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cpp: improve the Flex version checking macro
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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
7 Warnings about uninitialized yylloc in yyparse have been fixed.
8
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9** %language is no longer an experimental feature.
10
11 The introduction of this feature, in 2.4, was four years ago. The --language
12 option and the %language directive are no longer experimental.
13
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14** New format for error reports: carets
15
16 Caret errors have been added to Bison, for example (taken from the
17 documentation):
18
19 input.y:3.20-23: error: ambiguous reference: '$exp'
20 exp: exp '+' exp { $exp = $1 + $2; };
21 ^^^^
22
23 The default behaviour for now is still not to display these unless explictly
24 asked with -fall of -fcaret. However, in a later release, it will be made the
25 default behavior (but may still be deactivated with -fno-caret).
26
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27** New value for %define variable: api.pure full
28
29 The %define variable api.pure requests a pure (reentrant) parser. However,
30 for historical reasons, using it in a location-tracking Yacc parser resulted
31 in an yyerror function that did not take a location as a parameter. With this
32 new value, the user may request a better pure parser, where yyerror does take
33 a location as a parameter (in location-tracking parsers).
34
35 The use of "%define api.pure true" is deprecated in favor of this new
36 "%define api.pure full".
37
5a05f42e 38** Changes in the format of error messages
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39
40 This used to be the format of many error reports:
41
42 foo.y:5.10-24: result type clash on merge function 'merge': <t3> != <t2>
43 foo.y:4.13-27: previous declaration
44
45 It is now:
46
47 foo.y:5.10-25: result type clash on merge function 'merge': <t3> != <t2>
48 foo.y:4.13-27: previous declaration
49
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50** Exception safety (lalr1.cc)
51
52 The parse function now catches exceptions, uses the %destructors to
53 release memory (the lookahead symbol and the symbols pushed on the stack)
7287be84 54 before re-throwing the exception.
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55
56 This feature is somewhat experimental. User feedback would be
57 appreciated.
58
7287be84 59** New %define variable: api.location.type (glr.cc, lalr1.cc, lalr1.java)
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60
61 The %define variable api.location.type defines the name of the type to use
62 for locations. When defined, Bison no longer generates the position.hh
63 and location.hh files, nor does the parser will include them: the user is
64 then responsible to define her type.
65
66 This can be used in programs with several parsers to factor their location
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67 and position files: let one of them generate them, and the others just use
68 them.
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69
70 This feature was actually introduced, but not documented, in Bison 2.5,
71 under the name "location_type" (which is maintained for backward
72 compatibility).
73
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74 For consistency, lalr1.java's %define variables location_type and
75 position_type are deprecated in favor of api.location.type and
76 api.position.type.
77
9c16d399 78** Graph improvements in DOT and XSLT
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79
80 The graphical presentation of the states is more readable: their shape is
81 now rectangular, the state number is clearly displayed, and the items are
82 numbered and left-justified.
83
84 The reductions are now explicitly represented as transitions to other
85 diamond shaped nodes.
86
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87 These changes are present in both --graph output and xml2dot.xsl XSLT
88 processing, with minor (documented) differences.
89
90 Two nodes were added to the documentation: Xml and Graphviz.
91
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92** Documentation
93
94 The sections about shift/reduce and reduce/reduce conflicts resolution
95 have been fixed and extended.
9d2423f5 96
9d3f7eaf 97* Noteworthy changes in release 2.6.5 (2012-11-07) [stable]
6f1360bd 98
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99 We consider compiler warnings about Bison generated parsers to be bugs.
100 Rather than working around them in your own project, please consider
101 reporting them to us.
102
103** Bug fixes
104
105 Warnings about uninitialized yylval and/or yylloc for push parsers with a
106 pure interface have been fixed for GCC 4.0 up to 4.8, and Clang 2.9 to
107 3.2.
108
109 Other issues in the test suite have been addressed.
6f1360bd 110
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111 Nul characters are correctly displayed in error messages.
112
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113 When possible, yylloc is correctly initialized before calling yylex. It
114 is no longer necessary to initialize it in the %initial-action.
115
0ac15849 116* Noteworthy changes in release 2.6.4 (2012-10-23) [stable]
a4eb820f 117
468455e1 118 Bison 2.6.3's --version was incorrect. This release fixes this issue.
a4eb820f 119
6eb8f74f 120* Noteworthy changes in release 2.6.3 (2012-10-22) [stable]
933ec544 121
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122** Bug fixes
123
9a50c55a 124 Bugs and portability issues in the test suite have been fixed.
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125
126 Some errors in translations have been addressed, and --help now directs
127 users to the appropriate place to report them.
128
129 Stray Info files shipped by accident are removed.
130
131 Incorrect definitions of YY_, issued by yacc.c when no parser header is
132 generated, are removed.
933ec544 133
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134 All the generated headers are self-contained.
135
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136** Header guards (yacc.c, glr.c, glr.cc)
137
138 In order to avoid collisions, the header guards are now
139 YY_<PREFIX>_<FILE>_INCLUDED, instead of merely <PREFIX>_<FILE>.
140 For instance the header generated from
141
142 %define api.prefix "calc"
143 %defines "lib/parse.h"
144
145 will use YY_CALC_LIB_PARSE_H_INCLUDED as guard.
146
7b70847e 147** Fix compiler warnings in the generated parser (yacc.c, glr.c)
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148
149 The compilation of pure parsers (%define api.pure) can trigger GCC
150 warnings such as:
151
152 input.c: In function 'yyparse':
153 input.c:1503:12: warning: 'yylval' may be used uninitialized in this
154 function [-Wmaybe-uninitialized]
155 *++yyvsp = yylval;
156 ^
157
158 This is now fixed; pragmas to avoid these warnings are no longer needed.
159
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160 Warnings from clang ("equality comparison with extraneous parentheses" and
161 "function declared 'noreturn' should not return") have also been
162 addressed.
163
e1eeecd3 164* Noteworthy changes in release 2.6.2 (2012-08-03) [stable]
9c26b8fc 165
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166** Bug fixes
167
168 Buffer overruns, complaints from Flex, and portability issues in the test
169 suite have been fixed.
170
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171** Spaces in %lex- and %parse-param (lalr1.cc, glr.cc)
172
173 Trailing end-of-lines in %parse-param or %lex-param would result in
174 invalid C++. This is fixed.
9c26b8fc 175
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176** Spurious spaces and end-of-lines
177
178 The generated files no longer end (nor start) with empty lines.
179
77b214ef 180* Noteworthy changes in release 2.6.1 (2012-07-30) [stable]
a4107f24 181
cbaea010 182 Bison no longer executes user-specified M4 code when processing a grammar.
8617d87e 183
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184** Future Changes
185
186 In addition to the removal of the features announced in Bison 2.6, the
187 next major release will remove the "Temporary hack for adding a semicolon
188 to the user action", as announced in the release 2.5. Instead of:
189
190 exp: exp "+" exp { $$ = $1 + $3 };
191
192 write:
193
194 exp: exp "+" exp { $$ = $1 + $3; };
195
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196** Bug fixes
197
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198*** Type names are now properly escaped.
199
200*** glr.cc: set_debug_level and debug_level work as expected.
a4107f24 201
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202*** Stray @ or $ in actions
203
204 While Bison used to warn about stray $ or @ in action rules, it did not
205 for other actions such as printers, destructors, or initial actions. It
206 now does.
207
cd735a8c 208** Type names in actions
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209
210 For consistency with rule actions, it is now possible to qualify $$ by a
cd735a8c 211 type-name in destructors, printers, and initial actions. For instance:
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212
213 %printer { fprintf (yyo, "(%d, %f)", $<ival>$, $<fval>$); } <*> <>;
214
215 will display two values for each typed and untyped symbol (provided
cd735a8c 216 that YYSTYPE has both "ival" and "fval" fields).
4982f078 217
1505e8bb 218* Noteworthy changes in release 2.6 (2012-07-19) [stable]
ad6b775f 219
c2425191 220** Future Changes
0f11eec2 221
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222 The next major release of Bison will drop support for the following
223 deprecated features. Please report disagreements to bug-bison@gnu.org.
0f11eec2 224
aaf61036 225*** K&R C parsers
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226
227 Support for generating parsers in K&R C will be removed. Parsers
242cc08e 228 generated for C support ISO C90, and are tested with ISO C99 and ISO C11
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229 compilers.
230
258cddbc 231*** Features deprecated since Bison 1.875
55d1006f 232
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233 The definitions of yystype and yyltype will be removed; use YYSTYPE and
234 YYLTYPE.
55d1006f 235
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236 YYPARSE_PARAM and YYLEX_PARAM, deprecated in favor of %parse-param and
237 %lex-param, will no longer be supported.
238
239 Support for the preprocessor symbol YYERROR_VERBOSE will be removed, use
240 %error-verbose.
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241
242*** The generated header will be included (yacc.c)
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243
244 Instead of duplicating the content of the generated header (definition of
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245 YYSTYPE, yyparse declaration etc.), the generated parser will include it,
246 as is already the case for GLR or C++ parsers. This change is deferred
247 because existing versions of ylwrap (e.g., Automake 1.12.1) do not support
248 it.
0f11eec2 249
c2425191 250** Generated Parser Headers
56ca3d8f 251
258cddbc 252*** Guards (yacc.c, glr.c, glr.cc)
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253
254 The generated headers are now guarded, as is already the case for C++
242cc08e 255 parsers (lalr1.cc). For instance, with --defines=foo.h:
c3e9f08f 256
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257 #ifndef YY_FOO_H
258 # define YY_FOO_H
259 ...
260 #endif /* !YY_FOO_H */
c3e9f08f 261
258cddbc 262*** New declarations (yacc.c, glr.c)
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263
264 The generated header now declares yydebug and yyparse. Both honor
265 --name-prefix=bar_, and yield
266
e29f0771 267 int bar_parse (void);
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268
269 rather than
270
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271 #define yyparse bar_parse
272 int yyparse (void);
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273
274 in order to facilitate the inclusion of several parser headers inside a
275 single compilation unit.
c3e9f08f 276
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277*** Exported symbols in C++
278
279 The symbols YYTOKEN_TABLE and YYERROR_VERBOSE, which were defined in the
280 header, are removed, as they prevent the possibility of including several
281 generated headers from a single compilation unit.
282
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283*** YYLSP_NEEDED
284
285 For the same reasons, the undocumented and unused macro YYLSP_NEEDED is no
286 longer defined.
287
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288** New %define variable: api.prefix
289
290 Now that the generated headers are more complete and properly protected
291 against multiple inclusions, constant names, such as YYSTYPE are a
292 problem. While yyparse and others are properly renamed by %name-prefix,
293 YYSTYPE, YYDEBUG and others have never been affected by it. Because it
294 would introduce backward compatibility issues in projects not expecting
295 YYSTYPE to be renamed, instead of changing the behavior of %name-prefix,
296 it is deprecated in favor of a new %define variable: api.prefix.
