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ed7658fe 1GNU Bison NEWS
3af4feb2 2
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3* Noteworthy changes in release ?.? (????-??-??) [?]
4
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5** Bug fixes
6
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7*** %define api.value.type union with %defines
8
9 The yacc.c and glr.c parsers were broken when %defines was used
10 together with "%define api.value.type union".
11
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12*** Redeclarations are reported in proper order
13
14 On
15
16 %token FOO "foo"
17 %printer {} "foo"
18 %printer {} FOO
19
20 bison used to report:
21
22 /tmp/foo.yy:2.10-11: error: %printer redeclaration for FOO
23 %printer {} "foo"
24 ^^
25 /tmp/foo.yy:3.10-11: previous declaration
26 %printer {} FOO
27 ^^
28
29 Now, the "previous" declaration is always the first one.
30
0bd5ee5f 31
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32** Documentation
33
34 Bison now installs various files in its docdir (which defaults to
35 '/usr/local/share/doc/bison'), including the three fully blown examples
36 extracted from the documentation:
37
38 - rpcalc
39 Reverse polish calculator, a simple introductory example.
40 - mfcalc
41 Multi-function Calc, a calculator with memory and functions and located
42 error messages.
43 - calc++
44 a calculator in C++ using variant support and token constructors.
45
a3efd13e 46* Noteworthy changes in release 3.0.2 (2013-12-05) [stable]
6d94eebb 47
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48** Bug fixes
49
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50*** Generated source files when errors are reported
51
52 When warnings are issued and -Werror is set, bison would still generate
53 the source files (*.c, *.h...). As a consequence, some runs of "make"
54 could fail the first time, but not the second (as the files were generated
55 anyway).
56
57 This is fixed: bison no longer generates this source files, but, of
58 course, still produces the various reports (*.output, *.xml, etc.).
59
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60*** %empty is used in reports
61
62 Empty right-hand sides are denoted by '%empty' in all the reports (text,
63 dot, XML and formats derived from it).
64
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65*** YYERROR and variants
66
67 When C++ variant support is enabled, an error triggered via YYERROR, but
68 not caught via error recovery, resulted in a double deletion.
6d94eebb 69
c2ecada3 70* Noteworthy changes in release 3.0.1 (2013-11-12) [stable]
e386b50f 71
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72** Bug fixes
73
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74*** Errors in caret diagnostics
75
76 On some platforms, some errors could result in endless diagnostics.
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77
78*** Fixes of the -Werror option
79
80 Options such as "-Werror -Wno-error=foo" were still turning "foo"
81 diagnostics into errors instead of warnings. This is fixed.
82
83 Actually, for consistency with GCC, "-Wno-error=foo -Werror" now also
84 leaves "foo" diagnostics as warnings. Similarly, with "-Werror=foo
85 -Wno-error", "foo" diagnostics are now errors.
e386b50f 86
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87*** GLR Predicates
88
89 As demonstrated in the documentation, one can now leave spaces between
90 "%?" and its "{".
91
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92*** Installation
93
94 The yacc.1 man page is no longer installed if --disable-yacc was
95 specified.
96
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97*** Fixes in the test suite
98
99 Bugs and portability issues.
100
534497f5 101* Noteworthy changes in release 3.0 (2013-07-25) [stable]
facb910c 102
8458a411 103** WARNING: Future backward-incompatibilities!
597afd73 104
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105 Like other GNU packages, Bison will start using some of the C99 features
106 for its own code, especially the definition of variables after statements.
107 The generated C parsers still aim at C90.
108
8458a411 109** Backward incompatible changes
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110
111*** Obsolete features
112
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113 Support for YYFAIL is removed (deprecated in Bison 2.4.2): use YYERROR.
114
115 Support for yystype and yyltype is removed (deprecated in Bison 1.875):
116 use YYSTYPE and YYLTYPE.
117
118 Support for YYLEX_PARAM and YYPARSE_PARAM is removed (deprecated in Bison
119 1.875): use %lex-param, %parse-param, or %param.
47db7ed1 120
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121 Missing semicolons at the end of actions are no longer added (as announced
122 in the release 2.5).
123
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124*** Use of YACC='bison -y'
125
126 TL;DR: With Autoconf <= 2.69, pass -Wno-yacc to (AM_)YFLAGS if you use
127 Bison extensions.
128
129 Traditional Yacc generates 'y.tab.c' whatever the name of the input file.
130 Therefore Makefiles written for Yacc expect 'y.tab.c' (and possibly
131 'y.tab.h' and 'y.outout') to be generated from 'foo.y'.
132
133 To this end, for ages, AC_PROG_YACC, Autoconf's macro to look for an
134 implementation of Yacc, was using Bison as 'bison -y'. While it does
135 ensure compatible output file names, it also enables warnings for
136 incompatibilities with POSIX Yacc. In other words, 'bison -y' triggers
137 warnings for Bison extensions.
138
139 Autoconf 2.70+ fixes this incompatibility by using YACC='bison -o y.tab.c'
140 (which also generates 'y.tab.h' and 'y.output' when needed).
141 Alternatively, disable Yacc warnings by passing '-Wno-yacc' to your Yacc
142 flags (YFLAGS, or AM_YFLAGS with Automake).
143
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144** Bug fixes
145
c21e515e 146*** The epilogue is no longer affected by internal #defines (glr.c)
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147
148 The glr.c skeleton uses defines such as #define yylval (yystackp->yyval) in
149 generated code. These weren't properly undefined before the inclusion of
150 the user epilogue, so functions such as the following were butchered by the
151 preprocessor expansion:
152
153 int yylex (YYSTYPE *yylval);
154
6c7022f7 155 This is fixed: yylval, yynerrs, yychar, and yylloc are now valid
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156 identifiers for user-provided variables.
157
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158*** stdio.h is no longer needed when locations are enabled (yacc.c)
159
160 Changes in Bison 2.7 introduced a dependency on FILE and fprintf when
161 locations are enabled. This is fixed.
162
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163*** Warnings about useless %pure-parser/%define api.pure are restored
164
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165** Diagnostics reported by Bison
166
167 Most of these features were contributed by Théophile Ranquet and Victor
168 Santet.
73370a9d 169
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170*** Carets
171
172 Version 2.7 introduced caret errors, for a prettier output. These are now
173 activated by default. The old format can still be used by invoking Bison
174 with -fno-caret (or -fnone).
175
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176 Some error messages that reproduced excerpts of the grammar are now using
177 the caret information only. For instance on:
178
179 %%
180 exp: 'a' | 'a';
181
182 Bison 2.7 reports:
183
184 in.y: warning: 1 reduce/reduce conflict [-Wconflicts-rr]
185 in.y:2.12-14: warning: rule useless in parser due to conflicts: exp: 'a' [-Wother]
186
187 Now bison reports:
188
189 in.y: warning: 1 reduce/reduce conflict [-Wconflicts-rr]
190 in.y:2.12-14: warning: rule useless in parser due to conflicts [-Wother]
191 exp: 'a' | 'a';
192 ^^^
193
194 and "bison -fno-caret" reports:
195
196 in.y: warning: 1 reduce/reduce conflict [-Wconflicts-rr]
197 in.y:2.12-14: warning: rule useless in parser due to conflicts [-Wother]
198
1048a1c9 199*** Enhancements of the -Werror option
518e8830 200
1048a1c9 201 The -Werror=CATEGORY option is now recognized, and will treat specified
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202 warnings as errors. The warnings need not have been explicitly activated
203 using the -W option, this is similar to what GCC 4.7 does.
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204
205 For example, given the following command line, Bison will treat both
d949eefd 206 warnings related to POSIX Yacc incompatibilities and S/R conflicts as
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207 errors (and only those):
208
209 $ bison -Werror=yacc,error=conflicts-sr input.y
210
211 If no categories are specified, -Werror will make all active warnings into
212 errors. For example, the following line does the same the previous example:
213
214 $ bison -Werror -Wnone -Wyacc -Wconflicts-sr input.y
215
216 (By default -Wconflicts-sr,conflicts-rr,deprecated,other is enabled.)
217
218 Note that the categories in this -Werror option may not be prefixed with
219 "no-". However, -Wno-error[=CATEGORY] is valid.
220
221 Note that -y enables -Werror=yacc. Therefore it is now possible to require
222 Yacc-like behavior (e.g., always generate y.tab.c), but to report
223 incompatibilities as warnings: "-y -Wno-error=yacc".
518e8830 224
46bdb8ec 225*** The display of warnings is now richer
73370a9d 226
46bdb8ec 227 The option that controls a given warning is now displayed:
73370a9d 228
46bdb8ec 229 foo.y:4.6: warning: type clash on default action: <foo> != <bar> [-Wother]
73370a9d 230
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231 In the case of warnings treated as errors, the prefix is changed from
232 "warning: " to "error: ", and the suffix is displayed, in a manner similar
d949eefd 233 to GCC, as [-Werror=CATEGORY].
1048a1c9 234
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235 For instance, where the previous version of Bison would report (and exit
236 with failure):
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237
238 bison: warnings being treated as errors
46bdb8ec 239 input.y:1.1: warning: stray ',' treated as white space
1048a1c9 240
46bdb8ec 241 it now reports:
1048a1c9 242
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243 input.y:1.1: error: stray ',' treated as white space [-Werror=other]
244
245*** Deprecated constructs
246
247 The new 'deprecated' warning category flags obsolete constructs whose
248 support will be discontinued. It is enabled by default. These warnings
249 used to be reported as 'other' warnings.
250
73370a9d 251*** Useless semantic types
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252
253 Bison now warns about useless (uninhabited) semantic types. Since
254 semantic types are not declared to Bison (they are defined in the opaque
255 %union structure), it is %printer/%destructor directives about useless
256 types that trigger the warning:
257
258 %token <type1> term
259 %type <type2> nterm
260 %printer {} <type1> <type3>
261 %destructor {} <type2> <type4>
262 %%
263 nterm: term { $$ = $1; };
264
265 3.28-34: warning: type <type3> is used, but is not associated to any symbol
266 4.28-34: warning: type <type4> is used, but is not associated to any symbol
267
31557b9e 268*** Undefined but unused symbols
b921d92f 269
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270 Bison used to raise an error for undefined symbols that are not used in
271 the grammar. This is now only a warning.
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272
273 %printer {} symbol1
274 %destructor {} symbol2
31557b9e 275 %type <type> symbol3
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276 %%
277 exp: "a";
278
73370a9d 279*** Useless destructors or printers
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280
281 Bison now warns about useless destructors or printers. In the following
282 example, the printer for <type1>, and the destructor for <type2> are
283 useless: all symbols of <type1> (token1) already have a printer, and all
284 symbols of type <type2> (token2) already have a destructor.
285
286 %token <type1> token1
287 <type2> token2
288 <type3> token3
289 <type4> token4
290 %printer {} token1 <type1> <type3>
291 %destructor {} token2 <type2> <type4>
292
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293*** Conflicts
294
295 The warnings and error messages about shift/reduce and reduce/reduce
296 conflicts have been normalized. For instance on the following foo.y file:
297
298 %glr-parser
299 %%
300 exp: exp '+' exp | '0' | '0';
301
302 compare the previous version of bison:
303
304 $ bison foo.y
305 foo.y: conflicts: 1 shift/reduce, 2 reduce/reduce
306 $ bison -Werror foo.y
307 bison: warnings being treated as errors
308 foo.y: conflicts: 1 shift/reduce, 2 reduce/reduce
309
310 with the new behavior:
311
312 $ bison foo.y
313 foo.y: warning: 1 shift/reduce conflict [-Wconflicts-sr]
314 foo.y: warning: 2 reduce/reduce conflicts [-Wconflicts-rr]
315 $ bison -Werror foo.y
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316 foo.y: error: 1 shift/reduce conflict [-Werror=conflicts-sr]
317 foo.y: error: 2 reduce/reduce conflicts [-Werror=conflicts-rr]
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318
319 When %expect or %expect-rr is used, such as with bar.y:
320
321 %expect 0
322 %glr-parser
323 %%
324 exp: exp '+' exp | '0' | '0';
325
326 Former behavior:
327
328 $ bison bar.y
329 bar.y: conflicts: 1 shift/reduce, 2 reduce/reduce
330 bar.y: expected 0 shift/reduce conflicts
331 bar.y: expected 0 reduce/reduce conflicts
332
333 New one:
334
335 $ bison bar.y
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336 bar.y: error: shift/reduce conflicts: 1 found, 0 expected
337 bar.y: error: reduce/reduce conflicts: 2 found, 0 expected
d87ea54c 338
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339** Incompatibilities with POSIX Yacc
340
341 The 'yacc' category is no longer part of '-Wall', enable it explicitly
342 with '-Wyacc'.
343
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344** Additional yylex/yyparse arguments
345
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346 The new directive %param declares additional arguments to both yylex and
347 yyparse. The %lex-param, %parse-param, and %param directives support one
348 or more arguments. Instead of
2055a44e 349
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350 %lex-param {arg1_type *arg1}
351 %lex-param {arg2_type *arg2}
352 %parse-param {arg1_type *arg1}
353 %parse-param {arg2_type *arg2}
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354
355 one may now declare
356
e436fa67 357 %param {arg1_type *arg1} {arg2_type *arg2}
2055a44e 358
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359** Types of values for %define variables
360
361 Bison used to make no difference between '%define foo bar' and '%define
362 foo "bar"'. The former is now called a 'keyword value', and the latter a
363 'string value'. A third kind was added: 'code values', such as '%define
364 foo {bar}'.
365
366 Keyword variables are used for fixed value sets, e.g.,
367
368 %define lr.type lalr
369
370 Code variables are used for value in the target language, e.g.,
371
372 %define api.value.type {struct semantic_type}
373
374 String variables are used remaining cases, e.g. file names.
375
2a6b66c5 376** Variable api.token.prefix
99c08fb6 377
2a6b66c5 378 The variable api.token.prefix changes the way tokens are identified in
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379 the generated files. This is especially useful to avoid collisions
380 with identifiers in the target language. For instance
381
e436fa67 382 %token FILE for ERROR
630a0218 383 %define api.token.prefix {TOK_}
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384 %%
385 start: FILE for ERROR;
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386
387 will generate the definition of the symbols TOK_FILE, TOK_for, and
388 TOK_ERROR in the generated sources. In particular, the scanner must
389 use these prefixed token names, although the grammar itself still
390 uses the short names (as in the sample rule given above).
391
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392** Variable api.value.type
393
394 This new %define variable supersedes the #define macro YYSTYPE. The use
395 of YYSTYPE is discouraged. In particular, #defining YYSTYPE *and* either
396 using %union or %defining api.value.type results in undefined behavior.
397
398 Either define api.value.type, or use "%union":
399
400 %union
401 {
402 int ival;
403 char *sval;
404 }
405 %token <ival> INT "integer"
406 %token <sval> STRING "string"
407 %printer { fprintf (yyo, "%d", $$); } <ival>
408 %destructor { free ($$); } <sval>
409
410 /* In yylex(). */
411 yylval.ival = 42; return INT;
412 yylval.sval = "42"; return STRING;
413
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414 The %define variable api.value.type supports both keyword and code values.
415
416 The keyword value 'union' means that the user provides genuine types, not
435575cb 417 union member names such as "ival" and "sval" above (WARNING: will fail if
1fa19a76 418 -y/--yacc/%yacc is enabled).
6574576c 419
435575cb 420 %define api.value.type union
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421 %token <int> INT "integer"
422 %token <char *> STRING "string"
423 %printer { fprintf (yyo, "%d", $$); } <int>
424 %destructor { free ($$); } <char *>
425
426 /* In yylex(). */
427 yylval.INT = 42; return INT;
428 yylval.STRING = "42"; return STRING;
429
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430 The keyword value variant is somewhat equivalent, but for C++ special
431 provision is made to allow classes to be used (more about this below).
6574576c 432
435575cb 433 %define api.value.type variant
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434 %token <int> INT "integer"
435 %token <std::string> STRING "string"
436
630a0218 437 Code values (in braces) denote user defined types. This is where YYSTYPE
435575cb 438 used to be used.
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439
440 %code requires
441 {
442 struct my_value
443 {
444 enum
445 {
446 is_int, is_string
447 } kind;
448 union
449 {
450 int ival;
451 char *sval;
452 } u;
453 };
454 }
435575cb 455 %define api.value.type {struct my_value}
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456 %token <u.ival> INT "integer"
457 %token <u.sval> STRING "string"
458 %printer { fprintf (yyo, "%d", $$); } <u.ival>
459 %destructor { free ($$); } <u.sval>
460
461 /* In yylex(). */
462 yylval.u.ival = 42; return INT;
463 yylval.u.sval = "42"; return STRING;
464
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465** Variable parse.error
466
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467 This variable controls the verbosity of error messages. The use of the
468 %error-verbose directive is deprecated in favor of "%define parse.error
469 verbose".
31b850d2 470
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471** Renamed %define variables
472
473 The following variables have been renamed for consistency. Backward
474 compatibility is ensured, but upgrading is recommended.
475
476 lr.default-reductions -> lr.default-reduction
477 lr.keep-unreachable-states -> lr.keep-unreachable-state
478 namespace -> api.namespace
479 stype -> api.value.type
480
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481** Semantic predicates
482
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483 Contributed by Paul Hilfinger.
484
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485 The new, experimental, semantic-predicate feature allows actions of the
486 form "%?{ BOOLEAN-EXPRESSION }", which cause syntax errors (as for
ca2a6d15 487 YYERROR) if the expression evaluates to 0, and are evaluated immediately
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488 in GLR parsers, rather than being deferred. The result is that they allow
489 the programmer to prune possible parses based on the values of run-time
490 expressions.
ca2a6d15 491
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492** The directive %expect-rr is now an error in non GLR mode
493
494 It used to be an error only if used in non GLR mode, _and_ if there are
495 reduce/reduce conflicts.
496
5202b6ac 497** Tokens are numbered in their order of appearance
93561c21 498
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499 Contributed by Valentin Tolmer.
500
501 With '%token A B', A had a number less than the one of B. However,
502 precedence declarations used to generate a reversed order. This is now
503 fixed, and introducing tokens with any of %token, %left, %right,
504 %precedence, or %nonassoc yields the same result.
505
506 When mixing declarations of tokens with a litteral character (e.g., 'a')
507 or with an identifier (e.g., B) in a precedence declaration, Bison
508 numbered the litteral characters first. For example
509
510 %right A B 'c' 'd'
511
512 would lead to the tokens declared in this order: 'c' 'd' A B. Again, the
513 input order is now preserved.
514
515 These changes were made so that one can remove useless precedence and
516 associativity declarations (i.e., map %nonassoc, %left or %right to
517 %precedence, or to %token) and get exactly the same output.
93561c21 518
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519** Useless precedence and associativity
520
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521 Contributed by Valentin Tolmer.
522
1282c124 523 When developing and maintaining a grammar, useless associativity and
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524 precedence directives are common. They can be a nuisance: new ambiguities
525 arising are sometimes masked because their conflicts are resolved due to
526 the extra precedence or associativity information. Furthermore, it can
527 hinder the comprehension of a new grammar: one will wonder about the role
528 of a precedence, where in fact it is useless. The following changes aim
529 at detecting and reporting these extra directives.
530
531*** Precedence warning category
532
533 A new category of warning, -Wprecedence, was introduced. It flags the
534 useless precedence and associativity directives.
535
536*** Useless associativity
537
538 Bison now warns about symbols with a declared associativity that is never
539 used to resolve conflicts. In that case, using %precedence is sufficient;
540 the parsing tables will remain unchanged. Solving these warnings may raise
541 useless precedence warnings, as the symbols no longer have associativity.
542 For example:
543
544 %left '+'
545 %left '*'
546 %%
547 exp:
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548 "number"
549 | exp '+' "number"
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550 | exp '*' exp
551 ;
552
553 will produce a
554
555 warning: useless associativity for '+', use %precedence [-Wprecedence]
556 %left '+'
557 ^^^
558
559*** Useless precedence
560
561 Bison now warns about symbols with a declared precedence and no declared
562 associativity (i.e., declared with %precedence), and whose precedence is
563 never used. In that case, the symbol can be safely declared with %token
564 instead, without modifying the parsing tables. For example:
565
566 %precedence '='
567 %%
1282c124 568 exp: "var" '=' "number";
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569
570 will produce a
571
572 warning: useless precedence for '=' [-Wprecedence]
573 %precedence '='
574 ^^^
575
576*** Useless precedence and associativity
577
578 In case of both useless precedence and associativity, the issue is flagged
579 as follows:
580
581 %nonassoc '='
582 %%
1282c124 583 exp: "var" '=' "number";
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584
585 The warning is:
586
587 warning: useless precedence and associativity for '=' [-Wprecedence]
588 %nonassoc '='
589 ^^^
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590
591** Empty rules
592
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593 With help from Joel E. Denny and Gabriel Rassoul.
594
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595 Empty rules (i.e., with an empty right-hand side) can now be explicitly
596 marked by the new %empty directive. Using %empty on a non-empty rule is
597 an error. The new -Wempty-rule warning reports empty rules without
598 %empty. On the following grammar:
599
600 %%
601 s: a b c;
602 a: ;
603 b: %empty;
604 c: 'a' %empty;
605
606 bison reports:
607
608 3.4-5: warning: empty rule without %empty [-Wempty-rule]
609 a: {}
610 ^^
611 5.8-13: error: %empty on non-empty rule
612 c: 'a' %empty {};
613 ^^^^^^
cc2235ac 614
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615** Java skeleton improvements
616
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617 The constants for token names were moved to the Lexer interface. Also, it
618 is possible to add code to the parser's constructors using "%code init"
619 and "%define init_throws".
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620 Contributed by Paolo Bonzini.
621
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622 The Java skeleton now supports push parsing.
623 Contributed by Dennis Heimbigner.
624
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625** C++ skeletons improvements
626
627*** The parser header is no longer mandatory (lalr1.cc, glr.cc)
628
629 Using %defines is now optional. Without it, the needed support classes
630 are defined in the generated parser, instead of additional files (such as
631 location.hh, position.hh and stack.hh).
632
633*** Locations are no longer mandatory (lalr1.cc, glr.cc)
634
635 Both lalr1.cc and glr.cc no longer require %location.
636
637*** syntax_error exception (lalr1.cc)
638
639 The C++ parser features a syntax_error exception, which can be
640 thrown from the scanner or from user rules to raise syntax errors.
641 This facilitates reporting errors caught in sub-functions (e.g.,
642 rejecting too large integral literals from a conversion function
643 used by the scanner, or rejecting invalid combinations from a
644 factory invoked by the user actions).
645
646*** %define api.value.type variant
647
648 This is based on a submission from Michiel De Wilde. With help
649 from Théophile Ranquet.
650
651 In this mode, complex C++ objects can be used as semantic values. For
652 instance:
653
654 %token <::std::string> TEXT;
655 %token <int> NUMBER;
656 %token SEMICOLON ";"
657 %type <::std::string> item;
658 %type <::std::list<std::string>> list;
659 %%
660 result:
661 list { std::cout << $1 << std::endl; }
662 ;
663
664 list:
6240346a 665 %empty { /* Generates an empty string list. */ }
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666 | list item ";" { std::swap ($$, $1); $$.push_back ($2); }
667 ;
668
669 item:
670 TEXT { std::swap ($$, $1); }
671 | NUMBER { $$ = string_cast ($1); }
672 ;
673
674*** %define api.token.constructor
675
676 When variants are enabled, Bison can generate functions to build the
677 tokens. This guarantees that the token type (e.g., NUMBER) is consistent
678 with the semantic value (e.g., int):
679
680 parser::symbol_type yylex ()
681 {
682 parser::location_type loc = ...;
683 ...
684 return parser::make_TEXT ("Hello, world!", loc);
685 ...
686 return parser::make_NUMBER (42, loc);
687 ...
688 return parser::make_SEMICOLON (loc);
689 ...
690 }
691
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692*** C++ locations
693
694 There are operator- and operator-= for 'location'. Negative line/column
695 increments can no longer underflow the resulting value.
696
1f5542fe 697* Noteworthy changes in release 2.7.1 (2013-04-15) [stable]
cc8962bd 698
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699** Bug fixes
700
701*** Fix compiler attribute portability (yacc.c)
702
703 With locations enabled, __attribute__ was used unprotected.
0a7b8559 704
e83be476
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705*** Fix some compiler warnings (lalr1.cc)
706
c13bb348 707* Noteworthy changes in release 2.7 (2012-12-12) [stable]
effd30c0 708
edf9a06f 709** Bug fixes
7bada535 710
edf9a06f 711 Warnings about uninitialized yylloc in yyparse have been fixed.
7bada535 712
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713 Restored C90 compliance (yet no report was ever made).
714
d4fe9e88 715** Diagnostics are improved
7bada535 716
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717 Contributed by Théophile Ranquet.
718
d4fe9e88 719*** Changes in the format of error messages
7bada535 720
d4fe9e88 721 This used to be the format of many error reports:
1f1bd572 722
d4fe9e88
AD
723 input.y:2.7-12: %type redeclaration for exp
724 input.y:1.7-12: previous declaration
1f1bd572 725
d4fe9e88 726 It is now:
1f1bd572 727
d4fe9e88
AD
728 input.y:2.7-12: error: %type redeclaration for exp
729 input.y:1.7-12: previous declaration
cbaea010 730
d4fe9e88 731*** New format for error reports: carets
cbaea010 732
d4fe9e88 733 Caret errors have been added to Bison:
cbaea010 734
d4fe9e88
AD
735 input.y:2.7-12: error: %type redeclaration for exp
736 %type <sval> exp
737 ^^^^^^
738 input.y:1.7-12: previous declaration
739 %type <ival> exp
740 ^^^^^^
cbaea010 741
d4fe9e88 742 or
cbaea010 743
7bada535 744 input.y:3.20-23: error: ambiguous reference: '$exp'
fb6040f0 745 exp: exp '+' exp { $exp = $1 + $3; };
7bada535 746 ^^^^
fb6040f0
TR
747 input.y:3.1-3: refers to: $exp at $$
748 exp: exp '+' exp { $exp = $1 + $3; };
749 ^^^
750 input.y:3.6-8: refers to: $exp at $1
751 exp: exp '+' exp { $exp = $1 + $3; };
752 ^^^
753 input.y:3.14-16: refers to: $exp at $3
754 exp: exp '+' exp { $exp = $1 + $3; };
755 ^^^
7bada535 756
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757 The default behavior for now is still not to display these unless
758 explicitly asked with -fcaret (or -fall). However, in a later release, it
d4fe9e88
AD
759 will be made the default behavior (but may still be deactivated with
760 -fno-caret).
d3e4409a 761
1f1bd572 762** New value for %define variable: api.pure full
d3e4409a 763
1f1bd572 764 The %define variable api.pure requests a pure (reentrant) parser. However,
d4fe9e88
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765 for historical reasons, using it in a location-tracking Yacc parser
766 resulted in a yyerror function that did not take a location as a
767 parameter. With this new value, the user may request a better pure parser,
768 where yyerror does take a location as a parameter (in location-tracking
769 parsers).
1f1bd572
TR
770
771 The use of "%define api.pure true" is deprecated in favor of this new
772 "%define api.pure full".
d3e4409a 773
7287be84 774** New %define variable: api.location.type (glr.cc, lalr1.cc, lalr1.java)
db8ab2be
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775
776 The %define variable api.location.type defines the name of the type to use
777 for locations. When defined, Bison no longer generates the position.hh
778 and location.hh files, nor does the parser will include them: the user is
779 then responsible to define her type.
780
781 This can be used in programs with several parsers to factor their location
7287be84
AD
782 and position files: let one of them generate them, and the others just use
783 them.
db8ab2be
AD
784
785 This feature was actually introduced, but not documented, in Bison 2.5,
786 under the name "location_type" (which is maintained for backward
787 compatibility).
788
7287be84
AD
789 For consistency, lalr1.java's %define variables location_type and
790 position_type are deprecated in favor of api.location.type and
791 api.position.type.
792
d4fe9e88
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793** Exception safety (lalr1.cc)
794
795 The parse function now catches exceptions, uses the %destructors to
796 release memory (the lookahead symbol and the symbols pushed on the stack)
797 before re-throwing the exception.
798
799 This feature is somewhat experimental. User feedback would be
800 appreciated.
801
9c16d399 802** Graph improvements in DOT and XSLT
fc4fdd62 803
8458a411
AD
804 Contributed by Théophile Ranquet.
805
fc4fdd62
TR
806 The graphical presentation of the states is more readable: their shape is
807 now rectangular, the state number is clearly displayed, and the items are
808 numbered and left-justified.
809
810 The reductions are now explicitly represented as transitions to other
811 diamond shaped nodes.
812
9c16d399
TR
813 These changes are present in both --graph output and xml2dot.xsl XSLT
814 processing, with minor (documented) differences.
815
d4fe9e88 816** %language is no longer an experimental feature.
fb4c8a7c 817
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818 The introduction of this feature, in 2.4, was four years ago. The
819 --language option and the %language directive are no longer experimental.
fb4c8a7c 820
53e2cd1e
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821** Documentation
822
823 The sections about shift/reduce and reduce/reduce conflicts resolution
824 have been fixed and extended.
9d2423f5 825
d4fe9e88
AD
826 Although introduced more than four years ago, XML and Graphviz reports
827 were not properly documented.
828
be22823e
AD
829 The translation of mid-rule actions is now described.
830
9d3f7eaf 831* Noteworthy changes in release 2.6.5 (2012-11-07) [stable]
6f1360bd 832
a68b1f23
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833 We consider compiler warnings about Bison generated parsers to be bugs.
834 Rather than working around them in your own project, please consider
835 reporting them to us.
836
837** Bug fixes
838
839 Warnings about uninitialized yylval and/or yylloc for push parsers with a
840 pure interface have been fixed for GCC 4.0 up to 4.8, and Clang 2.9 to
841 3.2.
842
843 Other issues in the test suite have been addressed.
6f1360bd 844
1282c124 845 Null characters are correctly displayed in error messages.
95066e92 846
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847 When possible, yylloc is correctly initialized before calling yylex. It
848 is no longer necessary to initialize it in the %initial-action.
849
0ac15849 850* Noteworthy changes in release 2.6.4 (2012-10-23) [stable]
a4eb820f 851
468455e1 852 Bison 2.6.3's --version was incorrect. This release fixes this issue.
a4eb820f 853
6eb8f74f 854* Noteworthy changes in release 2.6.3 (2012-10-22) [stable]
933ec544 855
6b4cb804
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856** Bug fixes
857
a1a77e1f 858 Bugs and portability issues in the test suite have been fixed.
6b4cb804
AD
859
860 Some errors in translations have been addressed, and --help now directs
861 users to the appropriate place to report them.
862
863 Stray Info files shipped by accident are removed.
864
865 Incorrect definitions of YY_, issued by yacc.c when no parser header is
866 generated, are removed.
9c26b8fc 867
a2b3f101
TR
868 All the generated headers are self-contained.
869
c9d5bcc9
AD
870** Header guards (yacc.c, glr.c, glr.cc)
871
872 In order to avoid collisions, the header guards are now
873 YY_<PREFIX>_<FILE>_INCLUDED, instead of merely <PREFIX>_<FILE>.
874 For instance the header generated from
875
876 %define api.prefix "calc"
877 %defines "lib/parse.h"
878
879 will use YY_CALC_LIB_PARSE_H_INCLUDED as guard.
880
c12c4c50 881** Fix compiler warnings in the generated parser (yacc.c, glr.c)
321d3e35
AD
882
883 The compilation of pure parsers (%define api.pure) can trigger GCC
884 warnings such as:
885
886 input.c: In function 'yyparse':
887 input.c:1503:12: warning: 'yylval' may be used uninitialized in this
888 function [-Wmaybe-uninitialized]
889 *++yyvsp = yylval;
890 ^
891
892 This is now fixed; pragmas to avoid these warnings are no longer needed.
893
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AD
894 Warnings from clang ("equality comparison with extraneous parentheses" and
895 "function declared 'noreturn' should not return") have also been
896 addressed.
897
e1eeecd3 898* Noteworthy changes in release 2.6.2 (2012-08-03) [stable]
9c26b8fc 899
43ca8040
AD
900** Bug fixes
901
902 Buffer overruns, complaints from Flex, and portability issues in the test
903 suite have been fixed.
904
c9d546b2
AD
905** Spaces in %lex- and %parse-param (lalr1.cc, glr.cc)
906
907 Trailing end-of-lines in %parse-param or %lex-param would result in
908 invalid C++. This is fixed.
9c26b8fc 909
dcd5344d
AD
910** Spurious spaces and end-of-lines
911
912 The generated files no longer end (nor start) with empty lines.
913
77b214ef 914* Noteworthy changes in release 2.6.1 (2012-07-30) [stable]
a4107f24 915
8617d87e
AD
916 Bison no longer executes user-specified M4 code when processing a grammar.
917
e20e6a50
AD
918** Future Changes
919
920 In addition to the removal of the features announced in Bison 2.6, the
921 next major release will remove the "Temporary hack for adding a semicolon
922 to the user action", as announced in the release 2.5. Instead of:
923
924 exp: exp "+" exp { $$ = $1 + $3 };
925
926 write:
927
928 exp: exp "+" exp { $$ = $1 + $3; };
929
8617d87e
AD
930** Bug fixes
931
0e164d43
AD
932*** Type names are now properly escaped.
933
934*** glr.cc: set_debug_level and debug_level work as expected.
a4107f24 935
26313726
AD
936*** Stray @ or $ in actions
937
938 While Bison used to warn about stray $ or @ in action rules, it did not
939 for other actions such as printers, destructors, or initial actions. It
940 now does.
941
cd735a8c 942** Type names in actions
4982f078
AD
943
944 For consistency with rule actions, it is now possible to qualify $$ by a
cd735a8c 945 type-name in destructors, printers, and initial actions. For instance:
4982f078
AD
946
947 %printer { fprintf (yyo, "(%d, %f)", $<ival>$, $<fval>$); } <*> <>;
948
949 will display two values for each typed and untyped symbol (provided
cd735a8c 950 that YYSTYPE has both "ival" and "fval" fields).
60aa04a2 951
1505e8bb 952* Noteworthy changes in release 2.6 (2012-07-19) [stable]
0f11eec2 953
d0a30438 954** Future changes
9553083c 955
55d1006f
AD
956 The next major release of Bison will drop support for the following
957 deprecated features. Please report disagreements to bug-bison@gnu.org.
0f11eec2 958
aaf61036 959*** K&R C parsers
55d1006f
AD
960
961 Support for generating parsers in K&R C will be removed. Parsers
242cc08e 962 generated for C support ISO C90, and are tested with ISO C99 and ISO C11
55d1006f
AD
963 compilers.
964
258cddbc 965*** Features deprecated since Bison 1.875
0f11eec2 966
258cddbc
AD
967 The definitions of yystype and yyltype will be removed; use YYSTYPE and
968 YYLTYPE.
0f11eec2 969
258cddbc
AD
970 YYPARSE_PARAM and YYLEX_PARAM, deprecated in favor of %parse-param and
971 %lex-param, will no longer be supported.
972
973 Support for the preprocessor symbol YYERROR_VERBOSE will be removed, use
974 %error-verbose.
55d1006f
AD
975
976*** The generated header will be included (yacc.c)
0f11eec2
AD
977
978 Instead of duplicating the content of the generated header (definition of
55d1006f
AD
979 YYSTYPE, yyparse declaration etc.), the generated parser will include it,
980 as is already the case for GLR or C++ parsers. This change is deferred
981 because existing versions of ylwrap (e.g., Automake 1.12.1) do not support
982 it.
0f11eec2 983
c2425191 984** Generated Parser Headers
56ca3d8f 985
258cddbc 986*** Guards (yacc.c, glr.c, glr.cc)
c3e9f08f
AD
987
988 The generated headers are now guarded, as is already the case for C++
242cc08e 989 parsers (lalr1.cc). For instance, with --defines=foo.h:
c3e9f08f 990
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AD
991 #ifndef YY_FOO_H
992 # define YY_FOO_H
993 ...
994 #endif /* !YY_FOO_H */
c3e9f08f 995
258cddbc 996*** New declarations (yacc.c, glr.c)
56ca3d8f
AD
997
998 The generated header now declares yydebug and yyparse. Both honor
999 --name-prefix=bar_, and yield
1000
e29f0771 1001 int bar_parse (void);
56ca3d8f
AD
1002
1003 rather than
1004
e29f0771
AD
1005 #define yyparse bar_parse
1006 int yyparse (void);
56ca3d8f
AD
1007
1008 in order to facilitate the inclusion of several parser headers inside a
1009 single compilation unit.
c3e9f08f 1010
258cddbc
AD
1011*** Exported symbols in C++
1012
1013 The symbols YYTOKEN_TABLE and YYERROR_VERBOSE, which were defined in the
1014 header, are removed, as they prevent the possibility of including several
1015 generated headers from a single compilation unit.
1016
694af10c
AD
1017*** YYLSP_NEEDED
1018
1019 For the same reasons, the undocumented and unused macro YYLSP_NEEDED is no
1020 longer defined.
1021
4b3847c3
AD
1022** New %define variable: api.prefix
1023
1024 Now that the generated headers are more complete and properly protected
1025 against multiple inclusions, constant names, such as YYSTYPE are a
1026 problem. While yyparse and others are properly renamed by %name-prefix,
1027 YYSTYPE, YYDEBUG and others have never been affected by it. Because it
1028 would introduce backward compatibility issues in projects not expecting
1029 YYSTYPE to be renamed, instead of changing the behavior of %name-prefix,
1030 it is deprecated in favor of a new %define variable: api.prefix.
1031
1032 The following examples compares both:
1033
1034 %name-prefix "bar_" | %define api.prefix "bar_"
1035 %token <ival> FOO %token <ival> FOO
1036 %union { int ival; } %union { int ival; }
1037 %% %%
1038 exp: 'a'; exp: 'a';
1039
1040 bison generates:
1041
1042 #ifndef BAR_FOO_H #ifndef BAR_FOO_H
1043 # define BAR_FOO_H # define BAR_FOO_H
1044
1045 /* Enabling traces. */ /* Enabling traces. */
5f108727
AD
1046 # ifndef YYDEBUG | # ifndef BAR_DEBUG
1047 > # if defined YYDEBUG
1048 > # if YYDEBUG
1049 > # define BAR_DEBUG 1
1050 > # else
1051 > # define BAR_DEBUG 0
1052 > # endif
1053 > # else
1054 # define YYDEBUG 0 | # define BAR_DEBUG 0
1055 > # endif
1056 # endif | # endif
1057
1058 # if YYDEBUG | # if BAR_DEBUG
4b3847c3
AD
1059 extern int bar_debug; extern int bar_debug;
1060 # endif # endif
1061
1062 /* Tokens. */ /* Tokens. */
1063 # ifndef YYTOKENTYPE | # ifndef BAR_TOKENTYPE
1064 # define YYTOKENTYPE | # define BAR_TOKENTYPE
1065 enum yytokentype { | enum bar_tokentype {
1066 FOO = 258 FOO = 258
1067 }; };
1068 # endif # endif
1069
1070 #if ! defined YYSTYPE \ | #if ! defined BAR_STYPE \
1071 && ! defined YYSTYPE_IS_DECLARED | && ! defined BAR_STYPE_IS_DECLARED
1072 typedef union YYSTYPE | typedef union BAR_STYPE
1073 { {
1074 int ival; int ival;
1075 } YYSTYPE; | } BAR_STYPE;
1076 # define YYSTYPE_IS_DECLARED 1 | # define BAR_STYPE_IS_DECLARED 1
1077 #endif #endif
1078
1079 extern YYSTYPE bar_lval; | extern BAR_STYPE bar_lval;
1080
1081 int bar_parse (void); int bar_parse (void);
1082
1083 #endif /* !BAR_FOO_H */ #endif /* !BAR_FOO_H */
1084
dfaac272 1085* Noteworthy changes in release 2.5.1 (2012-06-05) [stable]
df6e3db0 1086
debe2c03 1087** Future changes:
765e1bd4 1088
e4ab1254 1089 The next major release will drop support for generating parsers in K&R C.
041308d0 1090
466b4cf2 1091** yacc.c: YYBACKUP works as expected.
ef51bfa7 1092
d834eca0 1093** glr.c improvements:
041308d0 1094
d834eca0 1095*** Location support is eliminated when not requested:
041308d0 1096
e4ab1254
AD
1097 GLR parsers used to include location-related code even when locations were
1098 not requested, and therefore not even usable.
378e917c 1099
d834eca0 1100*** __attribute__ is preserved:
d115aad9 1101
e4ab1254
AD
1102 __attribute__ is no longer disabled when __STRICT_ANSI__ is defined (i.e.,
1103 when -std is passed to GCC).
041308d0 1104
466b4cf2 1105** lalr1.java: several fixes:
041308d0 1106
e4ab1254
AD
1107 The Java parser no longer throws ArrayIndexOutOfBoundsException if the
1108 first token leads to a syntax error. Some minor clean ups.
041308d0 1109
22172d47 1110** Changes for C++:
ef51bfa7 1111
22172d47 1112*** C++11 compatibility:
ef51bfa7 1113
e4ab1254
AD
1114 C and C++ parsers use "nullptr" instead of "0" when __cplusplus is 201103L
1115 or higher.
936c88d1 1116
22172d47
AD
1117*** Header guards
1118
1119 The header files such as "parser.hh", "location.hh", etc. used a constant
1120 name for preprocessor guards, for instance:
1121
e29f0771
AD
1122 #ifndef BISON_LOCATION_HH
1123 # define BISON_LOCATION_HH
1124 ...
1125 #endif // !BISON_LOCATION_HH
22172d47
AD
1126
1127 The inclusion guard is now computed from "PREFIX/FILE-NAME", where lower
1128 case characters are converted to upper case, and series of
1129 non-alphanumerical characters are converted to an underscore.
1130
1131 With "bison -o lang++/parser.cc", "location.hh" would now include:
1132
e29f0771
AD
1133 #ifndef YY_LANG_LOCATION_HH
1134 # define YY_LANG_LOCATION_HH
1135 ...
1136 #endif // !YY_LANG_LOCATION_HH
22172d47
AD
1137
1138*** C++ locations:
936c88d1 1139
e4ab1254
AD
1140 The position and location constructors (and their initialize methods)
1141 accept new arguments for line and column. Several issues in the
1142 documentation were fixed.
936c88d1 1143
466b4cf2
AD
1144** liby is no longer asking for "rpl_fprintf" on some platforms.
1145
7e508a2b
AD
1146** Changes in the manual:
1147
1148*** %printer is documented
1149
e4ab1254
AD
1150 The "%printer" directive, supported since at least Bison 1.50, is finally
1151 documented. The "mfcalc" example is extended to demonstrate it.
7e508a2b 1152
e4ab1254
AD
1153 For consistency with the C skeletons, the C++ parsers now also support
1154 "yyoutput" (as an alias to "debug_stream ()").
7e508a2b
AD
1155
1156*** Several improvements have been made:
466b4cf2 1157
e4ab1254
AD
1158 The layout for grammar excerpts was changed to a more compact scheme.
1159 Named references are motivated. The description of the automaton
1160 description file (*.output) is updated to the current format. Incorrect
1161 index entries were fixed. Some other errors were fixed.
466b4cf2 1162
86b08b49
AD
1163** Building bison:
1164
1165*** Conflicting prototypes with recent/modified Flex.
466b4cf2 1166
e4ab1254
AD
1167 Fixed build problems with the current, unreleased, version of Flex, and
1168 some modified versions of 2.5.35, which have modified function prototypes.
466b4cf2 1169
8ef26c2a
AD
1170*** Warnings during the build procedure have been eliminated.
1171
1172*** Several portability problems in the test suite have been fixed:
466b4cf2 1173
e4ab1254
AD
1174 This includes warnings with some compilers, unexpected behavior of tools
1175 such as diff, warning messages from the test suite itself, etc.
466b4cf2 1176
91aadcc7 1177*** The install-pdf target works properly:
8ef26c2a 1178
e4ab1254
AD
1179 Running "make install-pdf" (or -dvi, -html, -info, and -ps) no longer
1180 halts in the middle of its course.
8ef26c2a 1181
28801043 1182* Changes in version 2.5 (2011-05-14):
50cca368 1183
82f3355e
JD
1184** Grammar symbol names can now contain non-initial dashes:
1185
1186 Consistently with directives (such as %error-verbose) and with
1187 %define variables (e.g. push-pull), grammar symbol names may contain
1188 dashes in any position except the beginning. This is a GNU
1189 extension over POSIX Yacc. Thus, use of this extension is reported
1190 by -Wyacc and rejected in Yacc mode (--yacc).
1191
f1b238df 1192** Named references:
66381412
AR
1193
1194 Historically, Yacc and Bison have supported positional references
1195 ($n, $$) to allow access to symbol values from inside of semantic
1196 actions code.
1197
1198 Starting from this version, Bison can also accept named references.
1199 When no ambiguity is possible, original symbol names may be used
1200 as named references:
1201
4b568fc0 1202 if_stmt : "if" cond_expr "then" then_stmt ';'
66381412
AR
1203 { $if_stmt = mk_if_stmt($cond_expr, $then_stmt); }
1204
1205 In the more common case, explicit names may be declared:
1206
4b568fc0 1207 stmt[res] : "if" expr[cond] "then" stmt[then] "else" stmt[else] ';'
66381412
AR
1208 { $res = mk_if_stmt($cond, $then, $else); }
1209
5b1ff423 1210 Location information is also accessible using @name syntax. When
66381412
AR
1211 accessing symbol names containing dots or dashes, explicit bracketing
1212 ($[sym.1]) must be used.
1213
5b1ff423 1214 These features are experimental in this version. More user feedback
66381412 1215 will help to stabilize them.
2bd435c3 1216 Contributed by Alex Rozenman.
66381412 1217
f1b238df 1218** IELR(1) and canonical LR(1):
eb45ef3b
JD
1219
1220 IELR(1) is a minimal LR(1) parser table generation algorithm. That
1221 is, given any context-free grammar, IELR(1) generates parser tables
7262f54f 1222 with the full language-recognition power of canonical LR(1) but with
f1b238df
JD
1223 nearly the same number of parser states as LALR(1). This reduction
1224 in parser states is often an order of magnitude. More importantly,
eb45ef3b
JD
1225 because canonical LR(1)'s extra parser states may contain duplicate
1226 conflicts in the case of non-LR(1) grammars, the number of conflicts
1227 for IELR(1) is often an order of magnitude less as well. This can
1228 significantly reduce the complexity of developing of a grammar.
1229
1230 Bison can now generate IELR(1) and canonical LR(1) parser tables in
1231 place of its traditional LALR(1) parser tables, which remain the
1232 default. You can specify the type of parser tables in the grammar
1233 file with these directives:
1234
cf499cff
JD
1235 %define lr.type lalr
1236 %define lr.type ielr
1237 %define lr.type canonical-lr
eb45ef3b 1238
7fceb615 1239 The default-reduction optimization in the parser tables can also be
e4ab1254
AD
1240 adjusted using "%define lr.default-reductions". For details on both
1241 of these features, see the new section "Tuning LR" in the Bison
7fceb615 1242 manual.
eb45ef3b
JD
1243
1244 These features are experimental. More user feedback will help to
1245 stabilize them.
1246
8458a411
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1247** LAC (Lookahead Correction) for syntax error handling
1248
1249 Contributed by Joel E. Denny.
fcf834f9
JD
1250
1251 Canonical LR, IELR, and LALR can suffer from a couple of problems
1252 upon encountering a syntax error. First, the parser might perform
1253 additional parser stack reductions before discovering the syntax
7fceb615 1254 error. Such reductions can perform user semantic actions that are
fcf834f9
JD
1255 unexpected because they are based on an invalid token, and they
1256 cause error recovery to begin in a different syntactic context than
1257 the one in which the invalid token was encountered. Second, when
7fceb615 1258 verbose error messages are enabled (with %error-verbose or the
e4ab1254 1259 obsolete "#define YYERROR_VERBOSE"), the expected token list in the
7fceb615
JD
1260 syntax error message can both contain invalid tokens and omit valid
1261 tokens.
fcf834f9
JD
1262
1263 The culprits for the above problems are %nonassoc, default
1264 reductions in inconsistent states, and parser state merging. Thus,
1265 IELR and LALR suffer the most. Canonical LR can suffer only if
1266 %nonassoc is used or if default reductions are enabled for
1267 inconsistent states.
1268
7fceb615
JD
1269 LAC is a new mechanism within the parsing algorithm that solves
1270 these problems for canonical LR, IELR, and LALR without sacrificing
1271 %nonassoc, default reductions, or state merging. When LAC is in
1272 use, canonical LR and IELR behave almost exactly the same for both
1273 syntactically acceptable and syntactically unacceptable input.
fcf834f9
JD
1274 While LALR still does not support the full language-recognition
1275 power of canonical LR and IELR, LAC at least enables LALR's syntax
1276 error handling to correctly reflect LALR's language-recognition
1277 power.
1278
1279 Currently, LAC is only supported for deterministic parsers in C.
1280 You can enable LAC with the following directive:
1281
1282 %define parse.lac full
1283
e4ab1254 1284 See the new section "LAC" in the Bison manual for additional
7fceb615 1285 details including a few caveats.
fcf834f9
JD
1286
1287 LAC is an experimental feature. More user feedback will help to
1288 stabilize it.
1289
d397d9f0 1290** %define improvements:
cf499cff 1291
f1b238df 1292*** Can now be invoked via the command line:
50cca368 1293
de5ab940 1294 Each of these command-line options
50cca368 1295
de5ab940
JD
1296 -D NAME[=VALUE]
1297 --define=NAME[=VALUE]
1298
1299 -F NAME[=VALUE]
1300 --force-define=NAME[=VALUE]
50cca368
JD
1301
1302 is equivalent to this grammar file declaration
1303
de5ab940 1304 %define NAME ["VALUE"]
50cca368 1305
de5ab940
JD
1306 except that the manner in which Bison processes multiple definitions
1307 for the same NAME differs. Most importantly, -F and --force-define
1308 quietly override %define, but -D and --define do not. For further
e4ab1254 1309 details, see the section "Bison Options" in the Bison manual.
50cca368 1310
f1b238df 1311*** Variables renamed:
67212941
JD
1312
1313 The following %define variables
1314
1315 api.push_pull
1316 lr.keep_unreachable_states
1317
1318 have been renamed to
1319
1320 api.push-pull
1321 lr.keep-unreachable-states
1322
1323 The old names are now deprecated but will be maintained indefinitely
1324 for backward compatibility.
1325
7262f54f 1326*** Values no longer need to be quoted in the grammar file:
cf499cff
JD
1327
1328 If a %define value is an identifier, it no longer needs to be placed
1329 within quotations marks. For example,
1330
1331 %define api.push-pull "push"
1332
1333 can be rewritten as
1334
1335 %define api.push-pull push
1336
d397d9f0 1337*** Unrecognized variables are now errors not warnings.
cdf3f113 1338
d397d9f0
JD
1339*** Multiple invocations for any variable is now an error not a warning.
1340
1341** Unrecognized %code qualifiers are now errors not warnings.
1342
1343** Character literals not of length one:
1344
1345 Previously, Bison quietly converted all character literals to length
1346 one. For example, without warning, Bison interpreted the operators in
1347 the following grammar to be the same token:
1348
1349 exp: exp '++'
1350 | exp '+' exp
1351 ;
1352
1353 Bison now warns when a character literal is not of length one. In
1354 some future release, Bison will start reporting an error instead.
1355
1356** Destructor calls fixed for lookaheads altered in semantic actions:
1357
1358 Previously for deterministic parsers in C, if a user semantic action
1359 altered yychar, the parser in some cases used the old yychar value to
1360 determine which destructor to call for the lookahead upon a syntax
1361 error or upon parser return. This bug has been fixed.
1362
1363** C++ parsers use YYRHSLOC:
1364
1365 Similarly to the C parsers, the C++ parsers now define the YYRHSLOC
1366 macro and use it in the default YYLLOC_DEFAULT. You are encouraged
e4ab1254
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1367 to use it. If, for instance, your location structure has "first"
1368 and "last" members, instead of
d397d9f0 1369
e29f0771
AD
1370 # define YYLLOC_DEFAULT(Current, Rhs, N) \
1371 do \
1372 if (N) \
1373 { \
1374 (Current).first = (Rhs)[1].location.first; \
1375 (Current).last = (Rhs)[N].location.last; \
1376 } \
1377 else \
1378 { \
1379 (Current).first = (Current).last = (Rhs)[0].location.last; \
1380 } \
1381 while (false)
d397d9f0
JD
1382
1383 use:
1384
e29f0771
AD
1385 # define YYLLOC_DEFAULT(Current, Rhs, N) \
1386 do \
1387 if (N) \
1388 { \
1389 (Current).first = YYRHSLOC (Rhs, 1).first; \
1390 (Current).last = YYRHSLOC (Rhs, N).last; \
1391 } \
1392 else \
1393 { \
1394 (Current).first = (Current).last = YYRHSLOC (Rhs, 0).last; \
1395 } \
1396 while (false)
d397d9f0
JD
1397
1398** YYLLOC_DEFAULT in C++:
1399
1400 The default implementation of YYLLOC_DEFAULT used to be issued in
1401 the header file. It is now output in the implementation file, after
1402 the user %code sections so that its #ifndef guard does not try to
1403 override the user's YYLLOC_DEFAULT if provided.
cdf3f113 1404
f1b238df 1405** YYFAIL now produces warnings and Java parsers no longer implement it:
4395a9ff
JD
1406
1407 YYFAIL has existed for many years as an undocumented feature of
1408 deterministic parsers in C generated by Bison. More recently, it was
1409 a documented feature of Bison's experimental Java parsers. As
1410 promised in Bison 2.4.2's NEWS entry, any appearance of YYFAIL in a
1411 semantic action now produces a deprecation warning, and Java parsers
1412 no longer implement YYFAIL at all. For further details, including a
1413 discussion of how to suppress C preprocessor warnings about YYFAIL
1414 being unused, see the Bison 2.4.2 NEWS entry.
1415
f1b238df 1416** Temporary hack for adding a semicolon to the user action:
197b82ba
JD
1417
1418 Previously, Bison appended a semicolon to every user action for
1419 reductions when the output language defaulted to C (specifically, when
1420 neither %yacc, %language, %skeleton, or equivalent command-line
1421 options were specified). This allowed actions such as
1422
1423 exp: exp "+" exp { $$ = $1 + $3 };
1424
1425 instead of
1426
1427 exp: exp "+" exp { $$ = $1 + $3; };
1428
1429 As a first step in removing this misfeature, Bison now issues a
1430 warning when it appends a semicolon. Moreover, in cases where Bison
1431 cannot easily determine whether a semicolon is needed (for example, an
1432 action ending with a cpp directive or a braced compound initializer),
1433 it no longer appends one. Thus, the C compiler might now complain
1434 about a missing semicolon where it did not before. Future releases of
1435 Bison will cease to append semicolons entirely.
1436
d2060f06
JD
1437** Verbose syntax error message fixes:
1438
e4ab1254 1439 When %error-verbose or the obsolete "#define YYERROR_VERBOSE" is
7fceb615
JD
1440 specified, syntax error messages produced by the generated parser
1441 include the unexpected token as well as a list of expected tokens.
1442 The effect of %nonassoc on these verbose messages has been corrected
1443 in two ways, but a more complete fix requires LAC, described above:
d2060f06
JD
1444
1445*** When %nonassoc is used, there can exist parser states that accept no
1446 tokens, and so the parser does not always require a lookahead token
1447 in order to detect a syntax error. Because no unexpected token or
1448 expected tokens can then be reported, the verbose syntax error
1449 message described above is suppressed, and the parser instead
e4ab1254 1450 reports the simpler message, "syntax error". Previously, this
d2060f06
JD
1451 suppression was sometimes erroneously triggered by %nonassoc when a
1452 lookahead was actually required. Now verbose messages are
1453 suppressed only when all previous lookaheads have already been
1454 shifted or discarded.
1455
1456*** Previously, the list of expected tokens erroneously included tokens
1457 that would actually induce a syntax error because conflicts for them
1458 were resolved with %nonassoc in the current parser state. Such
1459 tokens are now properly omitted from the list.
1460
1461*** Expected token lists are still often wrong due to state merging
fcf834f9
JD
1462 (from LALR or IELR) and default reductions, which can both add
1463 invalid tokens and subtract valid tokens. Canonical LR almost
1464 completely fixes this problem by eliminating state merging and
1465 default reductions. However, there is one minor problem left even
1466 when using canonical LR and even after the fixes above. That is,
1467 if the resolution of a conflict with %nonassoc appears in a later
1468 parser state than the one at which some syntax error is
1469 discovered, the conflicted token is still erroneously included in
1470 the expected token list. Bison's new LAC implementation,
1471 described above, eliminates this problem and the need for
1472 canonical LR. However, LAC is still experimental and is disabled
1473 by default.
53f036ce 1474
1a33f4f6
JD
1475** Java skeleton fixes:
1476
1477*** A location handling bug has been fixed.
1478
1479*** The top element of each of the value stack and location stack is now
1480 cleared when popped so that it can be garbage collected.
6771a463 1481
02803d55
JD
1482*** Parser traces now print the top element of the stack.
1483
86408959
JD
1484** -W/--warnings fixes:
1485
e4ab1254 1486*** Bison now properly recognizes the "no-" versions of categories:
86408959
JD
1487
1488 For example, given the following command line, Bison now enables all
1489 warnings except warnings for incompatibilities with POSIX Yacc:
1490
1491 bison -Wall,no-yacc gram.y
1492
786743d5
JD
1493*** Bison now treats S/R and R/R conflicts like other warnings:
1494
1495 Previously, conflict reports were independent of Bison's normal
1496 warning system. Now, Bison recognizes the warning categories
e4ab1254 1497 "conflicts-sr" and "conflicts-rr". This change has important
786743d5
JD
1498 consequences for the -W and --warnings command-line options. For
1499 example:
1500
1501 bison -Wno-conflicts-sr gram.y # S/R conflicts not reported
1502 bison -Wno-conflicts-rr gram.y # R/R conflicts not reported
1503 bison -Wnone gram.y # no conflicts are reported
1504 bison -Werror gram.y # any conflict is an error
1505
1506 However, as before, if the %expect or %expect-rr directive is
1507 specified, an unexpected number of conflicts is an error, and an
1508 expected number of conflicts is not reported, so -W and --warning
1509 then have no effect on the conflict report.
1510
e4ab1254 1511*** The "none" category no longer disables a preceding "error":
bf0e44e8
JD
1512
1513 For example, for the following command line, Bison now reports
1514 errors instead of warnings for incompatibilities with POSIX Yacc:
1515
1516 bison -Werror,none,yacc gram.y
1517
e4ab1254 1518*** The "none" category now disables all Bison warnings:
c39014ae 1519
e4ab1254 1520 Previously, the "none" category disabled only Bison warnings for
c39014ae
JD
1521 which there existed a specific -W/--warning category. However,
1522 given the following command line, Bison is now guaranteed to
1523 suppress all warnings:
1524
1525 bison -Wnone gram.y
1526
1f36f544
JD
1527** Precedence directives can now assign token number 0:
1528
1529 Since Bison 2.3b, which restored the ability of precedence
1530 directives to assign token numbers, doing so for token number 0 has
1531 produced an assertion failure. For example:
1532
1533 %left END 0
1534
1535 This bug has been fixed.
1536
64877e5e 1537* Changes in version 2.4.3 (2010-08-05):
8b9e021f 1538
2bfcac9a
JD
1539** Bison now obeys -Werror and --warnings=error for warnings about
1540 grammar rules that are useless in the parser due to conflicts.
1541
8b9e021f
JD
1542** Problems with spawning M4 on at least FreeBSD 8 and FreeBSD 9 have
1543 been fixed.
1544
4ad3921d
JD
1545** Failures in the test suite for GCC 4.5 have been fixed.
1546
06cb07d5
JD
1547** Failures in the test suite for some versions of Sun Studio C++ have
1548 been fixed.
1549
9b5049bd
JD
1550** Contrary to Bison 2.4.2's NEWS entry, it has been decided that
1551 warnings about undefined %prec identifiers will not be converted to
1552 errors in Bison 2.5. They will remain warnings, which should be
1553 sufficient for POSIX while avoiding backward compatibility issues.
1554
93d7dde9
JD
1555** Minor documentation fixes.
1556
e19a049c 1557* Changes in version 2.4.2 (2010-03-20):
74553c98 1558
f39ab286
JD
1559** Some portability problems that resulted in failures and livelocks
1560 in the test suite on some versions of at least Solaris, AIX, HP-UX,
e19a049c
JD
1561 RHEL4, and Tru64 have been addressed. As a result, fatal Bison
1562 errors should no longer cause M4 to report a broken pipe on the
f39ab286
JD
1563 affected platforms.
1564
e4ab1254 1565** "%prec IDENTIFIER" requires IDENTIFIER to be defined separately.
8bb3a2e7
JD
1566
1567 POSIX specifies that an error be reported for any identifier that does
1568 not appear on the LHS of a grammar rule and that is not defined by
1569 %token, %left, %right, or %nonassoc. Bison 2.3b and later lost this
1570 error report for the case when an identifier appears only after a
1571 %prec directive. It is now restored. However, for backward
1572 compatibility with recent Bison releases, it is only a warning for
1573 now. In Bison 2.5 and later, it will return to being an error.
9b5049bd
JD
1574 [Between the 2.4.2 and 2.4.3 releases, it was decided that this
1575 warning will not be converted to an error in Bison 2.5.]
8bb3a2e7 1576
d8911864
EB
1577** Detection of GNU M4 1.4.6 or newer during configure is improved.
1578
a603c6e0
JD
1579** Warnings from gcc's -Wundef option about undefined YYENABLE_NLS,
1580 YYLTYPE_IS_TRIVIAL, and __STRICT_ANSI__ in C/C++ parsers are now
1581 avoided.
c938d650 1582
98a345a2
JD
1583** %code is now a permanent feature.
1584
1585 A traditional Yacc prologue directive is written in the form:
1586
1587 %{CODE%}
1588
1589 To provide a more flexible alternative, Bison 2.3b introduced the
1590 %code directive with the following forms for C/C++:
1591
1592 %code {CODE}
1593 %code requires {CODE}
1594 %code provides {CODE}
1595 %code top {CODE}
1596
1597 These forms are now considered permanent features of Bison. See the
1598 %code entries in the section "Bison Declaration Summary" in the Bison
1599 manual for a summary of their functionality. See the section
1600 "Prologue Alternatives" for a detailed discussion including the
1601 advantages of %code over the traditional Yacc prologue directive.
1602
1603 Bison's Java feature as a whole including its current usage of %code
1604 is still considered experimental.
1605
1625df5b
JD
1606** YYFAIL is deprecated and will eventually be removed.
1607
1608 YYFAIL has existed for many years as an undocumented feature of
1609 deterministic parsers in C generated by Bison. Previously, it was
1610 documented for Bison's experimental Java parsers. YYFAIL is no longer
1611 documented for Java parsers and is formally deprecated in both cases.
1612 Users are strongly encouraged to migrate to YYERROR, which is
1613 specified by POSIX.
1614
1615 Like YYERROR, you can invoke YYFAIL from a semantic action in order to
1616 induce a syntax error. The most obvious difference from YYERROR is
1617 that YYFAIL will automatically invoke yyerror to report the syntax
1618 error so that you don't have to. However, there are several other
1619 subtle differences between YYERROR and YYFAIL, and YYFAIL suffers from
e4ab1254 1620 inherent flaws when %error-verbose or "#define YYERROR_VERBOSE" is
1625df5b
JD
1621 used. For a more detailed discussion, see:
1622
1623 http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/bison-patches/2009-12/msg00024.html
1624
1625 The upcoming Bison 2.5 will remove YYFAIL from Java parsers, but
1626 deterministic parsers in C will continue to implement it. However,
1627 because YYFAIL is already flawed, it seems futile to try to make new
1628 Bison features compatible with it. Thus, during parser generation,
1629 Bison 2.5 will produce a warning whenever it discovers YYFAIL in a
1630 rule action. In a later release, YYFAIL will be disabled for
e4ab1254 1631 %error-verbose and "#define YYERROR_VERBOSE". Eventually, YYFAIL will
1625df5b
JD
1632 be removed altogether.
1633
1634 There exists at least one case where Bison 2.5's YYFAIL warning will
1635 be a false positive. Some projects add phony uses of YYFAIL and other
1636 Bison-defined macros for the sole purpose of suppressing C
1637 preprocessor warnings (from GCC cpp's -Wunused-macros, for example).
1638 To avoid Bison's future warning, such YYFAIL uses can be moved to the
e4ab1254 1639 epilogue (that is, after the second "%%") in the Bison input file. In
1625df5b
JD
1640 this release (2.4.2), Bison already generates its own code to suppress
1641 C preprocessor warnings for YYFAIL, so projects can remove their own
1642 phony uses of YYFAIL if compatibility with Bison releases prior to
1643 2.4.2 is not necessary.
1644
2755de8f
AD
1645** Internationalization.
1646
1647 Fix a regression introduced in Bison 2.4: Under some circumstances,
1648 message translations were not installed although supported by the
1649 host system.
1650
74553c98 1651* Changes in version 2.4.1 (2008-12-11):
c9ba9e59 1652
0ea583d2
AD
1653** In the GLR defines file, unexpanded M4 macros in the yylval and yylloc
1654 declarations have been fixed.
1979121c 1655
0ea583d2
AD
1656** Temporary hack for adding a semicolon to the user action.
1657
1658 Bison used to prepend a trailing semicolon at the end of the user
1659 action for reductions. This allowed actions such as
1660
1661 exp: exp "+" exp { $$ = $1 + $3 };
1662
1663 instead of
1664
1665 exp: exp "+" exp { $$ = $1 + $3; };
1666
e4ab1254 1667 Some grammars still depend on this "feature". Bison 2.4.1 restores
0ea583d2
AD
1668 the previous behavior in the case of C output (specifically, when
1669 neither %language or %skeleton or equivalent command-line options
1670 are used) to leave more time for grammars depending on the old
1671 behavior to be adjusted. Future releases of Bison will disable this
1672 feature.
1673
1674** A few minor improvements to the Bison manual.
c9ba9e59 1675
402b123d 1676* Changes in version 2.4 (2008-11-02):
7bd1665a 1677
402b123d 1678** %language is an experimental feature.
ed4d67dc
JD
1679
1680 We first introduced this feature in test release 2.3b as a cleaner
1681 alternative to %skeleton. Since then, we have discussed the possibility of
1682 modifying its effect on Bison's output file names. Thus, in this release,
1683 we consider %language to be an experimental feature that will likely evolve
1684 in future releases.
7bd1665a 1685
402b123d 1686** Forward compatibility with GNU M4 has been improved.
241fda7a 1687
402b123d 1688** Several bugs in the C++ skeleton and the experimental Java skeleton have been
241fda7a
JD
1689 fixed.
1690
402b123d 1691* Changes in version 2.3b (2008-05-27):
35fe0834 1692
402b123d 1693** The quotes around NAME that used to be required in the following directive
d9df47b6
JD
1694 are now deprecated:
1695
1696 %define NAME "VALUE"
1697
e4ab1254 1698** The directive "%pure-parser" is now deprecated in favor of:
d9df47b6
JD
1699
1700 %define api.pure
1701
1702 which has the same effect except that Bison is more careful to warn about
1703 unreasonable usage in the latter case.
1704
402b123d 1705** Push Parsing
c373bf8b
JD
1706
1707 Bison can now generate an LALR(1) parser in C with a push interface. That
e4ab1254
AD
1708 is, instead of invoking "yyparse", which pulls tokens from "yylex", you can
1709 push one token at a time to the parser using "yypush_parse", which will
c373bf8b
JD
1710 return to the caller after processing each token. By default, the push
1711 interface is disabled. Either of the following directives will enable it:
1712
1713 %define api.push_pull "push" // Just push; does not require yylex.
1714 %define api.push_pull "both" // Push and pull; requires yylex.
1715
e4ab1254 1716 See the new section "A Push Parser" in the Bison manual for details.
c373bf8b 1717
59da312b
JD
1718 The current push parsing interface is experimental and may evolve. More user
1719 feedback will help to stabilize it.
1720
402b123d 1721** The -g and --graph options now output graphs in Graphviz DOT format,
8e55b3aa
JD
1722 not VCG format. Like --graph, -g now also takes an optional FILE argument
1723 and thus cannot be bundled with other short options.
c373bf8b 1724
402b123d 1725** Java
59da312b
JD
1726
1727 Bison can now generate an LALR(1) parser in Java. The skeleton is
e4ab1254 1728 "data/lalr1.java". Consider using the new %language directive instead of
59da312b
JD
1729 %skeleton to select it.
1730
e4ab1254 1731 See the new section "Java Parsers" in the Bison manual for details.
59da312b
JD
1732
1733 The current Java interface is experimental and may evolve. More user
1734 feedback will help to stabilize it.
2bd435c3 1735 Contributed by Paolo Bonzini.
59da312b 1736
402b123d 1737** %language
59da312b
JD
1738
1739 This new directive specifies the programming language of the generated
d43f77e7
PB
1740 parser, which can be C (the default), C++, or Java. Besides the skeleton
1741 that Bison uses, the directive affects the names of the generated files if
1742 the grammar file's name ends in ".y".
59da312b 1743
402b123d 1744** XML Automaton Report
59da312b
JD
1745
1746 Bison can now generate an XML report of the LALR(1) automaton using the new
e4ab1254 1747 "--xml" option. The current XML schema is experimental and may evolve. More
59da312b 1748 user feedback will help to stabilize it.
2bd435c3 1749 Contributed by Wojciech Polak.
c373bf8b 1750
402b123d 1751** The grammar file may now specify the name of the parser header file using
c373bf8b
JD
1752 %defines. For example:
1753
1754 %defines "parser.h"
1755
402b123d 1756** When reporting useless rules, useless nonterminals, and unused terminals,
d80fb37a
JD
1757 Bison now employs the terms "useless in grammar" instead of "useless",
1758 "useless in parser" instead of "never reduced", and "unused in grammar"
1759 instead of "unused".
cff03fb2 1760
402b123d 1761** Unreachable State Removal
c373bf8b
JD
1762
1763 Previously, Bison sometimes generated parser tables containing unreachable
31984206
JD
1764 states. A state can become unreachable during conflict resolution if Bison
1765 disables a shift action leading to it from a predecessor state. Bison now:
75ad86ee
JD
1766
1767 1. Removes unreachable states.
1768
1769 2. Does not report any conflicts that appeared in unreachable states.
1770 WARNING: As a result, you may need to update %expect and %expect-rr
1771 directives in existing grammar files.
1772
1773 3. For any rule used only in such states, Bison now reports the rule as
cff03fb2 1774 "useless in parser due to conflicts".
75ad86ee 1775
31984206
JD
1776 This feature can be disabled with the following directive:
1777
1778 %define lr.keep_unreachable_states
1779
e4ab1254 1780 See the %define entry in the "Bison Declaration Summary" in the Bison manual
31984206
JD
1781 for further discussion.
1782
e4ab1254 1783** Lookahead Set Correction in the ".output" Report
b1cc23c4 1784
e4ab1254
AD
1785 When instructed to generate a ".output" file including lookahead sets
1786 (using "--report=lookahead", for example), Bison now prints each reduction's
88c78747
JD
1787 lookahead set only next to the associated state's one item that (1) is
1788 associated with the same rule as the reduction and (2) has its dot at the end
1789 of its RHS. Previously, Bison also erroneously printed the lookahead set
1790 next to all of the state's other items associated with the same rule. This
e4ab1254 1791 bug affected only the ".output" file and not the generated parser source
88c78747
JD
1792 code.
1793
e4ab1254 1794** --report-file=FILE is a new option to override the default ".output" file
59da312b 1795 name.
1bb2bd75 1796
e4ab1254 1797** The "=" that used to be required in the following directives is now
02975b9a
JD
1798 deprecated:
1799
1800 %file-prefix "parser"
1801 %name-prefix "c_"
1802 %output "parser.c"
1803
e4ab1254 1804** An Alternative to "%{...%}" -- "%code QUALIFIER {CODE}"
c373bf8b
JD
1805
1806 Bison 2.3a provided a new set of directives as a more flexible alternative to
8e0a5e9e
JD
1807 the traditional Yacc prologue blocks. Those have now been consolidated into
1808 a single %code directive with an optional qualifier field, which identifies
1809 the purpose of the code and thus the location(s) where Bison should generate
1810 it:
1811
e4ab1254
AD
1812 1. "%code {CODE}" replaces "%after-header {CODE}"
1813 2. "%code requires {CODE}" replaces "%start-header {CODE}"
1814 3. "%code provides {CODE}" replaces "%end-header {CODE}"
1815 4. "%code top {CODE}" replaces "%before-header {CODE}"
8e0a5e9e 1816
e4ab1254
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1817 See the %code entries in section "Bison Declaration Summary" in the Bison
1818 manual for a summary of the new functionality. See the new section "Prologue
1819 Alternatives" for a detailed discussion including the advantages of %code
8e0a5e9e
JD
1820 over the traditional Yacc prologues.
1821
1822 The prologue alternatives are experimental. More user feedback will help to
1823 determine whether they should become permanent features.
1824
402b123d 1825** Revised warning: unset or unused mid-rule values
17bd8a73
JD
1826
1827 Since Bison 2.2, Bison has warned about mid-rule values that are set but not
1828 used within any of the actions of the parent rule. For example, Bison warns
1829 about unused $2 in:
1830
1831 exp: '1' { $$ = 1; } '+' exp { $$ = $1 + $4; };
1832
1833 Now, Bison also warns about mid-rule values that are used but not set. For
1834 example, Bison warns about unset $$ in the mid-rule action in:
1835
1836 exp: '1' { $1 = 1; } '+' exp { $$ = $2 + $4; };
1837
1838 However, Bison now disables both of these warnings by default since they
1839 sometimes prove to be false alarms in existing grammars employing the Yacc
1840 constructs $0 or $-N (where N is some positive integer).
1841
e4ab1254
AD
1842 To enable these warnings, specify the option "--warnings=midrule-values" or
1843 "-W", which is a synonym for "--warnings=all".
17bd8a73 1844
e4ab1254 1845** Default %destructor or %printer with "<*>" or "<>"
c373bf8b
JD
1846
1847 Bison now recognizes two separate kinds of default %destructor's and
12e35840
JD
1848 %printer's:
1849
e4ab1254 1850 1. Place "<*>" in a %destructor/%printer symbol list to define a default
12e35840
JD
1851 %destructor/%printer for all grammar symbols for which you have formally
1852 declared semantic type tags.
1853
e4ab1254 1854 2. Place "<>" in a %destructor/%printer symbol list to define a default
12e35840
JD
1855 %destructor/%printer for all grammar symbols without declared semantic
1856 type tags.
1857
e4ab1254
AD
1858 Bison no longer supports the "%symbol-default" notation from Bison 2.3a.
1859 "<*>" and "<>" combined achieve the same effect with one exception: Bison no
12e35840
JD
1860 longer applies any %destructor to a mid-rule value if that mid-rule value is
1861 not actually ever referenced using either $$ or $n in a semantic action.
1862
85894313
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1863 The default %destructor's and %printer's are experimental. More user
1864 feedback will help to determine whether they should become permanent
1865 features.
1866
e4ab1254 1867 See the section "Freeing Discarded Symbols" in the Bison manual for further
12e35840
JD
1868 details.
1869
402b123d 1870** %left, %right, and %nonassoc can now declare token numbers. This is required
e4ab1254 1871 by POSIX. However, see the end of section "Operator Precedence" in the Bison
ab7f29f8
JD
1872 manual for a caveat concerning the treatment of literal strings.
1873
402b123d 1874** The nonfunctional --no-parser, -n, and %no-parser options have been
b1cc23c4
JD
1875 completely removed from Bison.
1876
402b123d 1877* Changes in version 2.3a, 2006-09-13:
742e4900 1878
402b123d 1879** Instead of %union, you can define and use your own union type
ddc8ede1
PE
1880 YYSTYPE if your grammar contains at least one <type> tag.
1881 Your YYSTYPE need not be a macro; it can be a typedef.
1882 This change is for compatibility with other Yacc implementations,
1883 and is required by POSIX.
1884
402b123d 1885** Locations columns and lines start at 1.
cd48d21d
AD
1886 In accordance with the GNU Coding Standards and Emacs.
1887
402b123d 1888** You may now declare per-type and default %destructor's and %printer's:
ec5479ce
JD
1889
1890 For example:
1891
b2a0b7ca
JD
1892 %union { char *string; }
1893 %token <string> STRING1
1894 %token <string> STRING2
1895 %type <string> string1
1896 %type <string> string2
1897 %union { char character; }
1898 %token <character> CHR
1899 %type <character> chr
1900 %destructor { free ($$); } %symbol-default
1901 %destructor { free ($$); printf ("%d", @$.first_line); } STRING1 string1
1902 %destructor { } <character>
1903
1904 guarantees that, when the parser discards any user-defined symbol that has a
e4ab1254
AD
1905 semantic type tag other than "<character>", it passes its semantic value to
1906 "free". However, when the parser discards a "STRING1" or a "string1", it
1907 also prints its line number to "stdout". It performs only the second
1908 "%destructor" in this case, so it invokes "free" only once.
ec5479ce 1909
85894313
JD
1910 [Although we failed to mention this here in the 2.3a release, the default
1911 %destructor's and %printer's were experimental, and they were rewritten in
1912 future versions.]
1913
e4ab1254
AD
1914** Except for LALR(1) parsers in C with POSIX Yacc emulation enabled (with "-y",
1915 "--yacc", or "%yacc"), Bison no longer generates #define statements for
b931235e
JD
1916 associating token numbers with token names. Removing the #define statements
1917 helps to sanitize the global namespace during preprocessing, but POSIX Yacc
1918 requires them. Bison still generates an enum for token names in all cases.
1919
402b123d 1920** Handling of traditional Yacc prologue blocks is now more consistent but
34f98f46 1921 potentially incompatible with previous releases of Bison.
9bc0dd67
JD
1922
1923 As before, you declare prologue blocks in your grammar file with the
e4ab1254 1924 "%{ ... %}" syntax. To generate the pre-prologue, Bison concatenates all
34f98f46
JD
1925 prologue blocks that you've declared before the first %union. To generate
1926 the post-prologue, Bison concatenates all prologue blocks that you've
ddc8ede1 1927 declared after the first %union.
9bc0dd67 1928
34f98f46 1929 Previous releases of Bison inserted the pre-prologue into both the header
9bc0dd67
JD
1930 file and the code file in all cases except for LALR(1) parsers in C. In the
1931 latter case, Bison inserted it only into the code file. For parsers in C++,
1932 the point of insertion was before any token definitions (which associate
1933 token numbers with names). For parsers in C, the point of insertion was
1934 after the token definitions.
1935
1936 Now, Bison never inserts the pre-prologue into the header file. In the code
1937 file, it always inserts it before the token definitions.
1938
402b123d 1939** Bison now provides a more flexible alternative to the traditional Yacc
34f98f46
JD
1940 prologue blocks: %before-header, %start-header, %end-header, and
1941 %after-header.
1942
1943 For example, the following declaration order in the grammar file reflects the
1944 order in which Bison will output these code blocks. However, you are free to
1945 declare these code blocks in your grammar file in whatever order is most
1946 convenient for you:
1947
1948 %before-header {
1949 /* Bison treats this block like a pre-prologue block: it inserts it into
1950 * the code file before the contents of the header file. It does *not*
1951 * insert it into the header file. This is a good place to put
1952 * #include's that you want at the top of your code file. A common
e4ab1254 1953 * example is '#include "system.h"'. */
34f98f46
JD
1954 }
1955 %start-header {
1956 /* Bison inserts this block into both the header file and the code file.
1957 * In both files, the point of insertion is before any Bison-generated
1958 * token, semantic type, location type, and class definitions. This is a
1959 * good place to define %union dependencies, for example. */
9bc0dd67
JD
1960 }
1961 %union {
34f98f46
JD
1962 /* Unlike the traditional Yacc prologue blocks, the output order for the
1963 * new %*-header blocks is not affected by their declaration position
1964 * relative to any %union in the grammar file. */
9bc0dd67 1965 }
34f98f46
JD
1966 %end-header {
1967 /* Bison inserts this block into both the header file and the code file.
1968 * In both files, the point of insertion is after the Bison-generated
1969 * definitions. This is a good place to declare or define public
1970 * functions or data structures that depend on the Bison-generated
1971 * definitions. */
9bc0dd67 1972 }
34f98f46
JD
1973 %after-header {
1974 /* Bison treats this block like a post-prologue block: it inserts it into
1975 * the code file after the contents of the header file. It does *not*
1976 * insert it into the header file. This is a good place to declare or
1977 * define internal functions or data structures that depend on the
1978 * Bison-generated definitions. */
1979 }
1980
1981 If you have multiple occurrences of any one of the above declarations, Bison
1982 will concatenate the contents in declaration order.
9bc0dd67 1983
85894313
JD
1984 [Although we failed to mention this here in the 2.3a release, the prologue
1985 alternatives were experimental, and they were rewritten in future versions.]
1986
e4ab1254 1987** The option "--report=look-ahead" has been changed to "--report=lookahead".
9e6e7ed2
PE
1988 The old spelling still works, but is not documented and may be removed
1989 in a future release.
742e4900 1990
402b123d 1991* Changes in version 2.3, 2006-06-05:
4ad3ed84 1992
e4ab1254 1993** GLR grammars should now use "YYRECOVERING ()" instead of "YYRECOVERING",
4ad3ed84
PE
1994 for compatibility with LALR(1) grammars.
1995
402b123d 1996** It is now documented that any definition of YYSTYPE or YYLTYPE should
4ad3ed84
PE
1997 be to a type name that does not contain parentheses or brackets.
1998
402b123d 1999* Changes in version 2.2, 2006-05-19:
193d7c70 2000
402b123d 2001** The distribution terms for all Bison-generated parsers now permit
193d7c70
PE
2002 using the parsers in nonfree programs. Previously, this permission
2003 was granted only for Bison-generated LALR(1) parsers in C.
5f4236a0 2004
402b123d 2005** %name-prefix changes the namespace name in C++ outputs.
aa08666d 2006
402b123d 2007** The C++ parsers export their token_type.
5f4236a0 2008
402b123d 2009** Bison now allows multiple %union declarations, and concatenates
d6ca7905
PE
2010 their contents together.
2011
402b123d 2012** New warning: unused values
4d7bc38c
PE
2013 Right-hand side symbols whose values are not used are reported,
2014 if the symbols have destructors. For instance:
affac613 2015
8f3596a6 2016 exp: exp "?" exp ":" exp { $1 ? $1 : $3; }
e9690142
JD
2017 | exp "+" exp
2018 ;
affac613 2019
8f3596a6
AD
2020 will trigger a warning about $$ and $5 in the first rule, and $3 in
2021 the second ($1 is copied to $$ by the default rule). This example
4e26c69e 2022 most likely contains three errors, and could be rewritten as:
affac613 2023
4e26c69e 2024 exp: exp "?" exp ":" exp
e9690142
JD
2025 { $$ = $1 ? $3 : $5; free ($1 ? $5 : $3); free ($1); }
2026 | exp "+" exp
2027 { $$ = $1 ? $1 : $3; if ($1) free ($3); }
2028 ;
affac613 2029
4e26c69e
PE
2030 However, if the original actions were really intended, memory leaks
2031 and all, the warnings can be suppressed by letting Bison believe the
2032 values are used, e.g.:
721be13c 2033
8f3596a6 2034 exp: exp "?" exp ":" exp { $1 ? $1 : $3; (void) ($$, $5); }
e9690142
JD
2035 | exp "+" exp { $$ = $1; (void) $3; }
2036 ;
721be13c 2037
84866159
AD
2038 If there are mid-rule actions, the warning is issued if no action
2039 uses it. The following triggers no warning: $1 and $3 are used.
2040
2041 exp: exp { push ($1); } '+' exp { push ($3); sum (); };
2042
721be13c
PE
2043 The warning is intended to help catching lost values and memory leaks.
2044 If a value is ignored, its associated memory typically is not reclaimed.
affac613 2045
402b123d 2046** %destructor vs. YYABORT, YYACCEPT, and YYERROR.
9d9b8b70
PE
2047 Destructors are now called when user code invokes YYABORT, YYACCEPT,
2048 and YYERROR, for all objects on the stack, other than objects
2049 corresponding to the right-hand side of the current rule.
a85284cf 2050
402b123d 2051** %expect, %expect-rr
035aa4a0
PE
2052 Incorrect numbers of expected conflicts are now actual errors,
2053 instead of warnings.
2054
402b123d 2055** GLR, YACC parsers.
4e26c69e
PE
2056 The %parse-params are available in the destructors (and the
2057 experimental printers) as per the documentation.
4b367315 2058
e4ab1254 2059** Bison now warns if it finds a stray "$" or "@" in an action.
ad6a9b97 2060
402b123d 2061** %require "VERSION"
4e26c69e
PE
2062 This specifies that the grammar file depends on features implemented
2063 in Bison version VERSION or higher.
b50d2359 2064
402b123d 2065** lalr1.cc: The token and value types are now class members.
e14d0ab6
AD
2066 The tokens were defined as free form enums and cpp macros. YYSTYPE
2067 was defined as a free form union. They are now class members:
e4ab1254
AD
2068 tokens are enumerations of the "yy::parser::token" struct, and the
2069 semantic values have the "yy::parser::semantic_type" type.
fb9712a9
AD
2070
2071 If you do not want or can update to this scheme, the directive
e4ab1254 2072 '%define "global_tokens_and_yystype" "1"' triggers the global
b50d2359
AD
2073 definition of tokens and YYSTYPE. This change is suitable both
2074 for previous releases of Bison, and this one.
fb9712a9 2075
b50d2359 2076 If you wish to update, then make sure older version of Bison will
e4ab1254 2077 fail using '%require "2.2"'.
fb9712a9 2078
402b123d 2079** DJGPP support added.
193d7c70 2080\f
402b123d 2081* Changes in version 2.1, 2005-09-16:
1ce59070 2082
402b123d 2083** The C++ lalr1.cc skeleton supports %lex-param.
e14d0ab6 2084
402b123d 2085** Bison-generated parsers now support the translation of diagnostics like
baf785db
PE
2086 "syntax error" into languages other than English. The default
2087 language is still English. For details, please see the new
0410a6e0
PE
2088 Internationalization section of the Bison manual. Software
2089 distributors should also see the new PACKAGING file. Thanks to
2090 Bruno Haible for this new feature.
1ce59070 2091
402b123d 2092** Wording in the Bison-generated parsers has been changed slightly to
1a059451
PE
2093 simplify translation. In particular, the message "memory exhausted"
2094 has replaced "parser stack overflow", as the old message was not
2095 always accurate for modern Bison-generated parsers.
2096
402b123d 2097** Destructors are now called when the parser aborts, for all symbols left
258b75ca
PE
2098 behind on the stack. Also, the start symbol is now destroyed after a
2099 successful parse. In both cases, the behavior was formerly inconsistent.
2100
402b123d 2101** When generating verbose diagnostics, Bison-generated parsers no longer
72f000b0
PE
2102 quote the literal strings associated with tokens. For example, for
2103 a syntax error associated with '%token NUM "number"' they might
2104 print 'syntax error, unexpected number' instead of 'syntax error,
2105 unexpected "number"'.
193d7c70 2106\f
402b123d 2107* Changes in version 2.0, 2004-12-25:
efeed023 2108
402b123d 2109** Possibly-incompatible changes
d7e14fc0 2110
82de6b0d
PE
2111 - Bison-generated parsers no longer default to using the alloca function
2112 (when available) to extend the parser stack, due to widespread
2113 problems in unchecked stack-overflow detection. You can "#define
2114 YYSTACK_USE_ALLOCA 1" to require the use of alloca, but please read
2115 the manual to determine safe values for YYMAXDEPTH in that case.
8dd162d3 2116
82de6b0d
PE
2117 - Error token location.
2118 During error recovery, the location of the syntax error is updated
2119 to cover the whole sequence covered by the error token: it includes
2120 the shifted symbols thrown away during the first part of the error
2121 recovery, and the lookahead rejected during the second part.
18d192f0 2122
82de6b0d
PE
2123 - Semicolon changes:
2124 . Stray semicolons are no longer allowed at the start of a grammar.
2125 . Semicolons are now required after in-grammar declarations.
e342c3be 2126
82de6b0d
PE
2127 - Unescaped newlines are no longer allowed in character constants or
2128 string literals. They were never portable, and GCC 3.4.0 has
2129 dropped support for them. Better diagnostics are now generated if
2130 forget a closing quote.
8dd162d3 2131
82de6b0d 2132 - NUL bytes are no longer allowed in Bison string literals, unfortunately.
f74b6f91 2133
402b123d 2134** New features
1452af69 2135
82de6b0d 2136 - GLR grammars now support locations.
4febdd96 2137
82de6b0d
PE
2138 - New directive: %initial-action.
2139 This directive allows the user to run arbitrary code (including
2140 initializing @$) from yyparse before parsing starts.
1452af69 2141
82de6b0d
PE
2142 - A new directive "%expect-rr N" specifies the expected number of
2143 reduce/reduce conflicts in GLR parsers.
1452af69 2144
e4ab1254 2145 - %token numbers can now be hexadecimal integers, e.g., "%token FOO 0x12d".
82de6b0d 2146 This is a GNU extension.
4febdd96 2147
e4ab1254 2148 - The option "--report=lookahead" was changed to "--report=look-ahead".
9e6e7ed2 2149 [However, this was changed back after 2.3.]
1452af69 2150
82de6b0d 2151 - Experimental %destructor support has been added to lalr1.cc.
1452af69 2152
82de6b0d
PE
2153 - New configure option --disable-yacc, to disable installation of the
2154 yacc command and -ly library introduced in 1.875 for POSIX conformance.
6040d338 2155
402b123d 2156** Bug fixes
d5a3fe37 2157
82de6b0d
PE
2158 - For now, %expect-count violations are now just warnings, not errors.
2159 This is for compatibility with Bison 1.75 and earlier (when there are
2160 reduce/reduce conflicts) and with Bison 1.30 and earlier (when there
2161 are too many or too few shift/reduce conflicts). However, in future
2162 versions of Bison we plan to improve the %expect machinery so that
2163 these violations will become errors again.
3473d0f8 2164
82de6b0d
PE
2165 - Within Bison itself, numbers (e.g., goto numbers) are no longer
2166 arbitrarily limited to 16-bit counts.
d600ee67 2167
82de6b0d 2168 - Semicolons are now allowed before "|" in grammar rules, as POSIX requires.
d600ee67 2169\f
402b123d 2170* Changes in version 1.875, 2003-01-01:
963fcc17 2171
402b123d 2172** The documentation license has been upgraded to version 1.2
dc546b0f 2173 of the GNU Free Documentation License.
75eb3bc4 2174
402b123d 2175** syntax error processing
75eb3bc4 2176
dc546b0f
PE
2177 - In Yacc-style parsers YYLLOC_DEFAULT is now used to compute error
2178 locations too. This fixes bugs in error-location computation.
75eb3bc4 2179
dc546b0f
PE
2180 - %destructor
2181 It is now possible to reclaim the memory associated to symbols
2182 discarded during error recovery. This feature is still experimental.
20daca06 2183
dc546b0f
PE
2184 - %error-verbose
2185 This new directive is preferred over YYERROR_VERBOSE.
74724a70 2186
dc546b0f
PE
2187 - #defining yyerror to steal internal variables is discouraged.
2188 It is not guaranteed to work forever.
d1de5372 2189
402b123d 2190** POSIX conformance
d1de5372 2191
dc546b0f
PE
2192 - Semicolons are once again optional at the end of grammar rules.
2193 This reverts to the behavior of Bison 1.33 and earlier, and improves
2194 compatibility with Yacc.
74724a70 2195
e4ab1254
AD
2196 - "parse error" -> "syntax error"
2197 Bison now uniformly uses the term "syntax error"; formerly, the code
2198 and manual sometimes used the term "parse error" instead. POSIX
2199 requires "syntax error" in diagnostics, and it was thought better to
dc546b0f 2200 be consistent.
74724a70 2201
dc546b0f
PE
2202 - The documentation now emphasizes that yylex and yyerror must be
2203 declared before use. C99 requires this.
d1de5372 2204
dc546b0f
PE
2205 - Bison now parses C99 lexical constructs like UCNs and
2206 backslash-newline within C escape sequences, as POSIX 1003.1-2001 requires.
d1de5372 2207
dc546b0f
PE
2208 - File names are properly escaped in C output. E.g., foo\bar.y is
2209 output as "foo\\bar.y".
6780ca7a 2210
dc546b0f 2211 - Yacc command and library now available
e4ab1254 2212 The Bison distribution now installs a "yacc" command, as POSIX requires.
dc546b0f
PE
2213 Also, Bison now installs a small library liby.a containing
2214 implementations of Yacc-compatible yyerror and main functions.
2215 This library is normally not useful, but POSIX requires it.
6e649e65 2216
dc546b0f 2217 - Type clashes now generate warnings, not errors.
6e649e65 2218
dc546b0f
PE
2219 - If the user does not define YYSTYPE as a macro, Bison now declares it
2220 using typedef instead of defining it as a macro.
2221 For consistency, YYLTYPE is also declared instead of defined.
9501dc6e 2222
402b123d 2223** Other compatibility issues
886a425c 2224
e4ab1254
AD
2225 - %union directives can now have a tag before the "{", e.g., the
2226 directive "%union foo {...}" now generates the C code
2227 "typedef union foo { ... } YYSTYPE;"; this is for Yacc compatibility.
2228 The default union tag is "YYSTYPE", for compatibility with Solaris 9 Yacc.
2229 For consistency, YYLTYPE's struct tag is now "YYLTYPE" not "yyltype".
dc546b0f 2230 This is for compatibility with both Yacc and Bison 1.35.
72f889cc 2231
e4ab1254 2232 - ";" is output before the terminating "}" of an action, for
dc546b0f 2233 compatibility with Bison 1.35.
886a425c 2234
dc546b0f 2235 - Bison now uses a Yacc-style format for conflict reports, e.g.,
e4ab1254 2236 "conflicts: 2 shift/reduce, 1 reduce/reduce".
437c2d80 2237
e4ab1254 2238 - "yystype" and "yyltype" are now obsolescent macros instead of being
dc546b0f
PE
2239 typedefs or tags; they are no longer documented and are planned to be
2240 withdrawn in a future release.
2a8d363a 2241
402b123d 2242** GLR parser notes
2a8d363a 2243
dc546b0f
PE
2244 - GLR and inline
2245 Users of Bison have to decide how they handle the portability of the
e4ab1254 2246 C keyword "inline".
959e5f51 2247
e4ab1254
AD
2248 - "parsing stack overflow..." -> "parser stack overflow"
2249 GLR parsers now report "parser stack overflow" as per the Bison manual.
900c5db5 2250
18ad57b3
AD
2251** %parse-param and %lex-param
2252 The macros YYPARSE_PARAM and YYLEX_PARAM provide a means to pass
2253 additional context to yyparse and yylex. They suffer from several
2254 shortcomings:
2255
2256 - a single argument only can be added,
2257 - their types are weak (void *),
242cc08e 2258 - this context is not passed to ancillary functions such as yyerror,
18ad57b3
AD
2259 - only yacc.c parsers support them.
2260
2261 The new %parse-param/%lex-param directives provide a more precise control.
2262 For instance:
2263
2264 %parse-param {int *nastiness}
2265 %lex-param {int *nastiness}
2266 %parse-param {int *randomness}
2267
2268 results in the following signatures:
2269
2270 int yylex (int *nastiness);
2271 int yyparse (int *nastiness, int *randomness);
2272
2273 or, if both %pure-parser and %locations are used:
2274
2275 int yylex (YYSTYPE *lvalp, YYLTYPE *llocp, int *nastiness);
2276 int yyparse (int *nastiness, int *randomness);
2277
402b123d 2278** Bison now warns if it detects conflicting outputs to the same file,
e4ab1254 2279 e.g., it generates a warning for "bison -d -o foo.h foo.y" since
dc546b0f 2280 that command outputs both code and header to foo.h.
6e40b4eb 2281
402b123d 2282** #line in output files
dc546b0f 2283 - --no-line works properly.
6e40b4eb 2284
402b123d 2285** Bison can no longer be built by a K&R C compiler; it requires C89 or
6e40b4eb
AD
2286 later to be built. This change originally took place a few versions
2287 ago, but nobody noticed until we recently asked someone to try
2288 building Bison with a K&R C compiler.
d600ee67 2289\f
402b123d 2290* Changes in version 1.75, 2002-10-14:
7933f2b5 2291
402b123d 2292** Bison should now work on 64-bit hosts.
7933f2b5 2293
402b123d 2294** Indonesian translation thanks to Tedi Heriyanto.
7933f2b5 2295
402b123d 2296** GLR parsers
f50adbbd
AD
2297 Fix spurious parse errors.
2298
402b123d 2299** Pure parsers
f50adbbd
AD
2300 Some people redefine yyerror to steal yyparse' private variables.
2301 Reenable this trick until an official feature replaces it.
2302
402b123d 2303** Type Clashes
d90c934c
AD
2304 In agreement with POSIX and with other Yaccs, leaving a default
2305 action is valid when $$ is untyped, and $1 typed:
2306
e9690142 2307 untyped: ... typed;
d90c934c
AD
2308
2309 but the converse remains an error:
2310
e9690142 2311 typed: ... untyped;
d90c934c 2312
402b123d 2313** Values of mid-rule actions
d90c934c
AD
2314 The following code:
2315
e9690142 2316 foo: { ... } { $$ = $1; } ...
d90c934c
AD
2317
2318 was incorrectly rejected: $1 is defined in the second mid-rule
2319 action, and is equal to the $$ of the first mid-rule action.
d600ee67 2320\f
402b123d 2321* Changes in version 1.50, 2002-10-04:
adc8c848 2322
402b123d 2323** GLR parsing
676385e2
PH
2324 The declaration
2325 %glr-parser
2326 causes Bison to produce a Generalized LR (GLR) parser, capable of handling
2327 almost any context-free grammar, ambiguous or not. The new declarations
e8832397 2328 %dprec and %merge on grammar rules allow parse-time resolution of
676385e2
PH
2329 ambiguities. Contributed by Paul Hilfinger.
2330
7933f2b5 2331 Unfortunately Bison 1.50 does not work properly on 64-bit hosts
420f93c8
PE
2332 like the Alpha, so please stick to 32-bit hosts for now.
2333
402b123d 2334** Output Directory
8c165d89 2335 When not in Yacc compatibility mode, when the output file was not
e4ab1254
AD
2336 specified, running "bison foo/bar.y" created "foo/bar.c". It
2337 now creates "bar.c".
8c165d89 2338
402b123d 2339** Undefined token
007a50a4 2340 The undefined token was systematically mapped to 2 which prevented
e88dbdbf 2341 the use of 2 by the user. This is no longer the case.
007a50a4 2342
402b123d 2343** Unknown token numbers
e88dbdbf 2344 If yylex returned an out of range value, yyparse could die. This is
007a50a4
AD
2345 no longer the case.
2346
402b123d 2347** Error token
e88dbdbf 2348 According to POSIX, the error token must be 256.
23c5a174
AD
2349 Bison extends this requirement by making it a preference: *if* the
2350 user specified that one of her tokens is numbered 256, then error
2351 will be mapped onto another number.
2352
402b123d 2353** Verbose error messages
e4ab1254 2354 They no longer report "..., expecting error or..." for states where
217598da
AD
2355 error recovery is possible.
2356
402b123d 2357** End token
e4ab1254 2358 Defaults to "$end" instead of "$".
217598da 2359
402b123d 2360** Error recovery now conforms to documentation and to POSIX
68cd8af3
PE
2361 When a Bison-generated parser encounters a syntax error, it now pops
2362 the stack until it finds a state that allows shifting the error
2363 token. Formerly, it popped the stack until it found a state that
2364 allowed some non-error action other than a default reduction on the
2365 error token. The new behavior has long been the documented behavior,
2366 and has long been required by POSIX. For more details, please see
337116ba
PE
2367 Paul Eggert, "Reductions during Bison error handling" (2002-05-20)
2368 <http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/bug-bison/2002-05/msg00038.html>.
68cd8af3 2369
402b123d 2370** Traces
5504898e
AD
2371 Popped tokens and nonterminals are now reported.
2372
402b123d 2373** Larger grammars
a861a339
PE
2374 Larger grammars are now supported (larger token numbers, larger grammar
2375 size (= sum of the LHS and RHS lengths), larger LALR tables).
2376 Formerly, many of these numbers ran afoul of 16-bit limits;
2377 now these limits are 32 bits on most hosts.
355e7c1c 2378
402b123d 2379** Explicit initial rule
643a5994
AD
2380 Bison used to play hacks with the initial rule, which the user does
2381 not write. It is now explicit, and visible in the reports and
2382 graphs as rule 0.
23c5a174 2383
402b123d 2384** Useless rules
643a5994 2385 Before, Bison reported the useless rules, but, although not used,
77714df2 2386 included them in the parsers. They are now actually removed.
23c5a174 2387
402b123d 2388** Useless rules, useless nonterminals
6b98e4b5
AD
2389 They are now reported, as a warning, with their locations.
2390
402b123d 2391** Rules never reduced
e8832397
AD
2392 Rules that can never be reduced because of conflicts are now
2393 reported.
2394
e4ab1254 2395** Incorrect "Token not used"
11652ab3
AD
2396 On a grammar such as
2397
e29f0771
AD
2398 %token useless useful
2399 %%
2400 exp: '0' %prec useful;
11652ab3
AD
2401
2402 where a token was used to set the precedence of the last rule,
e4ab1254 2403 bison reported both "useful" and "useless" as useless tokens.
11652ab3 2404
402b123d 2405** Revert the C++ namespace changes introduced in 1.31
77714df2 2406 as they caused too many portability hassles.
0179dd65 2407
402b123d 2408** Default locations
b2d52318
AD
2409 By an accident of design, the default computation of @$ was
2410 performed after another default computation was performed: @$ = @1.
2411 The latter is now removed: YYLLOC_DEFAULT is fully responsible of
2412 the computation of @$.
adc8c848 2413
402b123d 2414** Token end-of-file
b7c49edf
AD
2415 The token end of file may be specified by the user, in which case,
2416 the user symbol is used in the reports, the graphs, and the verbose
e4ab1254 2417 error messages instead of "$end", which remains being the default.
b7c49edf 2418 For instance
e29f0771 2419 %token MYEOF 0
b7c49edf 2420 or
e29f0771 2421 %token MYEOF 0 "end of file"
fdbcd8e2 2422
402b123d 2423** Semantic parser
fdbcd8e2
AD
2424 This old option, which has been broken for ages, is removed.
2425
402b123d 2426** New translations
a861a339 2427 Brazilian Portuguese, thanks to Alexandre Folle de Menezes.
84614e13
AD
2428 Croatian, thanks to Denis Lackovic.
2429
402b123d 2430** Incorrect token definitions
e4ab1254
AD
2431 When given
2432 %token 'a' "A"
2433 bison used to output
2434 #define 'a' 65
b87f8b21 2435
402b123d 2436** Token definitions as enums
77714df2
AD
2437 Tokens are output both as the traditional #define's, and, provided
2438 the compiler supports ANSI C or is a C++ compiler, as enums.
e88dbdbf 2439 This lets debuggers display names instead of integers.
77714df2 2440
402b123d 2441** Reports
ec3bc396
AD
2442 In addition to --verbose, bison supports --report=THINGS, which
2443 produces additional information:
b408954b
AD
2444 - itemset
2445 complete the core item sets with their closure
e4ab1254 2446 - lookahead [changed to "look-ahead" in 1.875e through 2.3, but changed back]
9e6e7ed2 2447 explicitly associate lookahead tokens to items
b408954b
AD
2448 - solved
2449 describe shift/reduce conflicts solving.
2450 Bison used to systematically output this information on top of
2451 the report. Solved conflicts are now attached to their states.
ec3bc396 2452
402b123d 2453** Type clashes
9af3fbce
AD
2454 Previous versions don't complain when there is a type clash on
2455 the default action if the rule has a mid-rule action, such as in:
2456
e29f0771
AD
2457 %type <foo> bar
2458 %%
2459 bar: '0' {} '0';
9af3fbce
AD
2460
2461 This is fixed.
a861a339 2462
402b123d 2463** GNU M4 is now required when using Bison.
f987e9d2 2464\f
402b123d 2465* Changes in version 1.35, 2002-03-25:
76551463 2466
402b123d 2467** C Skeleton
76551463
AD
2468 Some projects use Bison's C parser with C++ compilers, and define
2469 YYSTYPE as a class. The recent adjustment of C parsers for data
2470 alignment and 64 bit architectures made this impossible.
2471
2472 Because for the time being no real solution for C++ parser
2473 generation exists, kludges were implemented in the parser to
2474 maintain this use. In the future, when Bison has C++ parsers, this
2475 kludge will be disabled.
2476
2477 This kludge also addresses some C++ problems when the stack was
2478 extended.
76551463 2479\f
402b123d 2480* Changes in version 1.34, 2002-03-12:
76551463 2481
402b123d 2482** File name clashes are detected
76551463 2483 $ bison foo.y -d -o foo.x
e4ab1254 2484 fatal error: header and parser would both be named "foo.x"
76551463 2485
e4ab1254 2486** A missing ";" at the end of a rule triggers a warning
76551463
AD
2487 In accordance with POSIX, and in agreement with other
2488 Yacc implementations, Bison will mandate this semicolon in the near
2489 future. This eases the implementation of a Bison parser of Bison
2490 grammars by making this grammar LALR(1) instead of LR(2). To
2491 facilitate the transition, this release introduces a warning.
2492
402b123d 2493** Revert the C++ namespace changes introduced in 1.31, as they caused too
76551463
AD
2494 many portability hassles.
2495
402b123d 2496** DJGPP support added.
76551463 2497
402b123d 2498** Fix test suite portability problems.
76551463 2499\f
402b123d 2500* Changes in version 1.33, 2002-02-07:
76551463 2501
402b123d 2502** Fix C++ issues
76551463
AD
2503 Groff could not be compiled for the definition of size_t was lacking
2504 under some conditions.
2505
402b123d 2506** Catch invalid @n
76551463
AD
2507 As is done with $n.
2508\f
402b123d 2509* Changes in version 1.32, 2002-01-23:
76551463 2510
402b123d 2511** Fix Yacc output file names
76551463 2512
402b123d 2513** Portability fixes
76551463 2514
402b123d 2515** Italian, Dutch translations
76551463 2516\f
402b123d 2517* Changes in version 1.31, 2002-01-14:
52d1aeee 2518
402b123d 2519** Many Bug Fixes
52d1aeee 2520
402b123d 2521** GNU Gettext and %expect
52d1aeee
MA
2522 GNU Gettext asserts 10 s/r conflicts, but there are 7. Now that
2523 Bison dies on incorrect %expectations, we fear there will be
2524 too many bug reports for Gettext, so _for the time being_, %expect
e4ab1254 2525 does not trigger an error when the input file is named "plural.y".
52d1aeee 2526
402b123d 2527** Use of alloca in parsers
52d1aeee
MA
2528 If YYSTACK_USE_ALLOCA is defined to 0, then the parsers will use
2529 malloc exclusively. Since 1.29, but was not NEWS'ed.
2530
2531 alloca is used only when compiled with GCC, to avoid portability
2532 problems as on AIX.
2533
402b123d 2534** yyparse now returns 2 if memory is exhausted; formerly it dumped core.
b47dbebe 2535
402b123d 2536** When the generated parser lacks debugging code, YYDEBUG is now 0
52d1aeee
MA
2537 (as POSIX requires) instead of being undefined.
2538
402b123d 2539** User Actions
52d1aeee
MA
2540 Bison has always permitted actions such as { $$ = $1 }: it adds the
2541 ending semicolon. Now if in Yacc compatibility mode, the semicolon
2542 is no longer output: one has to write { $$ = $1; }.
2543
402b123d 2544** Better C++ compliance
52d1aeee 2545 The output parsers try to respect C++ namespaces.
76551463 2546 [This turned out to be a failed experiment, and it was reverted later.]
52d1aeee 2547
402b123d 2548** Reduced Grammars
52d1aeee
MA
2549 Fixed bugs when reporting useless nonterminals.
2550
402b123d 2551** 64 bit hosts
52d1aeee
MA
2552 The parsers work properly on 64 bit hosts.
2553
402b123d 2554** Error messages
52d1aeee
MA
2555 Some calls to strerror resulted in scrambled or missing error messages.
2556
402b123d 2557** %expect
52d1aeee
MA
2558 When the number of shift/reduce conflicts is correct, don't issue
2559 any warning.
2560
402b123d 2561** The verbose report includes the rule line numbers.
52d1aeee 2562
402b123d 2563** Rule line numbers are fixed in traces.
52d1aeee 2564
402b123d 2565** Swedish translation
52d1aeee 2566
402b123d 2567** Parse errors
52d1aeee
MA
2568 Verbose parse error messages from the parsers are better looking.
2569 Before: parse error: unexpected `'/'', expecting `"number"' or `'-'' or `'(''
2570 Now: parse error: unexpected '/', expecting "number" or '-' or '('
2571
402b123d 2572** Fixed parser memory leaks.
52d1aeee
MA
2573 When the generated parser was using malloc to extend its stacks, the
2574 previous allocations were not freed.
2575
402b123d 2576** Fixed verbose output file.
52d1aeee
MA
2577 Some newlines were missing.
2578 Some conflicts in state descriptions were missing.
2579
402b123d 2580** Fixed conflict report.
52d1aeee
MA
2581 Option -v was needed to get the result.
2582
402b123d 2583** %expect
52d1aeee
MA
2584 Was not used.
2585 Mismatches are errors, not warnings.
2586
402b123d 2587** Fixed incorrect processing of some invalid input.
52d1aeee 2588
402b123d 2589** Fixed CPP guards: 9foo.h uses BISON_9FOO_H instead of 9FOO_H.
52d1aeee 2590
402b123d 2591** Fixed some typos in the documentation.
52d1aeee 2592
402b123d 2593** %token MY_EOF 0 is supported.
52d1aeee
MA
2594 Before, MY_EOF was silently renumbered as 257.
2595
402b123d 2596** doc/refcard.tex is updated.
52d1aeee 2597
402b123d 2598** %output, %file-prefix, %name-prefix.
52d1aeee
MA
2599 New.
2600
402b123d 2601** --output
e4ab1254 2602 New, aliasing "--output-file".
52d1aeee 2603\f
402b123d 2604* Changes in version 1.30, 2001-10-26:
342b8b6e 2605
e4ab1254
AD
2606** "--defines" and "--graph" have now an optional argument which is the
2607 output file name. "-d" and "-g" do not change; they do not take any
342b8b6e
AD
2608 argument.
2609
e4ab1254 2610** "%source_extension" and "%header_extension" are removed, failed
342b8b6e
AD
2611 experiment.
2612
402b123d 2613** Portability fixes.
f987e9d2 2614\f
402b123d 2615* Changes in version 1.29, 2001-09-07:
342b8b6e 2616
402b123d 2617** The output file does not define const, as this caused problems when used
342b8b6e
AD
2618 with common autoconfiguration schemes. If you still use ancient compilers
2619 that lack const, compile with the equivalent of the C compiler option
e4ab1254 2620 "-Dconst=". Autoconf's AC_C_CONST macro provides one way to do this.
342b8b6e 2621
e4ab1254 2622** Added "-g" and "--graph".
f87a2205 2623
402b123d 2624** The Bison manual is now distributed under the terms of the GNU FDL.
f2b5126e 2625
402b123d 2626** The input and the output files has automatically a similar extension.
234a3be3 2627
402b123d 2628** Russian translation added.
f87a2205 2629
402b123d 2630** NLS support updated; should hopefully be less troublesome.
f87a2205 2631
402b123d 2632** Added the old Bison reference card.
c33638bb 2633
e4ab1254 2634** Added "--locations" and "%locations".
6deb4447 2635
e4ab1254 2636** Added "-S" and "--skeleton".
cd5bd6ac 2637
e4ab1254 2638** "%raw", "-r", "--raw" is disabled.
62ab6972 2639
402b123d 2640** Special characters are escaped when output. This solves the problems
cd5bd6ac
AD
2641 of the #line lines with path names including backslashes.
2642
402b123d 2643** New directives.
e4ab1254
AD
2644 "%yacc", "%fixed_output_files", "%defines", "%no_parser", "%verbose",
2645 "%debug", "%source_extension" and "%header_extension".
f987e9d2 2646
402b123d 2647** @$
f987e9d2 2648 Automatic location tracking.
f87a2205 2649\f
402b123d 2650* Changes in version 1.28, 1999-07-06:
d2e00347 2651
402b123d 2652** Should compile better now with K&R compilers.
d2e00347 2653
402b123d 2654** Added NLS.
d2e00347 2655
402b123d 2656** Fixed a problem with escaping the double quote character.
d2e00347 2657
402b123d 2658** There is now a FAQ.
d2e00347 2659\f
402b123d 2660* Changes in version 1.27:
5c31c3c2 2661
402b123d 2662** The make rule which prevented bison.simple from being created on
5c31c3c2
JT
2663 some systems has been fixed.
2664\f
402b123d 2665* Changes in version 1.26:
4be07551 2666
7e508a2b 2667** Bison now uses Automake.
4be07551 2668
402b123d 2669** New mailing lists: <bug-bison@gnu.org> and <help-bison@gnu.org>.
4be07551 2670
402b123d 2671** Token numbers now start at 257 as previously documented, not 258.
4be07551 2672
402b123d 2673** Bison honors the TMPDIR environment variable.
4be07551 2674
402b123d 2675** A couple of buffer overruns have been fixed.
f51dbca1 2676
402b123d 2677** Problems when closing files should now be reported.
f51dbca1 2678
402b123d 2679** Generated parsers should now work even on operating systems which do
f51dbca1 2680 not provide alloca().
4be07551 2681\f
402b123d 2682* Changes in version 1.25, 1995-10-16:
df8878c5 2683
402b123d 2684** Errors in the input grammar are not fatal; Bison keeps reading
df8878c5 2685the grammar file, and reports all the errors found in it.
8c44d3ec 2686
402b123d 2687** Tokens can now be specified as multiple-character strings: for
df8878c5 2688example, you could use "<=" for a token which looks like <=, instead
7e508a2b 2689of choosing a name like LESSEQ.
df8878c5 2690
402b123d 2691** The %token_table declaration says to write a table of tokens (names
df8878c5
RS
2692and numbers) into the parser file. The yylex function can use this
2693table to recognize multiple-character string tokens, or for other
2694purposes.
2695
402b123d 2696** The %no_lines declaration says not to generate any #line preprocessor
df8878c5
RS
2697directives in the parser file.
2698
402b123d 2699** The %raw declaration says to use internal Bison token numbers, not
df8878c5
RS
2700Yacc-compatible token numbers, when token names are defined as macros.
2701
402b123d 2702** The --no-parser option produces the parser tables without including
df8878c5
RS
2703the parser engine; a project can now use its own parser engine.
2704The actions go into a separate file called NAME.act, in the form of
2705a switch statement body.
2706\f
402b123d 2707* Changes in version 1.23:
6780ca7a 2708
4d019228
DM
2709The user can define YYPARSE_PARAM as the name of an argument to be
2710passed into yyparse. The argument should have type void *. It should
2711actually point to an object. Grammar actions can access the variable
2712by casting it to the proper pointer type.
6780ca7a 2713
6780ca7a 2714Line numbers in output file corrected.
6780ca7a 2715\f
402b123d 2716* Changes in version 1.22:
6780ca7a
DM
2717
2718--help option added.
6780ca7a 2719\f
402b123d 2720* Changes in version 1.20:
6780ca7a
DM
2721
2722Output file does not redefine const for C++.
9f4503d6 2723
76551463
AD
2724-----
2725
fc51acdd 2726Copyright (C) 1995-2014 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
76551463 2727
74553c98 2728This file is part of Bison, the GNU Parser Generator.
76551463 2729
f16b0819 2730This program is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify
76551463 2731it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
f16b0819
PE
2732the Free Software Foundation, either version 3 of the License, or
2733(at your option) any later version.
76551463 2734
f16b0819 2735This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
76551463
AD
2736but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
2737MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the
2738GNU General Public License for more details.
2739
2740You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
f16b0819 2741along with this program. If not, see <http://www.gnu.org/licenses/>.
7e508a2b
AD
2742
2743 LocalWords: yacc YYBACKUP glr GCC lalr ArrayIndexOutOfBoundsException nullptr
2744 LocalWords: cplusplus liby rpl fprintf mfcalc Wyacc stmt cond expr mk sym lr
2745 LocalWords: IELR ielr Lookahead YYERROR nonassoc LALR's api lookaheads yychar
2746 LocalWords: destructor lookahead YYRHSLOC YYLLOC Rhs ifndef YYFAIL cpp sr rr
2747 LocalWords: preprocessor initializer Wno Wnone Werror FreeBSD prec livelocks
2748 LocalWords: Solaris AIX UX RHEL Tru LHS gcc's Wundef YYENABLE NLS YYLTYPE VCG
2749 LocalWords: yyerror cpp's Wunused yylval yylloc prepend yyparse yylex yypush
2750 LocalWords: Graphviz xml nonterminals midrule destructor's YYSTYPE typedef ly
2751 LocalWords: CHR chr printf stdout namespace preprocessing enum pre include's
2752 LocalWords: YYRECOVERING nonfree destructors YYABORT YYACCEPT params enums de
2753 LocalWords: struct yystype DJGPP lex param Haible NUM alloca YYSTACK NUL goto
2754 LocalWords: YYMAXDEPTH Unescaped UCNs YYLTYPE's yyltype typedefs inline Yaccs
2755 LocalWords: Heriyanto Reenable dprec Hilfinger Eggert MYEOF Folle Menezes EOF
242cc08e 2756 LocalWords: Lackovic define's itemset Groff Gettext malloc NEWS'ed YYDEBUG YY
7e508a2b 2757 LocalWords: namespaces strerror const autoconfiguration Dconst Autoconf's FDL
242cc08e
AD
2758 LocalWords: Automake TMPDIR LESSEQ ylwrap endif yydebug YYTOKEN YYLSP ival hh
2759 LocalWords: extern YYTOKENTYPE TOKENTYPE yytokentype tokentype STYPE lval pdf
dcb366b1 2760 LocalWords: lang yyoutput dvi html ps POSIX lvalp llocp Wother nterm arg init
1282c124
AD
2761 LocalWords: TOK calc yyo fval Wconflicts parsers yystackp yyval yynerrs
2762 LocalWords: Théophile Ranquet Santet fno fnone stype associativity Tolmer
2763 LocalWords: Wprecedence Rassoul Wempty Paolo Bonzini parser's Michiel loc
2764 LocalWords: redeclaration sval fcaret reentrant XSLT xsl Wmaybe yyvsp Tedi
2765 LocalWords: pragmas noreturn untyped Rozenman unexpanded Wojciech Polak
6574576c 2766 LocalWords: Alexandre MERCHANTABILITY yytype
7e508a2b
AD
2767
2768Local Variables:
2769mode: outline
e4ab1254 2770fill-column: 76
7e508a2b 2771End: