5a174 | 1042 | |
402b123d | 1043 | ** Useless rules, useless nonterminals |
6b98e4b5 AD |
1044 | They are now reported, as a warning, with their locations. |
1045 | ||
402b123d | 1046 | ** Rules never reduced |
e8832397 AD |
1047 | Rules that can never be reduced because of conflicts are now |
1048 | reported. | |
1049 | ||
402b123d | 1050 | ** Incorrect `Token not used' |
11652ab3 AD |
1051 | On a grammar such as |
1052 | ||
1053 | %token useless useful | |
1054 | %% | |
1055 | exp: '0' %prec useful; | |
1056 | ||
1057 | where a token was used to set the precedence of the last rule, | |
1058 | bison reported both `useful' and `useless' as useless tokens. | |
1059 | ||
402b123d | 1060 | ** Revert the C++ namespace changes introduced in 1.31 |
77714df2 | 1061 | as they caused too many portability hassles. |
0179dd65 | 1062 | |
402b123d | 1063 | ** Default locations |
b2d52318 AD |
1064 | By an accident of design, the default computation of @$ was |
1065 | performed after another default computation was performed: @$ = @1. | |
1066 | The latter is now removed: YYLLOC_DEFAULT is fully responsible of | |
1067 | the computation of @$. | |
adc8c848 | 1068 | |
402b123d | 1069 | ** Token end-of-file |
b7c49edf AD |
1070 | The token end of file may be specified by the user, in which case, |
1071 | the user symbol is used in the reports, the graphs, and the verbose | |
a861a339 | 1072 | error messages instead of `$end', which remains being the default. |
b7c49edf | 1073 | For instance |
7bd6c77e | 1074 | %token MYEOF 0 |
b7c49edf | 1075 | or |
7bd6c77e | 1076 | %token MYEOF 0 "end of file" |
fdbcd8e2 | 1077 | |
402b123d | 1078 | ** Semantic parser |
fdbcd8e2 AD |
1079 | This old option, which has been broken for ages, is removed. |
1080 | ||
402b123d | 1081 | ** New translations |
a861a339 | 1082 | Brazilian Portuguese, thanks to Alexandre Folle de Menezes. |
84614e13 AD |
1083 | Croatian, thanks to Denis Lackovic. |
1084 | ||
402b123d | 1085 | ** Incorrect token definitions |
e88dbdbf | 1086 | When given `%token 'a' "A"', Bison used to output `#define 'a' 65'. |
b87f8b21 | 1087 | |
402b123d | 1088 | ** Token definitions as enums |
77714df2 AD |
1089 | Tokens are output both as the traditional #define's, and, provided |
1090 | the compiler supports ANSI C or is a C++ compiler, as enums. | |
e88dbdbf | 1091 | This lets debuggers display names instead of integers. |
77714df2 | 1092 | |
402b123d | 1093 | ** Reports |
ec3bc396 AD |
1094 | In addition to --verbose, bison supports --report=THINGS, which |
1095 | produces additional information: | |
b408954b AD |
1096 | - itemset |
1097 | complete the core item sets with their closure | |
9e6e7ed2 PE |
1098 | - lookahead [changed to `look-ahead' in 1.875e through 2.3, but changed back] |
1099 | explicitly associate lookahead tokens to items | |
b408954b AD |
1100 | - solved |
1101 | describe shift/reduce conflicts solving. | |
1102 | Bison used to systematically output this information on top of | |
1103 | the report. Solved conflicts are now attached to their states. | |
ec3bc396 | 1104 | |
402b123d | 1105 | ** Type clashes |
9af3fbce AD |
1106 | Previous versions don't complain when there is a type clash on |
1107 | the default action if the rule has a mid-rule action, such as in: | |
1108 | ||
1109 | %type <foo> bar | |
1110 | %% | |
1111 | bar: '0' {} '0'; | |
1112 | ||
1113 | This is fixed. | |
a861a339 | 1114 | |
402b123d | 1115 | ** GNU M4 is now required when using Bison. |
f987e9d2 | 1116 | \f |
402b123d | 1117 | * Changes in version 1.35, 2002-03-25: |
76551463 | 1118 | |
402b123d | 1119 | ** C Skeleton |
76551463 AD |
1120 | Some projects use Bison's C parser with C++ compilers, and define |
1121 | YYSTYPE as a class. The recent adjustment of C parsers for data | |
1122 | alignment and 64 bit architectures made this impossible. | |
1123 | ||
1124 | Because for the time being no real solution for C++ parser | |
1125 | generation exists, kludges were implemented in the parser to | |
1126 | maintain this use. In the future, when Bison has C++ parsers, this | |
1127 | kludge will be disabled. | |
1128 | ||
1129 | This kludge also addresses some C++ problems when the stack was | |
1130 | extended. | |
76551463 | 1131 | \f |
402b123d | 1132 | * Changes in version 1.34, 2002-03-12: |
76551463 | 1133 | |
402b123d | 1134 | ** File name clashes are detected |
76551463 AD |
1135 | $ bison foo.y -d -o foo.x |
1136 | fatal error: header and parser would both be named `foo.x' | |
1137 | ||
402b123d | 1138 | ** A missing `;' at the end of a rule triggers a warning |
76551463 AD |
1139 | In accordance with POSIX, and in agreement with other |
1140 | Yacc implementations, Bison will mandate this semicolon in the near | |
1141 | future. This eases the implementation of a Bison parser of Bison | |
1142 | grammars by making this grammar LALR(1) instead of LR(2). To | |
1143 | facilitate the transition, this release introduces a warning. | |
1144 | ||
402b123d | 1145 | ** Revert the C++ namespace changes introduced in 1.31, as they caused too |
76551463 AD |
1146 | many portability hassles. |
1147 | ||
402b123d | 1148 | ** DJGPP support added. |
76551463 | 1149 | |
402b123d | 1150 | ** Fix test suite portability problems. |
76551463 | 1151 | \f |
402b123d | 1152 | * Changes in version 1.33, 2002-02-07: |
76551463 | 1153 | |
402b123d | 1154 | ** Fix C++ issues |
76551463 AD |
1155 | Groff could not be compiled for the definition of size_t was lacking |
1156 | under some conditions. | |
1157 | ||
402b123d | 1158 | ** Catch invalid @n |
76551463 AD |
1159 | As is done with $n. |
1160 | \f | |
402b123d | 1161 | * Changes in version 1.32, 2002-01-23: |
76551463 | 1162 | |
402b123d | 1163 | ** Fix Yacc output file names |
76551463 | 1164 | |
402b123d | 1165 | ** Portability fixes |
76551463 | 1166 | |
402b123d | 1167 | ** Italian, Dutch translations |
76551463 | 1168 | \f |
402b123d | 1169 | * Changes in version 1.31, 2002-01-14: |
52d1aeee | 1170 | |
402b123d | 1171 | ** Many Bug Fixes |
52d1aeee | 1172 | |
402b123d | 1173 | ** GNU Gettext and %expect |
52d1aeee MA |
1174 | GNU Gettext asserts 10 s/r conflicts, but there are 7. Now that |
1175 | Bison dies on incorrect %expectations, we fear there will be | |
1176 | too many bug reports for Gettext, so _for the time being_, %expect | |
1177 | does not trigger an error when the input file is named `plural.y'. | |
1178 | ||
402b123d | 1179 | ** Use of alloca in parsers |
52d1aeee MA |
1180 | If YYSTACK_USE_ALLOCA is defined to 0, then the parsers will use |
1181 | malloc exclusively. Since 1.29, but was not NEWS'ed. | |
1182 | ||
1183 | alloca is used only when compiled with GCC, to avoid portability | |
1184 | problems as on AIX. | |
1185 | ||
402b123d | 1186 | ** yyparse now returns 2 if memory is exhausted; formerly it dumped core. |
b47dbebe | 1187 | |
402b123d | 1188 | ** When the generated parser lacks debugging code, YYDEBUG is now 0 |
52d1aeee MA |
1189 | (as POSIX requires) instead of being undefined. |
1190 | ||
402b123d | 1191 | ** User Actions |
52d1aeee MA |
1192 | Bison has always permitted actions such as { $$ = $1 }: it adds the |
1193 | ending semicolon. Now if in Yacc compatibility mode, the semicolon | |
1194 | is no longer output: one has to write { $$ = $1; }. | |
1195 | ||
402b123d | 1196 | ** Better C++ compliance |
52d1aeee | 1197 | The output parsers try to respect C++ namespaces. |
76551463 | 1198 | [This turned out to be a failed experiment, and it was reverted later.] |
52d1aeee | 1199 | |
402b123d | 1200 | ** Reduced Grammars |
52d1aeee MA |
1201 | Fixed bugs when reporting useless nonterminals. |
1202 | ||
402b123d | 1203 | ** 64 bit hosts |
52d1aeee MA |
1204 | The parsers work properly on 64 bit hosts. |
1205 | ||
402b123d | 1206 | ** Error messages |
52d1aeee MA |
1207 | Some calls to strerror resulted in scrambled or missing error messages. |
1208 | ||
402b123d | 1209 | ** %expect |
52d1aeee MA |
1210 | When the number of shift/reduce conflicts is correct, don't issue |
1211 | any warning. | |
1212 | ||
402b123d | 1213 | ** The verbose report includes the rule line numbers. |
52d1aeee | 1214 | |
402b123d | 1215 | ** Rule line numbers are fixed in traces. |
52d1aeee | 1216 | |
402b123d | 1217 | ** Swedish translation |
52d1aeee | 1218 | |
402b123d | 1219 | ** Parse errors |
52d1aeee MA |
1220 | Verbose parse error messages from the parsers are better looking. |
1221 | Before: parse error: unexpected `'/'', expecting `"number"' or `'-'' or `'('' | |
1222 | Now: parse error: unexpected '/', expecting "number" or '-' or '(' | |
1223 | ||
402b123d | 1224 | ** Fixed parser memory leaks. |
52d1aeee MA |
1225 | When the generated parser was using malloc to extend its stacks, the |
1226 | previous allocations were not freed. | |
1227 | ||
402b123d | 1228 | ** Fixed verbose output file. |
52d1aeee MA |
1229 | Some newlines were missing. |
1230 | Some conflicts in state descriptions were missing. | |
1231 | ||
402b123d | 1232 | ** Fixed conflict report. |
52d1aeee MA |
1233 | Option -v was needed to get the result. |
1234 | ||
402b123d | 1235 | ** %expect |
52d1aeee MA |
1236 | Was not used. |
1237 | Mismatches are errors, not warnings. | |
1238 | ||
402b123d | 1239 | ** Fixed incorrect processing of some invalid input. |
52d1aeee | 1240 | |
402b123d | 1241 | ** Fixed CPP guards: 9foo.h uses BISON_9FOO_H instead of 9FOO_H. |
52d1aeee | 1242 | |
402b123d | 1243 | ** Fixed some typos in the documentation. |
52d1aeee | 1244 | |
402b123d | 1245 | ** %token MY_EOF 0 is supported. |
52d1aeee MA |
1246 | Before, MY_EOF was silently renumbered as 257. |
1247 | ||
402b123d | 1248 | ** doc/refcard.tex is updated. |
52d1aeee | 1249 | |
402b123d | 1250 | ** %output, %file-prefix, %name-prefix. |
52d1aeee MA |
1251 | New. |
1252 | ||
402b123d | 1253 | ** --output |
52d1aeee MA |
1254 | New, aliasing `--output-file'. |
1255 | \f | |
402b123d | 1256 | * Changes in version 1.30, 2001-10-26: |
342b8b6e | 1257 | |
402b123d | 1258 | ** `--defines' and `--graph' have now an optional argument which is the |
fdac0091 | 1259 | output file name. `-d' and `-g' do not change; they do not take any |
342b8b6e AD |
1260 | argument. |
1261 | ||
402b123d | 1262 | ** `%source_extension' and `%header_extension' are removed, failed |
342b8b6e AD |
1263 | experiment. |
1264 | ||
402b123d | 1265 | ** Portability fixes. |
f987e9d2 | 1266 | \f |
402b123d | 1267 | * Changes in version 1.29, 2001-09-07: |
342b8b6e | 1268 | |
402b123d | 1269 | ** The output file does not define const, as this caused problems when used |
342b8b6e AD |
1270 | with common autoconfiguration schemes. If you still use ancient compilers |
1271 | that lack const, compile with the equivalent of the C compiler option | |
1272 | `-Dconst='. autoconf's AC_C_CONST macro provides one way to do this. | |
1273 | ||
402b123d | 1274 | ** Added `-g' and `--graph'. |
f87a2205 | 1275 | |
402b123d | 1276 | ** The Bison manual is now distributed under the terms of the GNU FDL. |
f2b5126e | 1277 | |
402b123d | 1278 | ** The input and the output files has automatically a similar extension. |
234a3be3 | 1279 | |
402b123d | 1280 | ** Russian translation added. |
f87a2205 | 1281 | |
402b123d | 1282 | ** NLS support updated; should hopefully be less troublesome. |
f87a2205 | 1283 | |
402b123d | 1284 | ** Added the old Bison reference card. |
c33638bb | 1285 | |
402b123d | 1286 | ** Added `--locations' and `%locations'. |
6deb4447 | 1287 | |
402b123d | 1288 | ** Added `-S' and `--skeleton'. |
cd5bd6ac | 1289 | |
402b123d | 1290 | ** `%raw', `-r', `--raw' is disabled. |
62ab6972 | 1291 | |
402b123d | 1292 | ** Special characters are escaped when output. This solves the problems |
cd5bd6ac AD |
1293 | of the #line lines with path names including backslashes. |
1294 | ||
402b123d | 1295 | ** New directives. |
4ecbf796 MA |
1296 | `%yacc', `%fixed_output_files', `%defines', `%no_parser', `%verbose', |
1297 | `%debug', `%source_extension' and `%header_extension'. | |
f987e9d2 | 1298 | |
402b123d | 1299 | ** @$ |
f987e9d2 | 1300 | Automatic location tracking. |
f87a2205 | 1301 | \f |
402b123d | 1302 | * Changes in version 1.28, 1999-07-06: |
d2e00347 | 1303 | |
402b123d | 1304 | ** Should compile better now with K&R compilers. |
d2e00347 | 1305 | |
402b123d | 1306 | ** Added NLS. |
d2e00347 | 1307 | |
402b123d | 1308 | ** Fixed a problem with escaping the double quote character. |
d2e00347 | 1309 | |
402b123d | 1310 | ** There is now a FAQ. |
d2e00347 | 1311 | \f |
402b123d | 1312 | * Changes in version 1.27: |
5c31c3c2 | 1313 | |
402b123d | 1314 | ** The make rule which prevented bison.simple from being created on |
5c31c3c2 JT |
1315 | some systems has been fixed. |
1316 | \f | |
402b123d | 1317 | * Changes in version 1.26: |
4be07551 | 1318 | |
402b123d | 1319 | ** Bison now uses automake. |
4be07551 | 1320 | |
402b123d | 1321 | ** New mailing lists: <bug-bison@gnu.org> and <help-bison@gnu.org>. |
4be07551 | 1322 | |
402b123d | 1323 | ** Token numbers now start at 257 as previously documented, not 258. |
4be07551 | 1324 | |
402b123d | 1325 | ** Bison honors the TMPDIR environment variable. |
4be07551 | 1326 | |
402b123d | 1327 | ** A couple of buffer overruns have been fixed. |
f51dbca1 | 1328 | |
402b123d | 1329 | ** Problems when closing files should now be reported. |
f51dbca1 | 1330 | |
402b123d | 1331 | ** Generated parsers should now work even on operating systems which do |
f51dbca1 | 1332 | not provide alloca(). |
4be07551 | 1333 | \f |
402b123d | 1334 | * Changes in version 1.25, 1995-10-16: |
df8878c5 | 1335 | |
402b123d | 1336 | ** Errors in the input grammar are not fatal; Bison keeps reading |
df8878c5 | 1337 | the grammar file, and reports all the errors found in it. |
8c44d3ec | 1338 | |
402b123d | 1339 | ** Tokens can now be specified as multiple-character strings: for |
df8878c5 RS |
1340 | example, you could use "<=" for a token which looks like <=, instead |
1341 | of chosing a name like LESSEQ. | |
1342 | ||
402b123d | 1343 | ** The %token_table declaration says to write a table of tokens (names |
df8878c5 RS |
1344 | and numbers) into the parser file. The yylex function can use this |
1345 | table to recognize multiple-character string tokens, or for other | |
1346 | purposes. | |
1347 | ||
402b123d | 1348 | ** The %no_lines declaration says not to generate any #line preprocessor |
df8878c5 RS |
1349 | directives in the parser file. |
1350 | ||
402b123d | 1351 | ** The %raw declaration says to use internal Bison token numbers, not |
df8878c5 RS |
1352 | Yacc-compatible token numbers, when token names are defined as macros. |
1353 | ||
402b123d | 1354 | ** The --no-parser option produces the parser tables without including |
df8878c5 RS |
1355 | the parser engine; a project can now use its own parser engine. |
1356 | The actions go into a separate file called NAME.act, in the form of | |
1357 | a switch statement body. | |
1358 | \f | |
402b123d | 1359 | * Changes in version 1.23: |
6780ca7a | 1360 | |
4d019228 DM |
1361 | The user can define YYPARSE_PARAM as the name of an argument to be |
1362 | passed into yyparse. The argument should have type void *. It should | |
1363 | actually point to an object. Grammar actions can access the variable | |
1364 | by casting it to the proper pointer type. | |
6780ca7a | 1365 | |
6780ca7a | 1366 | Line numbers in output file corrected. |
6780ca7a | 1367 | \f |
402b123d | 1368 | * Changes in version 1.22: |
6780ca7a DM |
1369 | |
1370 | --help option added. | |
6780ca7a | 1371 | \f |
402b123d | 1372 | * Changes in version 1.20: |
6780ca7a DM |
1373 | |
1374 | Output file does not redefine const for C++. | |
9f4503d6 AD |
1375 | |
1376 | Local Variables: | |
1377 | mode: outline | |
1378 | End: | |
76551463 AD |
1379 | |
1380 | ----- | |
1381 | ||
e141f4d4 | 1382 | Copyright (C) 1995-2010 Free Software Foundation, Inc. |
76551463 | 1383 | |
74553c98 | 1384 | This file is part of Bison, the GNU Parser Generator. |
76551463 | 1385 | |
f16b0819 | 1386 | This program is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify |
76551463 | 1387 | it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by |
f16b0819 PE |
1388 | the Free Software Foundation, either version 3 of the License, or |
1389 | (at your option) any later version. | |
76551463 | 1390 | |
f16b0819 | 1391 | This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, |
76551463 AD |
1392 | but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of |
1393 | MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the | |
1394 | GNU General Public License for more details. | |
1395 | ||
1396 | You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License | |
f16b0819 | 1397 | along with this program. If not, see <http://www.gnu.org/licenses/>. |