297
298 The following examples compares both:
299
300 %name-prefix "bar_" | %define api.prefix "bar_"
301 %token <ival> FOO %token <ival> FOO
302 %union { int ival; } %union { int ival; }
303 %% %%
304 exp: 'a'; exp: 'a';
305
306 bison generates:
307
308 #ifndef BAR_FOO_H #ifndef BAR_FOO_H
309 # define BAR_FOO_H # define BAR_FOO_H
310
311 /* Enabling traces. */ /* Enabling traces. */
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312 # ifndef YYDEBUG | # ifndef BAR_DEBUG
313 > # if defined YYDEBUG
314 > # if YYDEBUG
315 > # define BAR_DEBUG 1
316 > # else
317 > # define BAR_DEBUG 0
318 > # endif
319 > # else
320 # define YYDEBUG 0 | # define BAR_DEBUG 0
321 > # endif
322 # endif | # endif
323
324 # if YYDEBUG | # if BAR_DEBUG
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325 extern int bar_debug; extern int bar_debug;
326 # endif # endif
327
328 /* Tokens. */ /* Tokens. */
329 # ifndef YYTOKENTYPE | # ifndef BAR_TOKENTYPE
330 # define YYTOKENTYPE | # define BAR_TOKENTYPE
331 enum yytokentype { | enum bar_tokentype {
332 FOO = 258 FOO = 258
333 }; };
334 # endif # endif
335
336 #if ! defined YYSTYPE \ | #if ! defined BAR_STYPE \
337 && ! defined YYSTYPE_IS_DECLARED | && ! defined BAR_STYPE_IS_DECLARED
338 typedef union YYSTYPE | typedef union BAR_STYPE
339 { {
340 int ival; int ival;
341 } YYSTYPE; | } BAR_STYPE;
342 # define YYSTYPE_IS_DECLARED 1 | # define BAR_STYPE_IS_DECLARED 1
343 #endif #endif
344
345 extern YYSTYPE bar_lval; | extern BAR_STYPE bar_lval;
346
347 int bar_parse (void); int bar_parse (void);
348
349 #endif /* !BAR_FOO_H */ #endif /* !BAR_FOO_H */
350
dfaac272 351* Noteworthy changes in release 2.5.1 (2012-06-05) [stable]
90dcd415 352
debe2c03 353** Future changes:
041308d0 354
e4ab1254 355 The next major release will drop support for generating parsers in K&R C.
ef51bfa7 356
466b4cf2 357** yacc.c: YYBACKUP works as expected.
94556574 358
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359** glr.c improvements:
360
361*** Location support is eliminated when not requested:
362
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363 GLR parsers used to include location-related code even when locations were
364 not requested, and therefore not even usable.
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365
366*** __attribute__ is preserved:
debe2c03 367
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368 __attribute__ is no longer disabled when __STRICT_ANSI__ is defined (i.e.,
369 when -std is passed to GCC).
debe2c03 370
466b4cf2 371** lalr1.java: several fixes:
041308d0 372
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373 The Java parser no longer throws ArrayIndexOutOfBoundsException if the
374 first token leads to a syntax error. Some minor clean ups.
041308d0 375
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376** Changes for C++:
377
378*** C++11 compatibility:
ef51bfa7 379
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380 C and C++ parsers use "nullptr" instead of "0" when __cplusplus is 201103L
381 or higher.
ef51bfa7 382
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383*** Header guards
384
385 The header files such as "parser.hh", "location.hh", etc. used a constant
386 name for preprocessor guards, for instance:
387
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388 #ifndef BISON_LOCATION_HH
389 # define BISON_LOCATION_HH
390 ...
391 #endif // !BISON_LOCATION_HH
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392
393 The inclusion guard is now computed from "PREFIX/FILE-NAME", where lower
394 case characters are converted to upper case, and series of
395 non-alphanumerical characters are converted to an underscore.
396
397 With "bison -o lang++/parser.cc", "location.hh" would now include:
398
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399 #ifndef YY_LANG_LOCATION_HH
400 # define YY_LANG_LOCATION_HH
401 ...
402 #endif // !YY_LANG_LOCATION_HH
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403
404*** C++ locations:
936c88d1 405
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406 The position and location constructors (and their initialize methods)
407 accept new arguments for line and column. Several issues in the
408 documentation were fixed.
936c88d1 409
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410** liby is no longer asking for "rpl_fprintf" on some platforms.
411
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412** Changes in the manual:
413
414*** %printer is documented
415
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416 The "%printer" directive, supported since at least Bison 1.50, is finally
417 documented. The "mfcalc" example is extended to demonstrate it.
7e508a2b 418
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419 For consistency with the C skeletons, the C++ parsers now also support
420 "yyoutput" (as an alias to "debug_stream ()").
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421
422*** Several improvements have been made:
466b4cf2 423
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424 The layout for grammar excerpts was changed to a more compact scheme.
425 Named references are motivated. The description of the automaton
426 description file (*.output) is updated to the current format. Incorrect
427 index entries were fixed. Some other errors were fixed.
466b4cf2 428
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429** Building bison:
430
431*** Conflicting prototypes with recent/modified Flex.
432
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433 Fixed build problems with the current, unreleased, version of Flex, and
434 some modified versions of 2.5.35, which have modified function prototypes.
466b4cf2 435
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436*** Warnings during the build procedure have been eliminated.
437
438*** Several portability problems in the test suite have been fixed:
466b4cf2 439
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440 This includes warnings with some compilers, unexpected behavior of tools
441 such as diff, warning messages from the test suite itself, etc.
466b4cf2 442
91aadcc7 443*** The install-pdf target works properly:
8ef26c2a 444
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445 Running "make install-pdf" (or -dvi, -html, -info, and -ps) no longer
446 halts in the middle of its course.
8ef26c2a 447
b2bc8a1b 448* Changes in version 2.5 (2011-05-14):
006faedf 449
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450** Grammar symbol names can now contain non-initial dashes:
451
452 Consistently with directives (such as %error-verbose) and with
453 %define variables (e.g. push-pull), grammar symbol names may contain
454 dashes in any position except the beginning. This is a GNU
455 extension over POSIX Yacc. Thus, use of this extension is reported
456 by -Wyacc and rejected in Yacc mode (--yacc).
457
3b1977ea 458** Named references:
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459
460 Historically, Yacc and Bison have supported positional references
461 ($n, $$) to allow access to symbol values from inside of semantic
462 actions code.
463
464 Starting from this version, Bison can also accept named references.
465 When no ambiguity is possible, original symbol names may be used
466 as named references:
467
ac3297d5 468 if_stmt : "if" cond_expr "then" then_stmt ';'
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469 { $if_stmt = mk_if_stmt($cond_expr, $then_stmt); }
470
471 In the more common case, explicit names may be declared:
472
ac3297d5 473 stmt[res] : "if" expr[cond] "then" stmt[then] "else" stmt[else] ';'
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474 { $res = mk_if_stmt($cond, $then, $else); }
475
f840c05a 476 Location information is also accessible using @name syntax. When
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477 accessing symbol names containing dots or dashes, explicit bracketing
478 ($[sym.1]) must be used.
479
f840c05a 480 These features are experimental in this version. More user feedback
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481 will help to stabilize them.
482
3b1977ea 483** IELR(1) and canonical LR(1):
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484
485 IELR(1) is a minimal LR(1) parser table generation algorithm. That
486 is, given any context-free grammar, IELR(1) generates parser tables
723206df 487 with the full language-recognition power of canonical LR(1) but with
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488 nearly the same number of parser states as LALR(1). This reduction
489 in parser states is often an order of magnitude. More importantly,
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490 because canonical LR(1)'s extra parser states may contain duplicate
491 conflicts in the case of non-LR(1) grammars, the number of conflicts
492 for IELR(1) is often an order of magnitude less as well. This can
493 significantly reduce the complexity of developing of a grammar.
494
495 Bison can now generate IELR(1) and canonical LR(1) parser tables in
496 place of its traditional LALR(1) parser tables, which remain the
497 default. You can specify the type of parser tables in the grammar
498 file with these directives:
499
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500 %define lr.type lalr
501 %define lr.type ielr
502 %define lr.type canonical-lr
34a6c2d1 503
6f04ee6c 504 The default-reduction optimization in the parser tables can also be
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505 adjusted using "%define lr.default-reductions". For details on both
506 of these features, see the new section "Tuning LR" in the Bison
6f04ee6c 507 manual.
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508
509 These features are experimental. More user feedback will help to
510 stabilize them.
511
6f04ee6c 512** LAC (Lookahead Correction) for syntax error handling:
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513
514 Canonical LR, IELR, and LALR can suffer from a couple of problems
515 upon encountering a syntax error. First, the parser might perform
516 additional parser stack reductions before discovering the syntax
6f04ee6c 517 error. Such reductions can perform user semantic actions that are
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518 unexpected because they are based on an invalid token, and they
519 cause error recovery to begin in a different syntactic context than
520 the one in which the invalid token was encountered. Second, when
6f04ee6c 521 verbose error messages are enabled (with %error-verbose or the
e4ab1254 522 obsolete "#define YYERROR_VERBOSE"), the expected token list in the
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523 syntax error message can both contain invalid tokens and omit valid
524 tokens.
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525
526 The culprits for the above problems are %nonassoc, default
527 reductions in inconsistent states, and parser state merging. Thus,
528 IELR and LALR suffer the most. Canonical LR can suffer only if
529 %nonassoc is used or if default reductions are enabled for
530 inconsistent states.
531
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532 LAC is a new mechanism within the parsing algorithm that solves
533 these problems for canonical LR, IELR, and LALR without sacrificing
534 %nonassoc, default reductions, or state merging. When LAC is in
535 use, canonical LR and IELR behave almost exactly the same for both
536 syntactically acceptable and syntactically unacceptable input.
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537 While LALR still does not support the full language-recognition
538 power of canonical LR and IELR, LAC at least enables LALR's syntax
539 error handling to correctly reflect LALR's language-recognition
540 power.
541
542 Currently, LAC is only supported for deterministic parsers in C.
543 You can enable LAC with the following directive:
544
545 %define parse.lac full
546
e4ab1254 547 See the new section "LAC" in the Bison manual for additional
6f04ee6c 548 details including a few caveats.
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549
550 LAC is an experimental feature. More user feedback will help to
551 stabilize it.
552
6ee881f6 553** %define improvements:
f37495f6 554
3b1977ea 555*** Can now be invoked via the command line:
4ecd3681 556
34d41938 557 Each of these command-line options
4ecd3681 558
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559 -D NAME[=VALUE]
560 --define=NAME[=VALUE]
561
562 -F NAME[=VALUE]
563 --force-define=NAME[=VALUE]
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564
565 is equivalent to this grammar file declaration
566
34d41938 567 %define NAME ["VALUE"]
4ecd3681 568
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569 except that the manner in which Bison processes multiple definitions
570 for the same NAME differs. Most importantly, -F and --force-define
571 quietly override %define, but -D and --define do not. For further
e4ab1254 572 details, see the section "Bison Options" in the Bison manual.
4ecd3681 573
3b1977ea 574*** Variables renamed:
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575
576 The following %define variables
577
578 api.push_pull
579 lr.keep_unreachable_states
580
581 have been renamed to
582
583 api.push-pull
584 lr.keep-unreachable-states
585
586 The old names are now deprecated but will be maintained indefinitely
587 for backward compatibility.
588
723206df 589*** Values no longer need to be quoted in the grammar file:
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590
591 If a %define value is an identifier, it no longer needs to be placed
592 within quotations marks. For example,
593
594 %define api.push-pull "push"
595
596 can be rewritten as
597
598 %define api.push-pull push
599
6ee881f6 600*** Unrecognized variables are now errors not warnings.
c046698e 601
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602*** Multiple invocations for any variable is now an error not a warning.
603
604** Unrecognized %code qualifiers are now errors not warnings.
605
606** Character literals not of length one:
607
608 Previously, Bison quietly converted all character literals to length
609 one. For example, without warning, Bison interpreted the operators in
610 the following grammar to be the same token:
611
612 exp: exp '++'
613 | exp '+' exp
614 ;
615
616 Bison now warns when a character literal is not of length one. In
617 some future release, Bison will start reporting an error instead.
618
619** Destructor calls fixed for lookaheads altered in semantic actions:
620
621 Previously for deterministic parsers in C, if a user semantic action
622 altered yychar, the parser in some cases used the old yychar value to
623 determine which destructor to call for the lookahead upon a syntax
624 error or upon parser return. This bug has been fixed.
625
626** C++ parsers use YYRHSLOC:
627
628 Similarly to the C parsers, the C++ parsers now define the YYRHSLOC
629 macro and use it in the default YYLLOC_DEFAULT. You are encouraged
e4ab1254
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630 to use it. If, for instance, your location structure has "first"
631 and "last" members, instead of
6ee881f6 632
e29f0771
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633 # define YYLLOC_DEFAULT(Current, Rhs, N) \
634 do \
635 if (N) \
636 { \
637 (Current).first = (Rhs)[1].location.first; \
638 (Current).last = (Rhs)[N].location.last; \
639 } \
640 else \
641 { \
642 (Current).first = (Current).last = (Rhs)[0].location.last; \
643 } \
644 while (false)
6ee881f6
JD
645
646 use:
647
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648 # define YYLLOC_DEFAULT(Current, Rhs, N) \
649 do \
650 if (N) \
651 { \
652 (Current).first = YYRHSLOC (Rhs, 1).first; \
653 (Current).last = YYRHSLOC (Rhs, N).last; \
654 } \
655 else \
656 { \
657 (Current).first = (Current).last = YYRHSLOC (Rhs, 0).last; \
658 } \
659 while (false)
6ee881f6
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660
661** YYLLOC_DEFAULT in C++:
662
663 The default implementation of YYLLOC_DEFAULT used to be issued in
664 the header file. It is now output in the implementation file, after
665 the user %code sections so that its #ifndef guard does not try to
666 override the user's YYLLOC_DEFAULT if provided.
c046698e 667
3b1977ea 668** YYFAIL now produces warnings and Java parsers no longer implement it:
62efdd2a
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669
670 YYFAIL has existed for many years as an undocumented feature of
671 deterministic parsers in C generated by Bison. More recently, it was
672 a documented feature of Bison's experimental Java parsers. As
673 promised in Bison 2.4.2's NEWS entry, any appearance of YYFAIL in a
674 semantic action now produces a deprecation warning, and Java parsers
675 no longer implement YYFAIL at all. For further details, including a
676 discussion of how to suppress C preprocessor warnings about YYFAIL
677 being unused, see the Bison 2.4.2 NEWS entry.
678
3b1977ea 679** Temporary hack for adding a semicolon to the user action:
a2d05674
JD
680
681 Previously, Bison appended a semicolon to every user action for
682 reductions when the output language defaulted to C (specifically, when
683 neither %yacc, %language, %skeleton, or equivalent command-line
684 options were specified). This allowed actions such as
685
686 exp: exp "+" exp { $$ = $1 + $3 };
687
688 instead of
689
690 exp: exp "+" exp { $$ = $1 + $3; };
691
692 As a first step in removing this misfeature, Bison now issues a
693 warning when it appends a semicolon. Moreover, in cases where Bison
694 cannot easily determine whether a semicolon is needed (for example, an
695 action ending with a cpp directive or a braced compound initializer),
696 it no longer appends one. Thus, the C compiler might now complain
697 about a missing semicolon where it did not before. Future releases of
698 Bison will cease to append semicolons entirely.
699
095a1d11
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700** Verbose syntax error message fixes:
701
e4ab1254 702 When %error-verbose or the obsolete "#define YYERROR_VERBOSE" is
6f04ee6c
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703 specified, syntax error messages produced by the generated parser
704 include the unexpected token as well as a list of expected tokens.
705 The effect of %nonassoc on these verbose messages has been corrected
706 in two ways, but a more complete fix requires LAC, described above:
095a1d11
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707
708*** When %nonassoc is used, there can exist parser states that accept no
709 tokens, and so the parser does not always require a lookahead token
710 in order to detect a syntax error. Because no unexpected token or
711 expected tokens can then be reported, the verbose syntax error
712 message described above is suppressed, and the parser instead
e4ab1254 713 reports the simpler message, "syntax error". Previously, this
095a1d11
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714 suppression was sometimes erroneously triggered by %nonassoc when a
715 lookahead was actually required. Now verbose messages are
716 suppressed only when all previous lookaheads have already been
717 shifted or discarded.
718
719*** Previously, the list of expected tokens erroneously included tokens
720 that would actually induce a syntax error because conflicts for them
721 were resolved with %nonassoc in the current parser state. Such
722 tokens are now properly omitted from the list.
723
724*** Expected token lists are still often wrong due to state merging
4c38b19e
JD
725 (from LALR or IELR) and default reductions, which can both add
726 invalid tokens and subtract valid tokens. Canonical LR almost
727 completely fixes this problem by eliminating state merging and
728 default reductions. However, there is one minor problem left even
729 when using canonical LR and even after the fixes above. That is,
730 if the resolution of a conflict with %nonassoc appears in a later
731 parser state than the one at which some syntax error is
732 discovered, the conflicted token is still erroneously included in
733 the expected token list. Bison's new LAC implementation,
734 described above, eliminates this problem and the need for
735 canonical LR. However, LAC is still experimental and is disabled
736 by default.
1fa30307 737
4c2a6e42
JD
738** Java skeleton fixes:
739
740*** A location handling bug has been fixed.
741
742*** The top element of each of the value stack and location stack is now
743 cleared when popped so that it can be garbage collected.
77768165 744
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745*** Parser traces now print the top element of the stack.
746
248dba53
JD
747** -W/--warnings fixes:
748
e4ab1254 749*** Bison now properly recognizes the "no-" versions of categories:
248dba53
JD
750
751 For example, given the following command line, Bison now enables all
752 warnings except warnings for incompatibilities with POSIX Yacc:
753
754 bison -Wall,no-yacc gram.y
755
6f8bdce2
JD
756*** Bison now treats S/R and R/R conflicts like other warnings:
757
758 Previously, conflict reports were independent of Bison's normal
759 warning system. Now, Bison recognizes the warning categories
e4ab1254 760 "conflicts-sr" and "conflicts-rr". This change has important
6f8bdce2
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761 consequences for the -W and --warnings command-line options. For
762 example:
763
764 bison -Wno-conflicts-sr gram.y # S/R conflicts not reported
765 bison -Wno-conflicts-rr gram.y # R/R conflicts not reported
766 bison -Wnone gram.y # no conflicts are reported
767 bison -Werror gram.y # any conflict is an error
768
769 However, as before, if the %expect or %expect-rr directive is
770 specified, an unexpected number of conflicts is an error, and an
771 expected number of conflicts is not reported, so -W and --warning
772 then have no effect on the conflict report.
773
e4ab1254 774*** The "none" category no longer disables a preceding "error":
dab96632
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775
776 For example, for the following command line, Bison now reports
777 errors instead of warnings for incompatibilities with POSIX Yacc:
778
779 bison -Werror,none,yacc gram.y
780
e4ab1254 781*** The "none" category now disables all Bison warnings:
8ffd7912 782
e4ab1254 783 Previously, the "none" category disabled only Bison warnings for
8ffd7912
JD
784 which there existed a specific -W/--warning category. However,
785 given the following command line, Bison is now guaranteed to
786 suppress all warnings:
787
788 bison -Wnone gram.y
789
9d6af153
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790** Precedence directives can now assign token number 0:
791
792 Since Bison 2.3b, which restored the ability of precedence
793 directives to assign token numbers, doing so for token number 0 has
794 produced an assertion failure. For example:
795
796 %left END 0
797
798 This bug has been fixed.
799
7527c744 800* Changes in version 2.4.3 (2010-08-05):
7a9c3cb3 801
4631c34f
JD
802** Bison now obeys -Werror and --warnings=error for warnings about
803 grammar rules that are useless in the parser due to conflicts.
804
7a9c3cb3
JD
805** Problems with spawning M4 on at least FreeBSD 8 and FreeBSD 9 have
806 been fixed.
807
132247cd
JD
808** Failures in the test suite for GCC 4.5 have been fixed.
809
88bb35d6
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810** Failures in the test suite for some versions of Sun Studio C++ have
811 been fixed.
812
43fdc9fd
JD
813** Contrary to Bison 2.4.2's NEWS entry, it has been decided that
814 warnings about undefined %prec identifiers will not be converted to
815 errors in Bison 2.5. They will remain warnings, which should be
816 sufficient for POSIX while avoiding backward compatibility issues.
817
cf22447c
JD
818** Minor documentation fixes.
819
ea66d039 820* Changes in version 2.4.2 (2010-03-20):
8defe11b 821
47fa5747
JD
822** Some portability problems that resulted in failures and livelocks
823 in the test suite on some versions of at least Solaris, AIX, HP-UX,
ea66d039
JD
824 RHEL4, and Tru64 have been addressed. As a result, fatal Bison
825 errors should no longer cause M4 to report a broken pipe on the
47fa5747
JD
826 affected platforms.
827
e4ab1254 828** "%prec IDENTIFIER" requires IDENTIFIER to be defined separately.
2c203528
JD
829
830 POSIX specifies that an error be reported for any identifier that does
831 not appear on the LHS of a grammar rule and that is not defined by
832 %token, %left, %right, or %nonassoc. Bison 2.3b and later lost this
833 error report for the case when an identifier appears only after a
834 %prec directive. It is now restored. However, for backward
835 compatibility with recent Bison releases, it is only a warning for
836 now. In Bison 2.5 and later, it will return to being an error.
43fdc9fd
JD
837 [Between the 2.4.2 and 2.4.3 releases, it was decided that this
838 warning will not be converted to an error in Bison 2.5.]
2c203528 839
c5196098
EB
840** Detection of GNU M4 1.4.6 or newer during configure is improved.
841
34731471
JD
842** Warnings from gcc's -Wundef option about undefined YYENABLE_NLS,
843 YYLTYPE_IS_TRIVIAL, and __STRICT_ANSI__ in C/C++ parsers are now
844 avoided.
af2ffe5c 845
966aba65
JD
846** %code is now a permanent feature.
847
848 A traditional Yacc prologue directive is written in the form:
849
850 %{CODE%}
851
852 To provide a more flexible alternative, Bison 2.3b introduced the
853 %code directive with the following forms for C/C++:
854
855 %code {CODE}
856 %code requires {CODE}
857 %code provides {CODE}
858 %code top {CODE}
859
860 These forms are now considered permanent features of Bison. See the
861 %code entries in the section "Bison Declaration Summary" in the Bison
862 manual for a summary of their functionality. See the section
863 "Prologue Alternatives" for a detailed discussion including the
864 advantages of %code over the traditional Yacc prologue directive.
865
866 Bison's Java feature as a whole including its current usage of %code
867 is still considered experimental.
868
41d35e54
JD
869** YYFAIL is deprecated and will eventually be removed.
870
871 YYFAIL has existed for many years as an undocumented feature of
872 deterministic parsers in C generated by Bison. Previously, it was
873 documented for Bison's experimental Java parsers. YYFAIL is no longer
874 documented for Java parsers and is formally deprecated in both cases.
875 Users are strongly encouraged to migrate to YYERROR, which is
876 specified by POSIX.
877
878 Like YYERROR, you can invoke YYFAIL from a semantic action in order to
879 induce a syntax error. The most obvious difference from YYERROR is
880 that YYFAIL will automatically invoke yyerror to report the syntax
881 error so that you don't have to. However, there are several other
882 subtle differences between YYERROR and YYFAIL, and YYFAIL suffers from
e4ab1254 883 inherent flaws when %error-verbose or "#define YYERROR_VERBOSE" is
41d35e54
JD
884 used. For a more detailed discussion, see:
885
886 http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/bison-patches/2009-12/msg00024.html
887
888 The upcoming Bison 2.5 will remove YYFAIL from Java parsers, but
889 deterministic parsers in C will continue to implement it. However,
890 because YYFAIL is already flawed, it seems futile to try to make new
891 Bison features compatible with it. Thus, during parser generation,
892 Bison 2.5 will produce a warning whenever it discovers YYFAIL in a
893 rule action. In a later release, YYFAIL will be disabled for
e4ab1254 894 %error-verbose and "#define YYERROR_VERBOSE". Eventually, YYFAIL will
41d35e54
JD
895 be removed altogether.
896
897 There exists at least one case where Bison 2.5's YYFAIL warning will
898 be a false positive. Some projects add phony uses of YYFAIL and other
899 Bison-defined macros for the sole purpose of suppressing C
900 preprocessor warnings (from GCC cpp's -Wunused-macros, for example).
901 To avoid Bison's future warning, such YYFAIL uses can be moved to the
e4ab1254 902 epilogue (that is, after the second "%%") in the Bison input file. In
41d35e54
JD
903 this release (2.4.2), Bison already generates its own code to suppress
904 C preprocessor warnings for YYFAIL, so projects can remove their own
905 phony uses of YYFAIL if compatibility with Bison releases prior to
906 2.4.2 is not necessary.
907
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AD
908** Internationalization.
909
910 Fix a regression introduced in Bison 2.4: Under some circumstances,
911 message translations were not installed although supported by the
912 host system.
913
41930e7a 914* Changes in version 2.4.1 (2008-12-11):
c9ba9e59 915
a957d06c
JD
916** In the GLR defines file, unexpanded M4 macros in the yylval and yylloc
917 declarations have been fixed.
918
738cde3e
AD
919** Temporary hack for adding a semicolon to the user action.
920
921 Bison used to prepend a trailing semicolon at the end of the user
922 action for reductions. This allowed actions such as
923
924 exp: exp "+" exp { $$ = $1 + $3 };
925
926 instead of
927
928 exp: exp "+" exp { $$ = $1 + $3; };
929
e4ab1254 930 Some grammars still depend on this "feature". Bison 2.4.1 restores
d07932ef
JD
931 the previous behavior in the case of C output (specifically, when
932 neither %language or %skeleton or equivalent command-line options
933 are used) to leave more time for grammars depending on the old
934 behavior to be adjusted. Future releases of Bison will disable this
935 feature.
a957d06c
JD
936
937** A few minor improvements to the Bison manual.
c9ba9e59 938
d6fb461d 939* Changes in version 2.4 (2008-11-02):
7bd1665a 940
d6fb461d 941** %language is an experimental feature.
ed4d67dc
JD
942
943 We first introduced this feature in test release 2.3b as a cleaner
944 alternative to %skeleton. Since then, we have discussed the possibility of
945 modifying its effect on Bison's output file names. Thus, in this release,
946 we consider %language to be an experimental feature that will likely evolve
947 in future releases.
7bd1665a 948
d6fb461d 949** Forward compatibility with GNU M4 has been improved.
241fda7a 950
d6fb461d 951** Several bugs in the C++ skeleton and the experimental Java skeleton have been
241fda7a
JD
952 fixed.
953
d6fb461d 954* Changes in version 2.3b (2008-05-27):
35fe0834 955
d6fb461d 956** The quotes around NAME that used to be required in the following directive
d9df47b6
JD
957 are now deprecated:
958
959 %define NAME "VALUE"
960
e4ab1254 961** The directive "%pure-parser" is now deprecated in favor of:
d9df47b6
JD
962
963 %define api.pure
964
965 which has the same effect except that Bison is more careful to warn about
966 unreasonable usage in the latter case.
967
d6fb461d 968** Push Parsing
c373bf8b
JD
969
970 Bison can now generate an LALR(1) parser in C with a push interface. That
e4ab1254
AD
971 is, instead of invoking "yyparse", which pulls tokens from "yylex", you can
972 push one token at a time to the parser using "yypush_parse", which will
c373bf8b
JD
973 return to the caller after processing each token. By default, the push
974 interface is disabled. Either of the following directives will enable it:
975
976 %define api.push_pull "push" // Just push; does not require yylex.
977 %define api.push_pull "both" // Push and pull; requires yylex.
978
e4ab1254 979 See the new section "A Push Parser" in the Bison manual for details.
c373bf8b 980
59da312b
JD
981 The current push parsing interface is experimental and may evolve. More user
982 feedback will help to stabilize it.
983
d6fb461d 984** The -g and --graph options now output graphs in Graphviz DOT format,
8e55b3aa
JD
985 not VCG format. Like --graph, -g now also takes an optional FILE argument
986 and thus cannot be bundled with other short options.
c373bf8b 987
d6fb461d 988** Java
59da312b
JD
989
990 Bison can now generate an LALR(1) parser in Java. The skeleton is
e4ab1254 991 "data/lalr1.java". Consider using the new %language directive instead of
59da312b
JD
992 %skeleton to select it.
993
e4ab1254 994 See the new section "Java Parsers" in the Bison manual for details.
59da312b
JD
995
996 The current Java interface is experimental and may evolve. More user
997 feedback will help to stabilize it.
998
d6fb461d 999** %language
59da312b
JD
1000
1001 This new directive specifies the programming language of the generated
d43f77e7
PB
1002 parser, which can be C (the default), C++, or Java. Besides the skeleton
1003 that Bison uses, the directive affects the names of the generated files if
1004 the grammar file's name ends in ".y".
59da312b 1005
d6fb461d 1006** XML Automaton Report
59da312b
JD
1007
1008 Bison can now generate an XML report of the LALR(1) automaton using the new
e4ab1254 1009 "--xml" option. The current XML schema is experimental and may evolve. More
59da312b 1010 user feedback will help to stabilize it.
c373bf8b 1011
d6fb461d 1012** The grammar file may now specify the name of the parser header file using
c373bf8b
JD
1013 %defines. For example:
1014
1015 %defines "parser.h"
1016
d6fb461d 1017** When reporting useless rules, useless nonterminals, and unused terminals,
d80fb37a
JD
1018 Bison now employs the terms "useless in grammar" instead of "useless",
1019 "useless in parser" instead of "never reduced", and "unused in grammar"
1020 instead of "unused".
cff03fb2 1021
d6fb461d 1022** Unreachable State Removal
c373bf8b
JD
1023
1024 Previously, Bison sometimes generated parser tables containing unreachable
31984206
JD
1025 states. A state can become unreachable during conflict resolution if Bison
1026 disables a shift action leading to it from a predecessor state. Bison now:
75ad86ee
JD
1027
1028 1. Removes unreachable states.
1029
1030 2. Does not report any conflicts that appeared in unreachable states.
1031 WARNING: As a result, you may need to update %expect and %expect-rr
1032 directives in existing grammar files.
1033
1034 3. For any rule used only in such states, Bison now reports the rule as
cff03fb2 1035 "useless in parser due to conflicts".
75ad86ee 1036
31984206
JD
1037 This feature can be disabled with the following directive:
1038
1039 %define lr.keep_unreachable_states
1040
e4ab1254 1041 See the %define entry in the "Bison Declaration Summary" in the Bison manual
31984206
JD
1042 for further discussion.
1043
e4ab1254 1044** Lookahead Set Correction in the ".output" Report
b1cc23c4 1045
e4ab1254
AD
1046 When instructed to generate a ".output" file including lookahead sets
1047 (using "--report=lookahead", for example), Bison now prints each reduction's
88c78747
JD
1048 lookahead set only next to the associated state's one item that (1) is
1049 associated with the same rule as the reduction and (2) has its dot at the end
1050 of its RHS. Previously, Bison also erroneously printed the lookahead set
1051 next to all of the state's other items associated with the same rule. This
e4ab1254 1052 bug affected only the ".output" file and not the generated parser source
88c78747
JD
1053 code.
1054
e4ab1254 1055** --report-file=FILE is a new option to override the default ".output" file
59da312b 1056 name.
1bb2bd75 1057
e4ab1254 1058** The "=" that used to be required in the following directives is now
02975b9a
JD
1059 deprecated:
1060
1061 %file-prefix "parser"
1062 %name-prefix "c_"
1063 %output "parser.c"
1064
e4ab1254 1065** An Alternative to "%{...%}" -- "%code QUALIFIER {CODE}"
c373bf8b
JD
1066
1067 Bison 2.3a provided a new set of directives as a more flexible alternative to
8e0a5e9e
JD
1068 the traditional Yacc prologue blocks. Those have now been consolidated into
1069 a single %code directive with an optional qualifier field, which identifies
1070 the purpose of the code and thus the location(s) where Bison should generate
1071 it:
1072
e4ab1254
AD
1073 1. "%code {CODE}" replaces "%after-header {CODE}"
1074 2. "%code requires {CODE}" replaces "%start-header {CODE}"
1075 3. "%code provides {CODE}" replaces "%end-header {CODE}"
1076 4. "%code top {CODE}" replaces "%before-header {CODE}"
8e0a5e9e 1077
e4ab1254
AD
1078 See the %code entries in section "Bison Declaration Summary" in the Bison
1079 manual for a summary of the new functionality. See the new section "Prologue
1080 Alternatives" for a detailed discussion including the advantages of %code
8e0a5e9e
JD
1081 over the traditional Yacc prologues.
1082
1083 The prologue alternatives are experimental. More user feedback will help to
1084 determine whether they should become permanent features.
1085
d6fb461d 1086** Revised warning: unset or unused mid-rule values
17bd8a73
JD
1087
1088 Since Bison 2.2, Bison has warned about mid-rule values that are set but not
1089 used within any of the actions of the parent rule. For example, Bison warns
1090 about unused $2 in:
1091
1092 exp: '1' { $$ = 1; } '+' exp { $$ = $1 + $4; };
1093
1094 Now, Bison also warns about mid-rule values that are used but not set. For
1095 example, Bison warns about unset $$ in the mid-rule action in:
1096
1097 exp: '1' { $1 = 1; } '+' exp { $$ = $2 + $4; };
1098
1099 However, Bison now disables both of these warnings by default since they
1100 sometimes prove to be false alarms in existing grammars employing the Yacc
1101 constructs $0 or $-N (where N is some positive integer).
1102
e4ab1254
AD
1103 To enable these warnings, specify the option "--warnings=midrule-values" or
1104 "-W", which is a synonym for "--warnings=all".
17bd8a73 1105
e4ab1254 1106** Default %destructor or %printer with "<*>" or "<>"
c373bf8b
JD
1107
1108 Bison now recognizes two separate kinds of default %destructor's and
12e35840
JD
1109 %printer's:
1110
e4ab1254 1111 1. Place "<*>" in a %destructor/%printer symbol list to define a default
12e35840
JD
1112 %destructor/%printer for all grammar symbols for which you have formally
1113 declared semantic type tags.
1114
e4ab1254 1115 2. Place "<>" in a %destructor/%printer symbol list to define a default
12e35840
JD
1116 %destructor/%printer for all grammar symbols without declared semantic
1117 type tags.
1118
e4ab1254
AD
1119 Bison no longer supports the "%symbol-default" notation from Bison 2.3a.
1120 "<*>" and "<>" combined achieve the same effect with one exception: Bison no
12e35840
JD
1121 longer applies any %destructor to a mid-rule value if that mid-rule value is
1122 not actually ever referenced using either $$ or $n in a semantic action.
1123
85894313
JD
1124 The default %destructor's and %printer's are experimental. More user
1125 feedback will help to determine whether they should become permanent
1126 features.
1127
e4ab1254 1128 See the section "Freeing Discarded Symbols" in the Bison manual for further
12e35840
JD
1129 details.
1130
d6fb461d 1131** %left, %right, and %nonassoc can now declare token numbers. This is required
e4ab1254 1132 by POSIX. However, see the end of section "Operator Precedence" in the Bison
ab7f29f8
JD
1133 manual for a caveat concerning the treatment of literal strings.
1134
d6fb461d 1135** The nonfunctional --no-parser, -n, and %no-parser options have been
b1cc23c4
JD
1136 completely removed from Bison.
1137
d6fb461d 1138* Changes in version 2.3a, 2006-09-13:
742e4900 1139
d6fb461d 1140** Instead of %union, you can define and use your own union type
ddc8ede1
PE
1141 YYSTYPE if your grammar contains at least one <type> tag.
1142 Your YYSTYPE need not be a macro; it can be a typedef.
1143 This change is for compatibility with other Yacc implementations,
1144 and is required by POSIX.
1145
d6fb461d 1146** Locations columns and lines start at 1.
cd48d21d
AD
1147 In accordance with the GNU Coding Standards and Emacs.
1148
d6fb461d 1149** You may now declare per-type and default %destructor's and %printer's:
ec5479ce
JD
1150
1151 For example:
1152
b2a0b7ca
JD
1153 %union { char *string; }
1154 %token <string> STRING1
1155 %token <string> STRING2
1156 %type <string> string1
1157 %type <string> string2
1158 %union { char character; }
1159 %token <character> CHR
1160 %type <character> chr
1161 %destructor { free ($$); } %symbol-default
1162 %destructor { free ($$); printf ("%d", @$.first_line); } STRING1 string1
1163 %destructor { } <character>
1164
1165 guarantees that, when the parser discards any user-defined symbol that has a
e4ab1254
AD
1166 semantic type tag other than "<character>", it passes its semantic value to
1167 "free". However, when the parser discards a "STRING1" or a "string1", it
1168 also prints its line number to "stdout". It performs only the second
1169 "%destructor" in this case, so it invokes "free" only once.
ec5479ce 1170
85894313
JD
1171 [Although we failed to mention this here in the 2.3a release, the default
1172 %destructor's and %printer's were experimental, and they were rewritten in
1173 future versions.]
1174
e4ab1254
AD
1175** Except for LALR(1) parsers in C with POSIX Yacc emulation enabled (with "-y",
1176 "--yacc", or "%yacc"), Bison no longer generates #define statements for
b931235e
JD
1177 associating token numbers with token names. Removing the #define statements
1178 helps to sanitize the global namespace during preprocessing, but POSIX Yacc
1179 requires them. Bison still generates an enum for token names in all cases.
1180
d6fb461d 1181** Handling of traditional Yacc prologue blocks is now more consistent but
34f98f46 1182 potentially incompatible with previous releases of Bison.
9bc0dd67
JD
1183
1184 As before, you declare prologue blocks in your grammar file with the
e4ab1254 1185 "%{ ... %}" syntax. To generate the pre-prologue, Bison concatenates all
34f98f46
JD
1186 prologue blocks that you've declared before the first %union. To generate
1187 the post-prologue, Bison concatenates all prologue blocks that you've
ddc8ede1 1188 declared after the first %union.
9bc0dd67 1189
34f98f46 1190 Previous releases of Bison inserted the pre-prologue into both the header
9bc0dd67
JD
1191 file and the code file in all cases except for LALR(1) parsers in C. In the
1192 latter case, Bison inserted it only into the code file. For parsers in C++,
1193 the point of insertion was before any token definitions (which associate
1194 token numbers with names). For parsers in C, the point of insertion was
1195 after the token definitions.
1196
1197 Now, Bison never inserts the pre-prologue into the header file. In the code
1198 file, it always inserts it before the token definitions.
1199
d6fb461d 1200** Bison now provides a more flexible alternative to the traditional Yacc
34f98f46
JD
1201 prologue blocks: %before-header, %start-header, %end-header, and
1202 %after-header.
1203
1204 For example, the following declaration order in the grammar file reflects the
1205 order in which Bison will output these code blocks. However, you are free to
1206 declare these code blocks in your grammar file in whatever order is most
1207 convenient for you:
1208
1209 %before-header {
1210 /* Bison treats this block like a pre-prologue block: it inserts it into
1211 * the code file before the contents of the header file. It does *not*
1212 * insert it into the header file. This is a good place to put
1213 * #include's that you want at the top of your code file. A common
e4ab1254 1214 * example is '#include "system.h"'. */
34f98f46
JD
1215 }
1216 %start-header {
1217 /* Bison inserts this block into both the header file and the code file.
1218 * In both files, the point of insertion is before any Bison-generated
1219 * token, semantic type, location type, and class definitions. This is a
1220 * good place to define %union dependencies, for example. */
9bc0dd67
JD
1221 }
1222 %union {
34f98f46
JD
1223 /* Unlike the traditional Yacc prologue blocks, the output order for the
1224 * new %*-header blocks is not affected by their declaration position
1225 * relative to any %union in the grammar file. */
9bc0dd67 1226 }
34f98f46
JD
1227 %end-header {
1228 /* Bison inserts this block into both the header file and the code file.
1229 * In both files, the point of insertion is after the Bison-generated
1230 * definitions. This is a good place to declare or define public
1231 * functions or data structures that depend on the Bison-generated
1232 * definitions. */
9bc0dd67 1233 }
34f98f46
JD
1234 %after-header {
1235 /* Bison treats this block like a post-prologue block: it inserts it into
1236 * the code file after the contents of the header file. It does *not*
1237 * insert it into the header file. This is a good place to declare or
1238 * define internal functions or data structures that depend on the
1239 * Bison-generated definitions. */
1240 }
1241
1242 If you have multiple occurrences of any one of the above declarations, Bison
1243 will concatenate the contents in declaration order.
9bc0dd67 1244
85894313
JD
1245 [Although we failed to mention this here in the 2.3a release, the prologue
1246 alternatives were experimental, and they were rewritten in future versions.]
1247
e4ab1254 1248** The option "--report=look-ahead" has been changed to "--report=lookahead".
9e6e7ed2
PE
1249 The old spelling still works, but is not documented and may be removed
1250 in a future release.
742e4900 1251
d6fb461d 1252* Changes in version 2.3, 2006-06-05:
4ad3ed84 1253
e4ab1254 1254** GLR grammars should now use "YYRECOVERING ()" instead of "YYRECOVERING",
4ad3ed84
PE
1255 for compatibility with LALR(1) grammars.
1256
d6fb461d 1257** It is now documented that any definition of YYSTYPE or YYLTYPE should
4ad3ed84
PE
1258 be to a type name that does not contain parentheses or brackets.
1259
d6fb461d 1260* Changes in version 2.2, 2006-05-19:
193d7c70 1261
d6fb461d 1262** The distribution terms for all Bison-generated parsers now permit
193d7c70
PE
1263 using the parsers in nonfree programs. Previously, this permission
1264 was granted only for Bison-generated LALR(1) parsers in C.
5f4236a0 1265
d6fb461d 1266** %name-prefix changes the namespace name in C++ outputs.
aa08666d 1267
d6fb461d 1268** The C++ parsers export their token_type.
5f4236a0 1269
d6fb461d 1270** Bison now allows multiple %union declarations, and concatenates
d6ca7905
PE
1271 their contents together.
1272
d6fb461d 1273** New warning: unused values
4d7bc38c
PE
1274 Right-hand side symbols whose values are not used are reported,
1275 if the symbols have destructors. For instance:
affac613 1276
8f3596a6 1277 exp: exp "?" exp ":" exp { $1 ? $1 : $3; }
e29f0771
AD
1278 | exp "+" exp
1279 ;
affac613 1280
8f3596a6
AD
1281 will trigger a warning about $$ and $5 in the first rule, and $3 in
1282 the second ($1 is copied to $$ by the default rule). This example
4e26c69e 1283 most likely contains three errors, and could be rewritten as:
affac613 1284
4e26c69e 1285 exp: exp "?" exp ":" exp
e29f0771
AD
1286 { $$ = $1 ? $3 : $5; free ($1 ? $5 : $3); free ($1); }
1287 | exp "+" exp
1288 { $$ = $1 ? $1 : $3; if ($1) free ($3); }
1289 ;
affac613 1290
4e26c69e
PE
1291 However, if the original actions were really intended, memory leaks
1292 and all, the warnings can be suppressed by letting Bison believe the
1293 values are used, e.g.:
721be13c 1294
8f3596a6 1295 exp: exp "?" exp ":" exp { $1 ? $1 : $3; (void) ($$, $5); }
e29f0771
AD
1296 | exp "+" exp { $$ = $1; (void) $3; }
1297 ;
721be13c 1298
84866159
AD
1299 If there are mid-rule actions, the warning is issued if no action
1300 uses it. The following triggers no warning: $1 and $3 are used.
1301
1302 exp: exp { push ($1); } '+' exp { push ($3); sum (); };
1303
721be13c
PE
1304 The warning is intended to help catching lost values and memory leaks.
1305 If a value is ignored, its associated memory typically is not reclaimed.
affac613 1306
d6fb461d 1307** %destructor vs. YYABORT, YYACCEPT, and YYERROR.
9d9b8b70
PE
1308 Destructors are now called when user code invokes YYABORT, YYACCEPT,
1309 and YYERROR, for all objects on the stack, other than objects
1310 corresponding to the right-hand side of the current rule.
a85284cf 1311
d6fb461d 1312** %expect, %expect-rr
035aa4a0
PE
1313 Incorrect numbers of expected conflicts are now actual errors,
1314 instead of warnings.
1315
d6fb461d 1316** GLR, YACC parsers.
4e26c69e
PE
1317 The %parse-params are available in the destructors (and the
1318 experimental printers) as per the documentation.
4b367315 1319
e4ab1254 1320** Bison now warns if it finds a stray "$" or "@" in an action.
ad6a9b97 1321
d6fb461d 1322** %require "VERSION"
4e26c69e
PE
1323 This specifies that the grammar file depends on features implemented
1324 in Bison version VERSION or higher.
b50d2359 1325
d6fb461d 1326** lalr1.cc: The token and value types are now class members.
e14d0ab6
AD
1327 The tokens were defined as free form enums and cpp macros. YYSTYPE
1328 was defined as a free form union. They are now class members:
e4ab1254
AD
1329 tokens are enumerations of the "yy::parser::token" struct, and the
1330 semantic values have the "yy::parser::semantic_type" type.
fb9712a9
AD
1331
1332 If you do not want or can update to this scheme, the directive
e4ab1254 1333 '%define "global_tokens_and_yystype" "1"' triggers the global
b50d2359
AD
1334 definition of tokens and YYSTYPE. This change is suitable both
1335 for previous releases of Bison, and this one.
fb9712a9 1336
b50d2359 1337 If you wish to update, then make sure older version of Bison will
e4ab1254 1338 fail using '%require "2.2"'.
fb9712a9 1339
d6fb461d 1340** DJGPP support added.
193d7c70 1341\f
d6fb461d 1342* Changes in version 2.1, 2005-09-16:
1ce59070 1343
d6fb461d 1344** The C++ lalr1.cc skeleton supports %lex-param.
e14d0ab6 1345
d6fb461d 1346** Bison-generated parsers now support the translation of diagnostics like
baf785db
PE
1347 "syntax error" into languages other than English. The default
1348 language is still English. For details, please see the new
0410a6e0
PE
1349 Internationalization section of the Bison manual. Software
1350 distributors should also see the new PACKAGING file. Thanks to
1351 Bruno Haible for this new feature.
1ce59070 1352
d6fb461d 1353** Wording in the Bison-generated parsers has been changed slightly to
1a059451
PE
1354 simplify translation. In particular, the message "memory exhausted"
1355 has replaced "parser stack overflow", as the old message was not
1356 always accurate for modern Bison-generated parsers.
1357
d6fb461d 1358** Destructors are now called when the parser aborts, for all symbols left
258b75ca
PE
1359 behind on the stack. Also, the start symbol is now destroyed after a
1360 successful parse. In both cases, the behavior was formerly inconsistent.
1361
d6fb461d 1362** When generating verbose diagnostics, Bison-generated parsers no longer
72f000b0
PE
1363 quote the literal strings associated with tokens. For example, for
1364 a syntax error associated with '%token NUM "number"' they might
1365 print 'syntax error, unexpected number' instead of 'syntax error,
1366 unexpected "number"'.
193d7c70 1367\f
d6fb461d 1368* Changes in version 2.0, 2004-12-25:
efeed023 1369
d6fb461d 1370** Possibly-incompatible changes
d7e14fc0 1371
82de6b0d
PE
1372 - Bison-generated parsers no longer default to using the alloca function
1373 (when available) to extend the parser stack, due to widespread
1374 problems in unchecked stack-overflow detection. You can "#define
1375 YYSTACK_USE_ALLOCA 1" to require the use of alloca, but please read
1376 the manual to determine safe values for YYMAXDEPTH in that case.
8dd162d3 1377
82de6b0d
PE
1378 - Error token location.
1379 During error recovery, the location of the syntax error is updated
1380 to cover the whole sequence covered by the error token: it includes
1381 the shifted symbols thrown away during the first part of the error
1382 recovery, and the lookahead rejected during the second part.
18d192f0 1383
82de6b0d
PE
1384 - Semicolon changes:
1385 . Stray semicolons are no longer allowed at the start of a grammar.
1386 . Semicolons are now required after in-grammar declarations.
e342c3be 1387
82de6b0d
PE
1388 - Unescaped newlines are no longer allowed in character constants or
1389 string literals. They were never portable, and GCC 3.4.0 has
1390 dropped support for them. Better diagnostics are now generated if
1391 forget a closing quote.
8dd162d3 1392
82de6b0d 1393 - NUL bytes are no longer allowed in Bison string literals, unfortunately.
f74b6f91 1394
d6fb461d 1395** New features
1452af69 1396
82de6b0d 1397 - GLR grammars now support locations.
4febdd96 1398
82de6b0d
PE
1399 - New directive: %initial-action.
1400 This directive allows the user to run arbitrary code (including
1401 initializing @$) from yyparse before parsing starts.
1452af69 1402
82de6b0d
PE
1403 - A new directive "%expect-rr N" specifies the expected number of
1404 reduce/reduce conflicts in GLR parsers.
1452af69 1405
e4ab1254 1406 - %token numbers can now be hexadecimal integers, e.g., "%token FOO 0x12d".
82de6b0d 1407 This is a GNU extension.
4febdd96 1408
e4ab1254 1409 - The option "--report=lookahead" was changed to "--report=look-ahead".
9e6e7ed2 1410 [However, this was changed back after 2.3.]
1452af69 1411
82de6b0d 1412 - Experimental %destructor support has been added to lalr1.cc.
1452af69 1413
82de6b0d
PE
1414 - New configure option --disable-yacc, to disable installation of the
1415 yacc command and -ly library introduced in 1.875 for POSIX conformance.
6040d338 1416
d6fb461d 1417** Bug fixes
d5a3fe37 1418
82de6b0d
PE
1419 - For now, %expect-count violations are now just warnings, not errors.
1420 This is for compatibility with Bison 1.75 and earlier (when there are
1421 reduce/reduce conflicts) and with Bison 1.30 and earlier (when there
1422 are too many or too few shift/reduce conflicts). However, in future
1423 versions of Bison we plan to improve the %expect machinery so that
1424 these violations will become errors again.
3473d0f8 1425
82de6b0d
PE
1426 - Within Bison itself, numbers (e.g., goto numbers) are no longer
1427 arbitrarily limited to 16-bit counts.
d600ee67 1428
82de6b0d 1429 - Semicolons are now allowed before "|" in grammar rules, as POSIX requires.
d600ee67 1430\f
d6fb461d 1431* Changes in version 1.875, 2003-01-01:
963fcc17 1432
d6fb461d 1433** The documentation license has been upgraded to version 1.2
dc546b0f 1434 of the GNU Free Documentation License.
75eb3bc4 1435
d6fb461d 1436** syntax error processing
75eb3bc4 1437
dc546b0f
PE
1438 - In Yacc-style parsers YYLLOC_DEFAULT is now used to compute error
1439 locations too. This fixes bugs in error-location computation.
75eb3bc4 1440
dc546b0f
PE
1441 - %destructor
1442 It is now possible to reclaim the memory associated to symbols
1443 discarded during error recovery. This feature is still experimental.
20daca06 1444
dc546b0f
PE
1445 - %error-verbose
1446 This new directive is preferred over YYERROR_VERBOSE.
74724a70 1447
dc546b0f
PE
1448 - #defining yyerror to steal internal variables is discouraged.
1449 It is not guaranteed to work forever.
d1de5372 1450
d6fb461d 1451** POSIX conformance
d1de5372 1452
dc546b0f
PE
1453 - Semicolons are once again optional at the end of grammar rules.
1454 This reverts to the behavior of Bison 1.33 and earlier, and improves
1455 compatibility with Yacc.
74724a70 1456
e4ab1254
AD
1457 - "parse error" -> "syntax error"
1458 Bison now uniformly uses the term "syntax error"; formerly, the code
1459 and manual sometimes used the term "parse error" instead. POSIX
1460 requires "syntax error" in diagnostics, and it was thought better to
dc546b0f 1461 be consistent.
74724a70 1462
dc546b0f
PE
1463 - The documentation now emphasizes that yylex and yyerror must be
1464 declared before use. C99 requires this.
d1de5372 1465
dc546b0f
PE
1466 - Bison now parses C99 lexical constructs like UCNs and
1467 backslash-newline within C escape sequences, as POSIX 1003.1-2001 requires.
d1de5372 1468
dc546b0f
PE
1469 - File names are properly escaped in C output. E.g., foo\bar.y is
1470 output as "foo\\bar.y".
6780ca7a 1471
dc546b0f 1472 - Yacc command and library now available
e4ab1254 1473 The Bison distribution now installs a "yacc" command, as POSIX requires.
dc546b0f
PE
1474 Also, Bison now installs a small library liby.a containing
1475 implementations of Yacc-compatible yyerror and main functions.
1476 This library is normally not useful, but POSIX requires it.
6e649e65 1477
dc546b0f 1478 - Type clashes now generate warnings, not errors.
6e649e65 1479
dc546b0f
PE
1480 - If the user does not define YYSTYPE as a macro, Bison now declares it
1481 using typedef instead of defining it as a macro.
1482 For consistency, YYLTYPE is also declared instead of defined.
9501dc6e 1483
d6fb461d 1484** Other compatibility issues
886a425c 1485
e4ab1254
AD
1486 - %union directives can now have a tag before the "{", e.g., the
1487 directive "%union foo {...}" now generates the C code
1488 "typedef union foo { ... } YYSTYPE;"; this is for Yacc compatibility.
1489 The default union tag is "YYSTYPE", for compatibility with Solaris 9 Yacc.
1490 For consistency, YYLTYPE's struct tag is now "YYLTYPE" not "yyltype".
dc546b0f 1491 This is for compatibility with both Yacc and Bison 1.35.
72f889cc 1492
e4ab1254 1493 - ";" is output before the terminating "}" of an action, for
dc546b0f 1494 compatibility with Bison 1.35.
886a425c 1495
dc546b0f 1496 - Bison now uses a Yacc-style format for conflict reports, e.g.,
e4ab1254 1497 "conflicts: 2 shift/reduce, 1 reduce/reduce".
437c2d80 1498
e4ab1254 1499 - "yystype" and "yyltype" are now obsolescent macros instead of being
dc546b0f
PE
1500 typedefs or tags; they are no longer documented and are planned to be
1501 withdrawn in a future release.
2a8d363a 1502
d6fb461d 1503** GLR parser notes
2a8d363a 1504
dc546b0f
PE
1505 - GLR and inline
1506 Users of Bison have to decide how they handle the portability of the
e4ab1254 1507 C keyword "inline".
959e5f51 1508
e4ab1254
AD
1509 - "parsing stack overflow..." -> "parser stack overflow"
1510 GLR parsers now report "parser stack overflow" as per the Bison manual.
900c5db5 1511
18ad57b3
AD
1512** %parse-param and %lex-param
1513 The macros YYPARSE_PARAM and YYLEX_PARAM provide a means to pass
1514 additional context to yyparse and yylex. They suffer from several
1515 shortcomings:
1516
1517 - a single argument only can be added,
1518 - their types are weak (void *),
242cc08e 1519 - this context is not passed to ancillary functions such as yyerror,
18ad57b3
AD
1520 - only yacc.c parsers support them.
1521
1522 The new %parse-param/%lex-param directives provide a more precise control.
1523 For instance:
1524
1525 %parse-param {int *nastiness}
1526 %lex-param {int *nastiness}
1527 %parse-param {int *randomness}
1528
1529 results in the following signatures:
1530
1531 int yylex (int *nastiness);
1532 int yyparse (int *nastiness, int *randomness);
1533
1534 or, if both %pure-parser and %locations are used:
1535
1536 int yylex (YYSTYPE *lvalp, YYLTYPE *llocp, int *nastiness);
1537 int yyparse (int *nastiness, int *randomness);
1538
d6fb461d 1539** Bison now warns if it detects conflicting outputs to the same file,
e4ab1254 1540 e.g., it generates a warning for "bison -d -o foo.h foo.y" since
dc546b0f 1541 that command outputs both code and header to foo.h.
6e40b4eb 1542
d6fb461d 1543** #line in output files
dc546b0f 1544 - --no-line works properly.
6e40b4eb 1545
d6fb461d 1546** Bison can no longer be built by a K&R C compiler; it requires C89 or
6e40b4eb
AD
1547 later to be built. This change originally took place a few versions
1548 ago, but nobody noticed until we recently asked someone to try
1549 building Bison with a K&R C compiler.
d600ee67 1550\f
d6fb461d 1551* Changes in version 1.75, 2002-10-14:
7933f2b5 1552
d6fb461d 1553** Bison should now work on 64-bit hosts.
7933f2b5 1554
d6fb461d 1555** Indonesian translation thanks to Tedi Heriyanto.
7933f2b5 1556
d6fb461d 1557** GLR parsers
f50adbbd
AD
1558 Fix spurious parse errors.
1559
d6fb461d 1560** Pure parsers
f50adbbd
AD
1561 Some people redefine yyerror to steal yyparse' private variables.
1562 Reenable this trick until an official feature replaces it.
1563
d6fb461d 1564** Type Clashes
d90c934c
AD
1565 In agreement with POSIX and with other Yaccs, leaving a default
1566 action is valid when $$ is untyped, and $1 typed:
1567
e29f0771 1568 untyped: ... typed;
d90c934c
AD
1569
1570 but the converse remains an error:
1571
e29f0771 1572 typed: ... untyped;
d90c934c 1573
d6fb461d 1574** Values of mid-rule actions
d90c934c
AD
1575 The following code:
1576
e29f0771 1577 foo: { ... } { $$ = $1; } ...
d90c934c
AD
1578
1579 was incorrectly rejected: $1 is defined in the second mid-rule
1580 action, and is equal to the $$ of the first mid-rule action.
d600ee67 1581\f
d6fb461d 1582* Changes in version 1.50, 2002-10-04:
adc8c848 1583
d6fb461d 1584** GLR parsing
676385e2
PH
1585 The declaration
1586 %glr-parser
1587 causes Bison to produce a Generalized LR (GLR) parser, capable of handling
1588 almost any context-free grammar, ambiguous or not. The new declarations
e8832397 1589 %dprec and %merge on grammar rules allow parse-time resolution of
676385e2
PH
1590 ambiguities. Contributed by Paul Hilfinger.
1591
7933f2b5 1592 Unfortunately Bison 1.50 does not work properly on 64-bit hosts
420f93c8
PE
1593 like the Alpha, so please stick to 32-bit hosts for now.
1594
d6fb461d 1595** Output Directory
8c165d89 1596 When not in Yacc compatibility mode, when the output file was not
e4ab1254
AD
1597 specified, running "bison foo/bar.y" created "foo/bar.c". It
1598 now creates "bar.c".
8c165d89 1599
d6fb461d 1600** Undefined token
007a50a4 1601 The undefined token was systematically mapped to 2 which prevented
e88dbdbf 1602 the use of 2 by the user. This is no longer the case.
007a50a4 1603
d6fb461d 1604** Unknown token numbers
e88dbdbf 1605 If yylex returned an out of range value, yyparse could die. This is
007a50a4
AD
1606 no longer the case.
1607
d6fb461d 1608** Error token
e88dbdbf 1609 According to POSIX, the error token must be 256.
23c5a174
AD
1610 Bison extends this requirement by making it a preference: *if* the
1611 user specified that one of her tokens is numbered 256, then error
1612 will be mapped onto another number.
1613
d6fb461d 1614** Verbose error messages
e4ab1254 1615 They no longer report "..., expecting error or..." for states where
217598da
AD
1616 error recovery is possible.
1617
d6fb461d 1618** End token
e4ab1254 1619 Defaults to "$end" instead of "$".
217598da 1620
d6fb461d 1621** Error recovery now conforms to documentation and to POSIX
68cd8af3
PE
1622 When a Bison-generated parser encounters a syntax error, it now pops
1623 the stack until it finds a state that allows shifting the error
1624 token. Formerly, it popped the stack until it found a state that
1625 allowed some non-error action other than a default reduction on the
1626 error token. The new behavior has long been the documented behavior,
1627 and has long been required by POSIX. For more details, please see
337116ba
PE
1628 Paul Eggert, "Reductions during Bison error handling" (2002-05-20)
1629 <http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/bug-bison/2002-05/msg00038.html>.
68cd8af3 1630
d6fb461d 1631** Traces
5504898e
AD
1632 Popped tokens and nonterminals are now reported.
1633
d6fb461d 1634** Larger grammars
a861a339
PE
1635 Larger grammars are now supported (larger token numbers, larger grammar
1636 size (= sum of the LHS and RHS lengths), larger LALR tables).
1637 Formerly, many of these numbers ran afoul of 16-bit limits;
1638 now these limits are 32 bits on most hosts.
355e7c1c 1639
d6fb461d 1640** Explicit initial rule
643a5994
AD
1641 Bison used to play hacks with the initial rule, which the user does
1642 not write. It is now explicit, and visible in the reports and
1643 graphs as rule 0.
23c5a174 1644
d6fb461d 1645** Useless rules
643a5994 1646 Before, Bison reported the useless rules, but, although not used,
77714df2 1647 included them in the parsers. They are now actually removed.
23c5a174 1648
d6fb461d 1649** Useless rules, useless nonterminals
6b98e4b5
AD
1650 They are now reported, as a warning, with their locations.
1651
d6fb461d 1652** Rules never reduced
e8832397
AD
1653 Rules that can never be reduced because of conflicts are now
1654 reported.
1655
e4ab1254 1656** Incorrect "Token not used"
11652ab3
AD
1657 On a grammar such as
1658
e29f0771
AD
1659 %token useless useful
1660 %%
1661 exp: '0' %prec useful;
11652ab3
AD
1662
1663 where a token was used to set the precedence of the last rule,
e4ab1254 1664 bison reported both "useful" and "useless" as useless tokens.
11652ab3 1665
d6fb461d 1666** Revert the C++ namespace changes introduced in 1.31
77714df2 1667 as they caused too many portability hassles.
0179dd65 1668
d6fb461d 1669** Default locations
b2d52318
AD
1670 By an accident of design, the default computation of @$ was
1671 performed after another default computation was performed: @$ = @1.
1672 The latter is now removed: YYLLOC_DEFAULT is fully responsible of
1673 the computation of @$.
adc8c848 1674
d6fb461d 1675** Token end-of-file
b7c49edf
AD
1676 The token end of file may be specified by the user, in which case,
1677 the user symbol is used in the reports, the graphs, and the verbose
e4ab1254 1678 error messages instead of "$end", which remains being the default.
b7c49edf 1679 For instance
e29f0771 1680 %token MYEOF 0
b7c49edf 1681 or
e29f0771 1682 %token MYEOF 0 "end of file"
fdbcd8e2 1683
d6fb461d 1684** Semantic parser
fdbcd8e2
AD
1685 This old option, which has been broken for ages, is removed.
1686
d6fb461d 1687** New translations
a861a339 1688 Brazilian Portuguese, thanks to Alexandre Folle de Menezes.
84614e13
AD
1689 Croatian, thanks to Denis Lackovic.
1690
d6fb461d 1691** Incorrect token definitions
e4ab1254
AD
1692 When given
1693 %token 'a' "A"
1694 bison used to output
1695 #define 'a' 65
b87f8b21 1696
d6fb461d 1697** Token definitions as enums
77714df2
AD
1698 Tokens are output both as the traditional #define's, and, provided
1699 the compiler supports ANSI C or is a C++ compiler, as enums.
e88dbdbf 1700 This lets debuggers display names instead of integers.
77714df2 1701
d6fb461d 1702** Reports
ec3bc396
AD
1703 In addition to --verbose, bison supports --report=THINGS, which
1704 produces additional information:
b408954b
AD
1705 - itemset
1706 complete the core item sets with their closure
e4ab1254 1707 - lookahead [changed to "look-ahead" in 1.875e through 2.3, but changed back]
9e6e7ed2 1708 explicitly associate lookahead tokens to items
b408954b
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1709 - solved
1710 describe shift/reduce conflicts solving.
1711 Bison used to systematically output this information on top of
1712 the report. Solved conflicts are now attached to their states.
ec3bc396 1713
d6fb461d 1714** Type clashes
9af3fbce
AD
1715 Previous versions don't complain when there is a type clash on
1716 the default action if the rule has a mid-rule action, such as in:
1717
e29f0771
AD
1718 %type <foo> bar
1719 %%
1720 bar: '0' {} '0';
9af3fbce
AD
1721
1722 This is fixed.
a861a339 1723
d6fb461d 1724** GNU M4 is now required when using Bison.
f987e9d2 1725\f
d6fb461d 1726* Changes in version 1.35, 2002-03-25:
76551463 1727
d6fb461d 1728** C Skeleton
76551463
AD
1729 Some projects use Bison's C parser with C++ compilers, and define
1730 YYSTYPE as a class. The recent adjustment of C parsers for data
1731 alignment and 64 bit architectures made this impossible.
1732
1733 Because for the time being no real solution for C++ parser
1734 generation exists, kludges were implemented in the parser to
1735 maintain this use. In the future, when Bison has C++ parsers, this
1736 kludge will be disabled.
1737
1738 This kludge also addresses some C++ problems when the stack was
1739 extended.
76551463 1740\f
d6fb461d 1741* Changes in version 1.34, 2002-03-12:
76551463 1742
d6fb461d 1743** File name clashes are detected
76551463 1744 $ bison foo.y -d -o foo.x
e4ab1254 1745 fatal error: header and parser would both be named "foo.x"
76551463 1746
e4ab1254 1747** A missing ";" at the end of a rule triggers a warning
76551463
AD
1748 In accordance with POSIX, and in agreement with other
1749 Yacc implementations, Bison will mandate this semicolon in the near
1750 future. This eases the implementation of a Bison parser of Bison
1751 grammars by making this grammar LALR(1) instead of LR(2). To
1752 facilitate the transition, this release introduces a warning.
1753
d6fb461d 1754** Revert the C++ namespace changes introduced in 1.31, as they caused too
76551463
AD
1755 many portability hassles.
1756
d6fb461d 1757** DJGPP support added.
76551463 1758
d6fb461d 1759** Fix test suite portability problems.
76551463 1760\f
d6fb461d 1761* Changes in version 1.33, 2002-02-07:
76551463 1762
d6fb461d 1763** Fix C++ issues
76551463
AD
1764 Groff could not be compiled for the definition of size_t was lacking
1765 under some conditions.
1766
d6fb461d 1767** Catch invalid @n
76551463
AD
1768 As is done with $n.
1769\f
d6fb461d 1770* Changes in version 1.32, 2002-01-23:
76551463 1771
d6fb461d 1772** Fix Yacc output file names
76551463 1773
d6fb461d 1774** Portability fixes
76551463 1775
d6fb461d 1776** Italian, Dutch translations
76551463 1777\f
d6fb461d 1778* Changes in version 1.31, 2002-01-14:
52d1aeee 1779
d6fb461d 1780** Many Bug Fixes
52d1aeee 1781
d6fb461d 1782** GNU Gettext and %expect
52d1aeee
MA
1783 GNU Gettext asserts 10 s/r conflicts, but there are 7. Now that
1784 Bison dies on incorrect %expectations, we fear there will be
1785 too many bug reports for Gettext, so _for the time being_, %expect
e4ab1254 1786 does not trigger an error when the input file is named "plural.y".
52d1aeee 1787
d6fb461d 1788** Use of alloca in parsers
52d1aeee
MA
1789 If YYSTACK_USE_ALLOCA is defined to 0, then the parsers will use
1790 malloc exclusively. Since 1.29, but was not NEWS'ed.
1791
1792 alloca is used only when compiled with GCC, to avoid portability
1793 problems as on AIX.
1794
d6fb461d 1795** yyparse now returns 2 if memory is exhausted; formerly it dumped core.
b47dbebe 1796
d6fb461d 1797** When the generated parser lacks debugging code, YYDEBUG is now 0
52d1aeee
MA
1798 (as POSIX requires) instead of being undefined.
1799
d6fb461d 1800** User Actions
52d1aeee
MA
1801 Bison has always permitted actions such as { $$ = $1 }: it adds the
1802 ending semicolon. Now if in Yacc compatibility mode, the semicolon
1803 is no longer output: one has to write { $$ = $1; }.
1804
d6fb461d 1805** Better C++ compliance
52d1aeee 1806 The output parsers try to respect C++ namespaces.
76551463 1807 [This turned out to be a failed experiment, and it was reverted later.]
52d1aeee 1808
d6fb461d 1809** Reduced Grammars
52d1aeee
MA
1810 Fixed bugs when reporting useless nonterminals.
1811
d6fb461d 1812** 64 bit hosts
52d1aeee
MA
1813 The parsers work properly on 64 bit hosts.
1814
d6fb461d 1815** Error messages
52d1aeee
MA
1816 Some calls to strerror resulted in scrambled or missing error messages.
1817
d6fb461d 1818** %expect
52d1aeee
MA
1819 When the number of shift/reduce conflicts is correct, don't issue
1820 any warning.
1821
d6fb461d 1822** The verbose report includes the rule line numbers.
52d1aeee 1823
d6fb461d 1824** Rule line numbers are fixed in traces.
52d1aeee 1825
d6fb461d 1826** Swedish translation
52d1aeee 1827
d6fb461d 1828** Parse errors
52d1aeee
MA
1829 Verbose parse error messages from the parsers are better looking.
1830 Before: parse error: unexpected `'/'', expecting `"number"' or `'-'' or `'(''
1831 Now: parse error: unexpected '/', expecting "number" or '-' or '('
1832
d6fb461d 1833** Fixed parser memory leaks.
52d1aeee
MA
1834 When the generated parser was using malloc to extend its stacks, the
1835 previous allocations were not freed.
1836
d6fb461d 1837** Fixed verbose output file.
52d1aeee
MA
1838 Some newlines were missing.
1839 Some conflicts in state descriptions were missing.
1840
d6fb461d 1841** Fixed conflict report.
52d1aeee
MA
1842 Option -v was needed to get the result.
1843
d6fb461d 1844** %expect
52d1aeee
MA
1845 Was not used.
1846 Mismatches are errors, not warnings.
1847
d6fb461d 1848** Fixed incorrect processing of some invalid input.
52d1aeee 1849
d6fb461d 1850** Fixed CPP guards: 9foo.h uses BISON_9FOO_H instead of 9FOO_H.
52d1aeee 1851
d6fb461d 1852** Fixed some typos in the documentation.
52d1aeee 1853
d6fb461d 1854** %token MY_EOF 0 is supported.
52d1aeee
MA
1855 Before, MY_EOF was silently renumbered as 257.
1856
d6fb461d 1857** doc/refcard.tex is updated.
52d1aeee 1858
d6fb461d 1859** %output, %file-prefix, %name-prefix.
52d1aeee
MA
1860 New.
1861
d6fb461d 1862** --output
e4ab1254 1863 New, aliasing "--output-file".
52d1aeee 1864\f
d6fb461d 1865* Changes in version 1.30, 2001-10-26:
342b8b6e 1866
e4ab1254
AD
1867** "--defines" and "--graph" have now an optional argument which is the
1868 output file name. "-d" and "-g" do not change; they do not take any
342b8b6e
AD
1869 argument.
1870
e4ab1254 1871** "%source_extension" and "%header_extension" are removed, failed
342b8b6e
AD
1872 experiment.
1873
d6fb461d 1874** Portability fixes.
f987e9d2 1875\f
d6fb461d 1876* Changes in version 1.29, 2001-09-07:
342b8b6e 1877
d6fb461d 1878** The output file does not define const, as this caused problems when used
342b8b6e
AD
1879 with common autoconfiguration schemes. If you still use ancient compilers
1880 that lack const, compile with the equivalent of the C compiler option
e4ab1254 1881 "-Dconst=". Autoconf's AC_C_CONST macro provides one way to do this.
342b8b6e 1882
e4ab1254 1883** Added "-g" and "--graph".
f87a2205 1884
d6fb461d 1885** The Bison manual is now distributed under the terms of the GNU FDL.
f2b5126e 1886
d6fb461d 1887** The input and the output files has automatically a similar extension.
234a3be3 1888
d6fb461d 1889** Russian translation added.
f87a2205 1890
d6fb461d 1891** NLS support updated; should hopefully be less troublesome.
f87a2205 1892
d6fb461d 1893** Added the old Bison reference card.
c33638bb 1894
e4ab1254 1895** Added "--locations" and "%locations".
6deb4447 1896
e4ab1254 1897** Added "-S" and "--skeleton".
cd5bd6ac 1898
e4ab1254 1899** "%raw", "-r", "--raw" is disabled.
62ab6972 1900
d6fb461d 1901** Special characters are escaped when output. This solves the problems
cd5bd6ac
AD
1902 of the #line lines with path names including backslashes.
1903
d6fb461d 1904** New directives.
e4ab1254
AD
1905 "%yacc", "%fixed_output_files", "%defines", "%no_parser", "%verbose",
1906 "%debug", "%source_extension" and "%header_extension".
f987e9d2 1907
d6fb461d 1908** @$
f987e9d2 1909 Automatic location tracking.
f87a2205 1910\f
d6fb461d 1911* Changes in version 1.28, 1999-07-06:
d2e00347 1912
d6fb461d 1913** Should compile better now with K&R compilers.
d2e00347 1914
d6fb461d 1915** Added NLS.
d2e00347 1916
d6fb461d 1917** Fixed a problem with escaping the double quote character.
d2e00347 1918
d6fb461d 1919** There is now a FAQ.
d2e00347 1920\f
d6fb461d 1921* Changes in version 1.27:
5c31c3c2 1922
d6fb461d 1923** The make rule which prevented bison.simple from being created on
5c31c3c2
JT
1924 some systems has been fixed.
1925\f
d6fb461d 1926* Changes in version 1.26:
4be07551 1927
7e508a2b 1928** Bison now uses Automake.
4be07551 1929
d6fb461d 1930** New mailing lists: <bug-bison@gnu.org> and <help-bison@gnu.org>.
4be07551 1931
d6fb461d 1932** Token numbers now start at 257 as previously documented, not 258.
4be07551 1933
d6fb461d 1934** Bison honors the TMPDIR environment variable.
4be07551 1935
d6fb461d 1936** A couple of buffer overruns have been fixed.
f51dbca1 1937
d6fb461d 1938** Problems when closing files should now be reported.
f51dbca1 1939
d6fb461d 1940** Generated parsers should now work even on operating systems which do
f51dbca1 1941 not provide alloca().
4be07551 1942\f
d6fb461d 1943* Changes in version 1.25, 1995-10-16:
df8878c5 1944
d6fb461d 1945** Errors in the input grammar are not fatal; Bison keeps reading
df8878c5 1946the grammar file, and reports all the errors found in it.
8c44d3ec 1947
d6fb461d 1948** Tokens can now be specified as multiple-character strings: for
df8878c5 1949example, you could use "<=" for a token which looks like <=, instead
7e508a2b 1950of choosing a name like LESSEQ.
df8878c5 1951
d6fb461d 1952** The %token_table declaration says to write a table of tokens (names
df8878c5
RS
1953and numbers) into the parser file. The yylex function can use this
1954table to recognize multiple-character string tokens, or for other
1955purposes.
1956
d6fb461d 1957** The %no_lines declaration says not to generate any #line preprocessor
df8878c5
RS
1958directives in the parser file.
1959
d6fb461d 1960** The %raw declaration says to use internal Bison token numbers, not
df8878c5
RS
1961Yacc-compatible token numbers, when token names are defined as macros.
1962
d6fb461d 1963** The --no-parser option produces the parser tables without including
df8878c5
RS
1964the parser engine; a project can now use its own parser engine.
1965The actions go into a separate file called NAME.act, in the form of
1966a switch statement body.
1967\f
d6fb461d 1968* Changes in version 1.23:
6780ca7a 1969
4d019228
DM
1970The user can define YYPARSE_PARAM as the name of an argument to be
1971passed into yyparse. The argument should have type void *. It should
1972actually point to an object. Grammar actions can access the variable
1973by casting it to the proper pointer type.
6780ca7a 1974
6780ca7a 1975Line numbers in output file corrected.
6780ca7a 1976\f
d6fb461d 1977* Changes in version 1.22:
6780ca7a
DM
1978
1979--help option added.
6780ca7a 1980\f
d6fb461d 1981* Changes in version 1.20:
6780ca7a
DM
1982
1983Output file does not redefine const for C++.
9f4503d6 1984
76551463
AD
1985-----
1986
c932d613 1987Copyright (C) 1995-2012 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
76551463 1988
8defe11b 1989This file is part of Bison, the GNU Parser Generator.
76551463 1990
f16b0819 1991This program is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify
76551463 1992it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
f16b0819
PE
1993the Free Software Foundation, either version 3 of the License, or
1994(at your option) any later version.
76551463 1995
f16b0819 1996This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
76551463
AD
1997but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
1998MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the
1999GNU General Public License for more details.
2000
2001You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
f16b0819 2002along with this program. If not, see <http://www.gnu.org/licenses/>.
7e508a2b
AD
2003
2004 LocalWords: yacc YYBACKUP glr GCC lalr ArrayIndexOutOfBoundsException nullptr
2005 LocalWords: cplusplus liby rpl fprintf mfcalc Wyacc stmt cond expr mk sym lr
2006 LocalWords: IELR ielr Lookahead YYERROR nonassoc LALR's api lookaheads yychar
2007 LocalWords: destructor lookahead YYRHSLOC YYLLOC Rhs ifndef YYFAIL cpp sr rr
2008 LocalWords: preprocessor initializer Wno Wnone Werror FreeBSD prec livelocks
2009 LocalWords: Solaris AIX UX RHEL Tru LHS gcc's Wundef YYENABLE NLS YYLTYPE VCG
2010 LocalWords: yyerror cpp's Wunused yylval yylloc prepend yyparse yylex yypush
2011 LocalWords: Graphviz xml nonterminals midrule destructor's YYSTYPE typedef ly
2012 LocalWords: CHR chr printf stdout namespace preprocessing enum pre include's
2013 LocalWords: YYRECOVERING nonfree destructors YYABORT YYACCEPT params enums de
2014 LocalWords: struct yystype DJGPP lex param Haible NUM alloca YYSTACK NUL goto
2015 LocalWords: YYMAXDEPTH Unescaped UCNs YYLTYPE's yyltype typedefs inline Yaccs
2016 LocalWords: Heriyanto Reenable dprec Hilfinger Eggert MYEOF Folle Menezes EOF
242cc08e 2017 LocalWords: Lackovic define's itemset Groff Gettext malloc NEWS'ed YYDEBUG YY
7e508a2b 2018 LocalWords: namespaces strerror const autoconfiguration Dconst Autoconf's FDL
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AD
2019 LocalWords: Automake TMPDIR LESSEQ ylwrap endif yydebug YYTOKEN YYLSP ival hh
2020 LocalWords: extern YYTOKENTYPE TOKENTYPE yytokentype tokentype STYPE lval pdf
7287be84
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2021 LocalWords: lang yyoutput dvi html ps POSIX lvalp llocp calc yyo fval Wmaybe
2022 LocalWords: yyvsp pragmas noreturn java's
7e508a2b
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2023
2024Local Variables:
2025mode: outline
e4ab1254 2026fill-column: 76
7e508a2b 2027End: