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ed7658fe 1GNU Bison NEWS
3af4feb2 2
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3* Noteworthy changes in release ?.? (????-??-??) [?]
4
5a05f42e 5** Changes in the format of error messages
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6
7 This used to be the format of many error reports:
8
9 foo.y:5.10-24: result type clash on merge function 'merge': <t3> != <t2>
10 foo.y:4.13-27: previous declaration
11
12 It is now:
13
14 foo.y:5.10-25: result type clash on merge function 'merge': <t3> != <t2>
15 foo.y:4.13-27: previous declaration
16
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17** Exception safety (lalr1.cc)
18
19 The parse function now catches exceptions, uses the %destructors to
20 release memory (the lookahead symbol and the symbols pushed on the stack)
7287be84 21 before re-throwing the exception.
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22
23 This feature is somewhat experimental. User feedback would be
24 appreciated.
25
7287be84 26** New %define variable: api.location.type (glr.cc, lalr1.cc, lalr1.java)
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27
28 The %define variable api.location.type defines the name of the type to use
29 for locations. When defined, Bison no longer generates the position.hh
30 and location.hh files, nor does the parser will include them: the user is
31 then responsible to define her type.
32
33 This can be used in programs with several parsers to factor their location
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34 and position files: let one of them generate them, and the others just use
35 them.
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36
37 This feature was actually introduced, but not documented, in Bison 2.5,
38 under the name "location_type" (which is maintained for backward
39 compatibility).
40
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41 For consistency, lalr1.java's %define variables location_type and
42 position_type are deprecated in favor of api.location.type and
43 api.position.type.
44
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45** Graphviz improvements
46
47 The graphical presentation of the states is more readable: their shape is
48 now rectangular, the state number is clearly displayed, and the items are
49 numbered and left-justified.
50
51 The reductions are now explicitly represented as transitions to other
52 diamond shaped nodes.
53
9d3f7eaf 54* Noteworthy changes in release 2.6.5 (2012-11-07) [stable]
6f1360bd 55
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56 We consider compiler warnings about Bison generated parsers to be bugs.
57 Rather than working around them in your own project, please consider
58 reporting them to us.
59
60** Bug fixes
61
62 Warnings about uninitialized yylval and/or yylloc for push parsers with a
63 pure interface have been fixed for GCC 4.0 up to 4.8, and Clang 2.9 to
64 3.2.
65
66 Other issues in the test suite have been addressed.
6f1360bd 67
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68 Nul characters are correctly displayed in error messages.
69
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70 When possible, yylloc is correctly initialized before calling yylex. It
71 is no longer necessary to initialize it in the %initial-action.
72
0ac15849 73* Noteworthy changes in release 2.6.4 (2012-10-23) [stable]
a4eb820f 74
468455e1 75 Bison 2.6.3's --version was incorrect. This release fixes this issue.
a4eb820f 76
6eb8f74f 77* Noteworthy changes in release 2.6.3 (2012-10-22) [stable]
933ec544 78
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79** Bug fixes
80
9a50c55a 81 Bugs and portability issues in the test suite have been fixed.
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82
83 Some errors in translations have been addressed, and --help now directs
84 users to the appropriate place to report them.
85
86 Stray Info files shipped by accident are removed.
87
88 Incorrect definitions of YY_, issued by yacc.c when no parser header is
89 generated, are removed.
933ec544 90
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91 All the generated headers are self-contained.
92
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93** Header guards (yacc.c, glr.c, glr.cc)
94
95 In order to avoid collisions, the header guards are now
96 YY_<PREFIX>_<FILE>_INCLUDED, instead of merely <PREFIX>_<FILE>.
97 For instance the header generated from
98
99 %define api.prefix "calc"
100 %defines "lib/parse.h"
101
102 will use YY_CALC_LIB_PARSE_H_INCLUDED as guard.
103
7b70847e 104** Fix compiler warnings in the generated parser (yacc.c, glr.c)
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105
106 The compilation of pure parsers (%define api.pure) can trigger GCC
107 warnings such as:
108
109 input.c: In function 'yyparse':
110 input.c:1503:12: warning: 'yylval' may be used uninitialized in this
111 function [-Wmaybe-uninitialized]
112 *++yyvsp = yylval;
113 ^
114
115 This is now fixed; pragmas to avoid these warnings are no longer needed.
116
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117 Warnings from clang ("equality comparison with extraneous parentheses" and
118 "function declared 'noreturn' should not return") have also been
119 addressed.
120
e1eeecd3 121* Noteworthy changes in release 2.6.2 (2012-08-03) [stable]
9c26b8fc 122
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123** Bug fixes
124
125 Buffer overruns, complaints from Flex, and portability issues in the test
126 suite have been fixed.
127
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128** Spaces in %lex- and %parse-param (lalr1.cc, glr.cc)
129
130 Trailing end-of-lines in %parse-param or %lex-param would result in
131 invalid C++. This is fixed.
9c26b8fc 132
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133** Spurious spaces and end-of-lines
134
135 The generated files no longer end (nor start) with empty lines.
136
77b214ef 137* Noteworthy changes in release 2.6.1 (2012-07-30) [stable]
a4107f24 138
cbaea010 139 Bison no longer executes user-specified M4 code when processing a grammar.
8617d87e 140
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141** Future Changes
142
143 In addition to the removal of the features announced in Bison 2.6, the
144 next major release will remove the "Temporary hack for adding a semicolon
145 to the user action", as announced in the release 2.5. Instead of:
146
147 exp: exp "+" exp { $$ = $1 + $3 };
148
149 write:
150
151 exp: exp "+" exp { $$ = $1 + $3; };
152
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153** Bug fixes
154
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155*** Type names are now properly escaped.
156
157*** glr.cc: set_debug_level and debug_level work as expected.
a4107f24 158
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159*** Stray @ or $ in actions
160
161 While Bison used to warn about stray $ or @ in action rules, it did not
162 for other actions such as printers, destructors, or initial actions. It
163 now does.
164
cd735a8c 165** Type names in actions
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166
167 For consistency with rule actions, it is now possible to qualify $$ by a
cd735a8c 168 type-name in destructors, printers, and initial actions. For instance:
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169
170 %printer { fprintf (yyo, "(%d, %f)", $<ival>$, $<fval>$); } <*> <>;
171
172 will display two values for each typed and untyped symbol (provided
cd735a8c 173 that YYSTYPE has both "ival" and "fval" fields).
4982f078 174
1505e8bb 175* Noteworthy changes in release 2.6 (2012-07-19) [stable]
ad6b775f 176
c2425191 177** Future Changes
0f11eec2 178
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179 The next major release of Bison will drop support for the following
180 deprecated features. Please report disagreements to bug-bison@gnu.org.
0f11eec2 181
aaf61036 182*** K&R C parsers
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183
184 Support for generating parsers in K&R C will be removed. Parsers
242cc08e 185 generated for C support ISO C90, and are tested with ISO C99 and ISO C11
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186 compilers.
187
258cddbc 188*** Features deprecated since Bison 1.875
55d1006f 189
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190 The definitions of yystype and yyltype will be removed; use YYSTYPE and
191 YYLTYPE.
55d1006f 192
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193 YYPARSE_PARAM and YYLEX_PARAM, deprecated in favor of %parse-param and
194 %lex-param, will no longer be supported.
195
196 Support for the preprocessor symbol YYERROR_VERBOSE will be removed, use
197 %error-verbose.
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198
199*** The generated header will be included (yacc.c)
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200
201 Instead of duplicating the content of the generated header (definition of
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202 YYSTYPE, yyparse declaration etc.), the generated parser will include it,
203 as is already the case for GLR or C++ parsers. This change is deferred
204 because existing versions of ylwrap (e.g., Automake 1.12.1) do not support
205 it.
0f11eec2 206
c2425191 207** Generated Parser Headers
56ca3d8f 208
258cddbc 209*** Guards (yacc.c, glr.c, glr.cc)
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210
211 The generated headers are now guarded, as is already the case for C++
242cc08e 212 parsers (lalr1.cc). For instance, with --defines=foo.h:
c3e9f08f 213
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214 #ifndef YY_FOO_H
215 # define YY_FOO_H
216 ...
217 #endif /* !YY_FOO_H */
c3e9f08f 218
258cddbc 219*** New declarations (yacc.c, glr.c)
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220
221 The generated header now declares yydebug and yyparse. Both honor
222 --name-prefix=bar_, and yield
223
e29f0771 224 int bar_parse (void);
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225
226 rather than
227
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228 #define yyparse bar_parse
229 int yyparse (void);
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230
231 in order to facilitate the inclusion of several parser headers inside a
232 single compilation unit.
c3e9f08f 233
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234*** Exported symbols in C++
235
236 The symbols YYTOKEN_TABLE and YYERROR_VERBOSE, which were defined in the
237 header, are removed, as they prevent the possibility of including several
238 generated headers from a single compilation unit.
239
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240*** YYLSP_NEEDED
241
242 For the same reasons, the undocumented and unused macro YYLSP_NEEDED is no
243 longer defined.
244
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245** New %define variable: api.prefix
246
247 Now that the generated headers are more complete and properly protected
248 against multiple inclusions, constant names, such as YYSTYPE are a
249 problem. While yyparse and others are properly renamed by %name-prefix,
250 YYSTYPE, YYDEBUG and others have never been affected by it. Because it
251 would introduce backward compatibility issues in projects not expecting
252 YYSTYPE to be renamed, instead of changing the behavior of %name-prefix,
253 it is deprecated in favor of a new %define variable: api.prefix.
254
255 The following examples compares both:
256
257 %name-prefix "bar_" | %define api.prefix "bar_"
258 %token <ival> FOO %token <ival> FOO
259 %union { int ival; } %union { int ival; }
260 %% %%
261 exp: 'a'; exp: 'a';
262
263 bison generates:
264
265 #ifndef BAR_FOO_H #ifndef BAR_FOO_H
266 # define BAR_FOO_H # define BAR_FOO_H
267
268 /* Enabling traces. */ /* Enabling traces. */
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269 # ifndef YYDEBUG | # ifndef BAR_DEBUG
270 > # if defined YYDEBUG
271 > # if YYDEBUG
272 > # define BAR_DEBUG 1
273 > # else
274 > # define BAR_DEBUG 0
275 > # endif
276 > # else
277 # define YYDEBUG 0 | # define BAR_DEBUG 0
278 > # endif
279 # endif | # endif
280
281 # if YYDEBUG | # if BAR_DEBUG
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282 extern int bar_debug; extern int bar_debug;
283 # endif # endif
284
285 /* Tokens. */ /* Tokens. */
286 # ifndef YYTOKENTYPE | # ifndef BAR_TOKENTYPE
287 # define YYTOKENTYPE | # define BAR_TOKENTYPE
288 enum yytokentype { | enum bar_tokentype {
289 FOO = 258 FOO = 258
290 }; };
291 # endif # endif
292
293 #if ! defined YYSTYPE \ | #if ! defined BAR_STYPE \
294 && ! defined YYSTYPE_IS_DECLARED | && ! defined BAR_STYPE_IS_DECLARED
295 typedef union YYSTYPE | typedef union BAR_STYPE
296 { {
297 int ival; int ival;
298 } YYSTYPE; | } BAR_STYPE;
299 # define YYSTYPE_IS_DECLARED 1 | # define BAR_STYPE_IS_DECLARED 1
300 #endif #endif
301
302 extern YYSTYPE bar_lval; | extern BAR_STYPE bar_lval;
303
304 int bar_parse (void); int bar_parse (void);
305
306 #endif /* !BAR_FOO_H */ #endif /* !BAR_FOO_H */
307
dfaac272 308* Noteworthy changes in release 2.5.1 (2012-06-05) [stable]
90dcd415 309
debe2c03 310** Future changes:
041308d0 311
e4ab1254 312 The next major release will drop support for generating parsers in K&R C.
ef51bfa7 313
466b4cf2 314** yacc.c: YYBACKUP works as expected.
94556574 315
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316** glr.c improvements:
317
318*** Location support is eliminated when not requested:
319
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320 GLR parsers used to include location-related code even when locations were
321 not requested, and therefore not even usable.
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322
323*** __attribute__ is preserved:
debe2c03 324
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325 __attribute__ is no longer disabled when __STRICT_ANSI__ is defined (i.e.,
326 when -std is passed to GCC).
debe2c03 327
466b4cf2 328** lalr1.java: several fixes:
041308d0 329
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330 The Java parser no longer throws ArrayIndexOutOfBoundsException if the
331 first token leads to a syntax error. Some minor clean ups.
041308d0 332
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333** Changes for C++:
334
335*** C++11 compatibility:
ef51bfa7 336
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337 C and C++ parsers use "nullptr" instead of "0" when __cplusplus is 201103L
338 or higher.
ef51bfa7 339
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340*** Header guards
341
342 The header files such as "parser.hh", "location.hh", etc. used a constant
343 name for preprocessor guards, for instance:
344
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345 #ifndef BISON_LOCATION_HH
346 # define BISON_LOCATION_HH
347 ...
348 #endif // !BISON_LOCATION_HH
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349
350 The inclusion guard is now computed from "PREFIX/FILE-NAME", where lower
351 case characters are converted to upper case, and series of
352 non-alphanumerical characters are converted to an underscore.
353
354 With "bison -o lang++/parser.cc", "location.hh" would now include:
355
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356 #ifndef YY_LANG_LOCATION_HH
357 # define YY_LANG_LOCATION_HH
358 ...
359 #endif // !YY_LANG_LOCATION_HH
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360
361*** C++ locations:
936c88d1 362
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363 The position and location constructors (and their initialize methods)
364 accept new arguments for line and column. Several issues in the
365 documentation were fixed.
936c88d1 366
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367** liby is no longer asking for "rpl_fprintf" on some platforms.
368
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369** Changes in the manual:
370
371*** %printer is documented
372
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373 The "%printer" directive, supported since at least Bison 1.50, is finally
374 documented. The "mfcalc" example is extended to demonstrate it.
7e508a2b 375
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376 For consistency with the C skeletons, the C++ parsers now also support
377 "yyoutput" (as an alias to "debug_stream ()").
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378
379*** Several improvements have been made:
466b4cf2 380
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381 The layout for grammar excerpts was changed to a more compact scheme.
382 Named references are motivated. The description of the automaton
383 description file (*.output) is updated to the current format. Incorrect
384 index entries were fixed. Some other errors were fixed.
466b4cf2 385
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386** Building bison:
387
388*** Conflicting prototypes with recent/modified Flex.
389
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390 Fixed build problems with the current, unreleased, version of Flex, and
391 some modified versions of 2.5.35, which have modified function prototypes.
466b4cf2 392
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393*** Warnings during the build procedure have been eliminated.
394
395*** Several portability problems in the test suite have been fixed:
466b4cf2 396
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397 This includes warnings with some compilers, unexpected behavior of tools
398 such as diff, warning messages from the test suite itself, etc.
466b4cf2 399
91aadcc7 400*** The install-pdf target works properly:
8ef26c2a 401
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402 Running "make install-pdf" (or -dvi, -html, -info, and -ps) no longer
403 halts in the middle of its course.
8ef26c2a 404
b2bc8a1b 405* Changes in version 2.5 (2011-05-14):
006faedf 406
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407** Grammar symbol names can now contain non-initial dashes:
408
409 Consistently with directives (such as %error-verbose) and with
410 %define variables (e.g. push-pull), grammar symbol names may contain
411 dashes in any position except the beginning. This is a GNU
412 extension over POSIX Yacc. Thus, use of this extension is reported
413 by -Wyacc and rejected in Yacc mode (--yacc).
414
3b1977ea 415** Named references:
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416
417 Historically, Yacc and Bison have supported positional references
418 ($n, $$) to allow access to symbol values from inside of semantic
419 actions code.
420
421 Starting from this version, Bison can also accept named references.
422 When no ambiguity is possible, original symbol names may be used
423 as named references:
424
ac3297d5 425 if_stmt : "if" cond_expr "then" then_stmt ';'
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426 { $if_stmt = mk_if_stmt($cond_expr, $then_stmt); }
427
428 In the more common case, explicit names may be declared:
429
ac3297d5 430 stmt[res] : "if" expr[cond] "then" stmt[then] "else" stmt[else] ';'
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431 { $res = mk_if_stmt($cond, $then, $else); }
432
f840c05a 433 Location information is also accessible using @name syntax. When
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434 accessing symbol names containing dots or dashes, explicit bracketing
435 ($[sym.1]) must be used.
436
f840c05a 437 These features are experimental in this version. More user feedback
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438 will help to stabilize them.
439
3b1977ea 440** IELR(1) and canonical LR(1):
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441
442 IELR(1) is a minimal LR(1) parser table generation algorithm. That
443 is, given any context-free grammar, IELR(1) generates parser tables
723206df 444 with the full language-recognition power of canonical LR(1) but with
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445 nearly the same number of parser states as LALR(1). This reduction
446 in parser states is often an order of magnitude. More importantly,
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447 because canonical LR(1)'s extra parser states may contain duplicate
448 conflicts in the case of non-LR(1) grammars, the number of conflicts
449 for IELR(1) is often an order of magnitude less as well. This can
450 significantly reduce the complexity of developing of a grammar.
451
452 Bison can now generate IELR(1) and canonical LR(1) parser tables in
453 place of its traditional LALR(1) parser tables, which remain the
454 default. You can specify the type of parser tables in the grammar
455 file with these directives:
456
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457 %define lr.type lalr
458 %define lr.type ielr
459 %define lr.type canonical-lr
34a6c2d1 460
6f04ee6c 461 The default-reduction optimization in the parser tables can also be
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462 adjusted using "%define lr.default-reductions". For details on both
463 of these features, see the new section "Tuning LR" in the Bison
6f04ee6c 464 manual.
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465
466 These features are experimental. More user feedback will help to
467 stabilize them.
468
6f04ee6c 469** LAC (Lookahead Correction) for syntax error handling:
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470
471 Canonical LR, IELR, and LALR can suffer from a couple of problems
472 upon encountering a syntax error. First, the parser might perform
473 additional parser stack reductions before discovering the syntax
6f04ee6c 474 error. Such reductions can perform user semantic actions that are
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475 unexpected because they are based on an invalid token, and they
476 cause error recovery to begin in a different syntactic context than
477 the one in which the invalid token was encountered. Second, when
6f04ee6c 478 verbose error messages are enabled (with %error-verbose or the
e4ab1254 479 obsolete "#define YYERROR_VERBOSE"), the expected token list in the
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480 syntax error message can both contain invalid tokens and omit valid
481 tokens.
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482
483 The culprits for the above problems are %nonassoc, default
484 reductions in inconsistent states, and parser state merging. Thus,
485 IELR and LALR suffer the most. Canonical LR can suffer only if
486 %nonassoc is used or if default reductions are enabled for
487 inconsistent states.
488
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489 LAC is a new mechanism within the parsing algorithm that solves
490 these problems for canonical LR, IELR, and LALR without sacrificing
491 %nonassoc, default reductions, or state merging. When LAC is in
492 use, canonical LR and IELR behave almost exactly the same for both
493 syntactically acceptable and syntactically unacceptable input.
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494 While LALR still does not support the full language-recognition
495 power of canonical LR and IELR, LAC at least enables LALR's syntax
496 error handling to correctly reflect LALR's language-recognition
497 power.
498
499 Currently, LAC is only supported for deterministic parsers in C.
500 You can enable LAC with the following directive:
501
502 %define parse.lac full
503
e4ab1254 504 See the new section "LAC" in the Bison manual for additional
6f04ee6c 505 details including a few caveats.
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506
507 LAC is an experimental feature. More user feedback will help to
508 stabilize it.
509
6ee881f6 510** %define improvements:
f37495f6 511
3b1977ea 512*** Can now be invoked via the command line:
4ecd3681 513
34d41938 514 Each of these command-line options
4ecd3681 515
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516 -D NAME[=VALUE]
517 --define=NAME[=VALUE]
518
519 -F NAME[=VALUE]
520 --force-define=NAME[=VALUE]
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521
522 is equivalent to this grammar file declaration
523
34d41938 524 %define NAME ["VALUE"]
4ecd3681 525
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526 except that the manner in which Bison processes multiple definitions
527 for the same NAME differs. Most importantly, -F and --force-define
528 quietly override %define, but -D and --define do not. For further
e4ab1254 529 details, see the section "Bison Options" in the Bison manual.
4ecd3681 530
3b1977ea 531*** Variables renamed:
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532
533 The following %define variables
534
535 api.push_pull
536 lr.keep_unreachable_states
537
538 have been renamed to
539
540 api.push-pull
541 lr.keep-unreachable-states
542
543 The old names are now deprecated but will be maintained indefinitely
544 for backward compatibility.
545
723206df 546*** Values no longer need to be quoted in the grammar file:
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547
548 If a %define value is an identifier, it no longer needs to be placed
549 within quotations marks. For example,
550
551 %define api.push-pull "push"
552
553 can be rewritten as
554
555 %define api.push-pull push
556
6ee881f6 557*** Unrecognized variables are now errors not warnings.
c046698e 558
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559*** Multiple invocations for any variable is now an error not a warning.
560
561** Unrecognized %code qualifiers are now errors not warnings.
562
563** Character literals not of length one:
564
565 Previously, Bison quietly converted all character literals to length
566 one. For example, without warning, Bison interpreted the operators in
567 the following grammar to be the same token:
568
569 exp: exp '++'
570 | exp '+' exp
571 ;
572
573 Bison now warns when a character literal is not of length one. In
574 some future release, Bison will start reporting an error instead.
575
576** Destructor calls fixed for lookaheads altered in semantic actions:
577
578 Previously for deterministic parsers in C, if a user semantic action
579 altered yychar, the parser in some cases used the old yychar value to
580 determine which destructor to call for the lookahead upon a syntax
581 error or upon parser return. This bug has been fixed.
582
583** C++ parsers use YYRHSLOC:
584
585 Similarly to the C parsers, the C++ parsers now define the YYRHSLOC
586 macro and use it in the default YYLLOC_DEFAULT. You are encouraged
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587 to use it. If, for instance, your location structure has "first"
588 and "last" members, instead of
6ee881f6 589
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590 # define YYLLOC_DEFAULT(Current, Rhs, N) \
591 do \
592 if (N) \
593 { \
594 (Current).first = (Rhs)[1].location.first; \
595 (Current).last = (Rhs)[N].location.last; \
596 } \
597 else \
598 { \
599 (Current).first = (Current).last = (Rhs)[0].location.last; \
600 } \
601 while (false)
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602
603 use:
604
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605 # define YYLLOC_DEFAULT(Current, Rhs, N) \
606 do \
607 if (N) \
608 { \
609 (Current).first = YYRHSLOC (Rhs, 1).first; \
610 (Current).last = YYRHSLOC (Rhs, N).last; \
611 } \
612 else \
613 { \
614 (Current).first = (Current).last = YYRHSLOC (Rhs, 0).last; \
615 } \
616 while (false)
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617
618** YYLLOC_DEFAULT in C++:
619
620 The default implementation of YYLLOC_DEFAULT used to be issued in
621 the header file. It is now output in the implementation file, after
622 the user %code sections so that its #ifndef guard does not try to
623 override the user's YYLLOC_DEFAULT if provided.
c046698e 624
3b1977ea 625** YYFAIL now produces warnings and Java parsers no longer implement it:
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626
627 YYFAIL has existed for many years as an undocumented feature of
628 deterministic parsers in C generated by Bison. More recently, it was
629 a documented feature of Bison's experimental Java parsers. As
630 promised in Bison 2.4.2's NEWS entry, any appearance of YYFAIL in a
631 semantic action now produces a deprecation warning, and Java parsers
632 no longer implement YYFAIL at all. For further details, including a
633 discussion of how to suppress C preprocessor warnings about YYFAIL
634 being unused, see the Bison 2.4.2 NEWS entry.
635
3b1977ea 636** Temporary hack for adding a semicolon to the user action:
a2d05674
JD
637
638 Previously, Bison appended a semicolon to every user action for
639 reductions when the output language defaulted to C (specifically, when
640 neither %yacc, %language, %skeleton, or equivalent command-line
641 options were specified). This allowed actions such as
642
643 exp: exp "+" exp { $$ = $1 + $3 };
644
645 instead of
646
647 exp: exp "+" exp { $$ = $1 + $3; };
648
649 As a first step in removing this misfeature, Bison now issues a
650 warning when it appends a semicolon. Moreover, in cases where Bison
651 cannot easily determine whether a semicolon is needed (for example, an
652 action ending with a cpp directive or a braced compound initializer),
653 it no longer appends one. Thus, the C compiler might now complain
654 about a missing semicolon where it did not before. Future releases of
655 Bison will cease to append semicolons entirely.
656
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657** Verbose syntax error message fixes:
658
e4ab1254 659 When %error-verbose or the obsolete "#define YYERROR_VERBOSE" is
6f04ee6c
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660 specified, syntax error messages produced by the generated parser
661 include the unexpected token as well as a list of expected tokens.
662 The effect of %nonassoc on these verbose messages has been corrected
663 in two ways, but a more complete fix requires LAC, described above:
095a1d11
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664
665*** When %nonassoc is used, there can exist parser states that accept no
666 tokens, and so the parser does not always require a lookahead token
667 in order to detect a syntax error. Because no unexpected token or
668 expected tokens can then be reported, the verbose syntax error
669 message described above is suppressed, and the parser instead
e4ab1254 670 reports the simpler message, "syntax error". Previously, this
095a1d11
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671 suppression was sometimes erroneously triggered by %nonassoc when a
672 lookahead was actually required. Now verbose messages are
673 suppressed only when all previous lookaheads have already been
674 shifted or discarded.
675
676*** Previously, the list of expected tokens erroneously included tokens
677 that would actually induce a syntax error because conflicts for them
678 were resolved with %nonassoc in the current parser state. Such
679 tokens are now properly omitted from the list.
680
681*** Expected token lists are still often wrong due to state merging
4c38b19e
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682 (from LALR or IELR) and default reductions, which can both add
683 invalid tokens and subtract valid tokens. Canonical LR almost
684 completely fixes this problem by eliminating state merging and
685 default reductions. However, there is one minor problem left even
686 when using canonical LR and even after the fixes above. That is,
687 if the resolution of a conflict with %nonassoc appears in a later
688 parser state than the one at which some syntax error is
689 discovered, the conflicted token is still erroneously included in
690 the expected token list. Bison's new LAC implementation,
691 described above, eliminates this problem and the need for
692 canonical LR. However, LAC is still experimental and is disabled
693 by default.
1fa30307 694
4c2a6e42
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695** Java skeleton fixes:
696
697*** A location handling bug has been fixed.
698
699*** The top element of each of the value stack and location stack is now
700 cleared when popped so that it can be garbage collected.
77768165 701
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702*** Parser traces now print the top element of the stack.
703
248dba53
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704** -W/--warnings fixes:
705
e4ab1254 706*** Bison now properly recognizes the "no-" versions of categories:
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707
708 For example, given the following command line, Bison now enables all
709 warnings except warnings for incompatibilities with POSIX Yacc:
710
711 bison -Wall,no-yacc gram.y
712
6f8bdce2
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713*** Bison now treats S/R and R/R conflicts like other warnings:
714
715 Previously, conflict reports were independent of Bison's normal
716 warning system. Now, Bison recognizes the warning categories
e4ab1254 717 "conflicts-sr" and "conflicts-rr". This change has important
6f8bdce2
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718 consequences for the -W and --warnings command-line options. For
719 example:
720
721 bison -Wno-conflicts-sr gram.y # S/R conflicts not reported
722 bison -Wno-conflicts-rr gram.y # R/R conflicts not reported
723 bison -Wnone gram.y # no conflicts are reported
724 bison -Werror gram.y # any conflict is an error
725
726 However, as before, if the %expect or %expect-rr directive is
727 specified, an unexpected number of conflicts is an error, and an
728 expected number of conflicts is not reported, so -W and --warning
729 then have no effect on the conflict report.
730
e4ab1254 731*** The "none" category no longer disables a preceding "error":
dab96632
JD
732
733 For example, for the following command line, Bison now reports
734 errors instead of warnings for incompatibilities with POSIX Yacc:
735
736 bison -Werror,none,yacc gram.y
737
e4ab1254 738*** The "none" category now disables all Bison warnings:
8ffd7912 739
e4ab1254 740 Previously, the "none" category disabled only Bison warnings for
8ffd7912
JD
741 which there existed a specific -W/--warning category. However,
742 given the following command line, Bison is now guaranteed to
743 suppress all warnings:
744
745 bison -Wnone gram.y
746
9d6af153
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747** Precedence directives can now assign token number 0:
748
749 Since Bison 2.3b, which restored the ability of precedence
750 directives to assign token numbers, doing so for token number 0 has
751 produced an assertion failure. For example:
752
753 %left END 0
754
755 This bug has been fixed.
756
7527c744 757* Changes in version 2.4.3 (2010-08-05):
7a9c3cb3 758
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759** Bison now obeys -Werror and --warnings=error for warnings about
760 grammar rules that are useless in the parser due to conflicts.
761
7a9c3cb3
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762** Problems with spawning M4 on at least FreeBSD 8 and FreeBSD 9 have
763 been fixed.
764
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765** Failures in the test suite for GCC 4.5 have been fixed.
766
88bb35d6
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767** Failures in the test suite for some versions of Sun Studio C++ have
768 been fixed.
769
43fdc9fd
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770** Contrary to Bison 2.4.2's NEWS entry, it has been decided that
771 warnings about undefined %prec identifiers will not be converted to
772 errors in Bison 2.5. They will remain warnings, which should be
773 sufficient for POSIX while avoiding backward compatibility issues.
774
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775** Minor documentation fixes.
776
ea66d039 777* Changes in version 2.4.2 (2010-03-20):
8defe11b 778
47fa5747
JD
779** Some portability problems that resulted in failures and livelocks
780 in the test suite on some versions of at least Solaris, AIX, HP-UX,
ea66d039
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781 RHEL4, and Tru64 have been addressed. As a result, fatal Bison
782 errors should no longer cause M4 to report a broken pipe on the
47fa5747
JD
783 affected platforms.
784
e4ab1254 785** "%prec IDENTIFIER" requires IDENTIFIER to be defined separately.
2c203528
JD
786
787 POSIX specifies that an error be reported for any identifier that does
788 not appear on the LHS of a grammar rule and that is not defined by
789 %token, %left, %right, or %nonassoc. Bison 2.3b and later lost this
790 error report for the case when an identifier appears only after a
791 %prec directive. It is now restored. However, for backward
792 compatibility with recent Bison releases, it is only a warning for
793 now. In Bison 2.5 and later, it will return to being an error.
43fdc9fd
JD
794 [Between the 2.4.2 and 2.4.3 releases, it was decided that this
795 warning will not be converted to an error in Bison 2.5.]
2c203528 796
c5196098
EB
797** Detection of GNU M4 1.4.6 or newer during configure is improved.
798
34731471
JD
799** Warnings from gcc's -Wundef option about undefined YYENABLE_NLS,
800 YYLTYPE_IS_TRIVIAL, and __STRICT_ANSI__ in C/C++ parsers are now
801 avoided.
af2ffe5c 802
966aba65
JD
803** %code is now a permanent feature.
804
805 A traditional Yacc prologue directive is written in the form:
806
807 %{CODE%}
808
809 To provide a more flexible alternative, Bison 2.3b introduced the
810 %code directive with the following forms for C/C++:
811
812 %code {CODE}
813 %code requires {CODE}
814 %code provides {CODE}
815 %code top {CODE}
816
817 These forms are now considered permanent features of Bison. See the
818 %code entries in the section "Bison Declaration Summary" in the Bison
819 manual for a summary of their functionality. See the section
820 "Prologue Alternatives" for a detailed discussion including the
821 advantages of %code over the traditional Yacc prologue directive.
822
823 Bison's Java feature as a whole including its current usage of %code
824 is still considered experimental.
825
41d35e54
JD
826** YYFAIL is deprecated and will eventually be removed.
827
828 YYFAIL has existed for many years as an undocumented feature of
829 deterministic parsers in C generated by Bison. Previously, it was
830 documented for Bison's experimental Java parsers. YYFAIL is no longer
831 documented for Java parsers and is formally deprecated in both cases.
832 Users are strongly encouraged to migrate to YYERROR, which is
833 specified by POSIX.
834
835 Like YYERROR, you can invoke YYFAIL from a semantic action in order to
836 induce a syntax error. The most obvious difference from YYERROR is
837 that YYFAIL will automatically invoke yyerror to report the syntax
838 error so that you don't have to. However, there are several other
839 subtle differences between YYERROR and YYFAIL, and YYFAIL suffers from
e4ab1254 840 inherent flaws when %error-verbose or "#define YYERROR_VERBOSE" is
41d35e54
JD
841 used. For a more detailed discussion, see:
842
843 http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/bison-patches/2009-12/msg00024.html
844
845 The upcoming Bison 2.5 will remove YYFAIL from Java parsers, but
846 deterministic parsers in C will continue to implement it. However,
847 because YYFAIL is already flawed, it seems futile to try to make new
848 Bison features compatible with it. Thus, during parser generation,
849 Bison 2.5 will produce a warning whenever it discovers YYFAIL in a
850 rule action. In a later release, YYFAIL will be disabled for
e4ab1254 851 %error-verbose and "#define YYERROR_VERBOSE". Eventually, YYFAIL will
41d35e54
JD
852 be removed altogether.
853
854 There exists at least one case where Bison 2.5's YYFAIL warning will
855 be a false positive. Some projects add phony uses of YYFAIL and other
856 Bison-defined macros for the sole purpose of suppressing C
857 preprocessor warnings (from GCC cpp's -Wunused-macros, for example).
858 To avoid Bison's future warning, such YYFAIL uses can be moved to the
e4ab1254 859 epilogue (that is, after the second "%%") in the Bison input file. In
41d35e54
JD
860 this release (2.4.2), Bison already generates its own code to suppress
861 C preprocessor warnings for YYFAIL, so projects can remove their own
862 phony uses of YYFAIL if compatibility with Bison releases prior to
863 2.4.2 is not necessary.
864
dac8cc0d
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865** Internationalization.
866
867 Fix a regression introduced in Bison 2.4: Under some circumstances,
868 message translations were not installed although supported by the
869 host system.
870
41930e7a 871* Changes in version 2.4.1 (2008-12-11):
c9ba9e59 872
a957d06c
JD
873** In the GLR defines file, unexpanded M4 macros in the yylval and yylloc
874 declarations have been fixed.
875
738cde3e
AD
876** Temporary hack for adding a semicolon to the user action.
877
878 Bison used to prepend a trailing semicolon at the end of the user
879 action for reductions. This allowed actions such as
880
881 exp: exp "+" exp { $$ = $1 + $3 };
882
883 instead of
884
885 exp: exp "+" exp { $$ = $1 + $3; };
886
e4ab1254 887 Some grammars still depend on this "feature". Bison 2.4.1 restores
d07932ef
JD
888 the previous behavior in the case of C output (specifically, when
889 neither %language or %skeleton or equivalent command-line options
890 are used) to leave more time for grammars depending on the old
891 behavior to be adjusted. Future releases of Bison will disable this
892 feature.
a957d06c
JD
893
894** A few minor improvements to the Bison manual.
c9ba9e59 895
d6fb461d 896* Changes in version 2.4 (2008-11-02):
7bd1665a 897
d6fb461d 898** %language is an experimental feature.
ed4d67dc
JD
899
900 We first introduced this feature in test release 2.3b as a cleaner
901 alternative to %skeleton. Since then, we have discussed the possibility of
902 modifying its effect on Bison's output file names. Thus, in this release,
903 we consider %language to be an experimental feature that will likely evolve
904 in future releases.
7bd1665a 905
d6fb461d 906** Forward compatibility with GNU M4 has been improved.
241fda7a 907
d6fb461d 908** Several bugs in the C++ skeleton and the experimental Java skeleton have been
241fda7a
JD
909 fixed.
910
d6fb461d 911* Changes in version 2.3b (2008-05-27):
35fe0834 912
d6fb461d 913** The quotes around NAME that used to be required in the following directive
d9df47b6
JD
914 are now deprecated:
915
916 %define NAME "VALUE"
917
e4ab1254 918** The directive "%pure-parser" is now deprecated in favor of:
d9df47b6
JD
919
920 %define api.pure
921
922 which has the same effect except that Bison is more careful to warn about
923 unreasonable usage in the latter case.
924
d6fb461d 925** Push Parsing
c373bf8b
JD
926
927 Bison can now generate an LALR(1) parser in C with a push interface. That
e4ab1254
AD
928 is, instead of invoking "yyparse", which pulls tokens from "yylex", you can
929 push one token at a time to the parser using "yypush_parse", which will
c373bf8b
JD
930 return to the caller after processing each token. By default, the push
931 interface is disabled. Either of the following directives will enable it:
932
933 %define api.push_pull "push" // Just push; does not require yylex.
934 %define api.push_pull "both" // Push and pull; requires yylex.
935
e4ab1254 936 See the new section "A Push Parser" in the Bison manual for details.
c373bf8b 937
59da312b
JD
938 The current push parsing interface is experimental and may evolve. More user
939 feedback will help to stabilize it.
940
d6fb461d 941** The -g and --graph options now output graphs in Graphviz DOT format,
8e55b3aa
JD
942 not VCG format. Like --graph, -g now also takes an optional FILE argument
943 and thus cannot be bundled with other short options.
c373bf8b 944
d6fb461d 945** Java
59da312b
JD
946
947 Bison can now generate an LALR(1) parser in Java. The skeleton is
e4ab1254 948 "data/lalr1.java". Consider using the new %language directive instead of
59da312b
JD
949 %skeleton to select it.
950
e4ab1254 951 See the new section "Java Parsers" in the Bison manual for details.
59da312b
JD
952
953 The current Java interface is experimental and may evolve. More user
954 feedback will help to stabilize it.
955
d6fb461d 956** %language
59da312b
JD
957
958 This new directive specifies the programming language of the generated
d43f77e7
PB
959 parser, which can be C (the default), C++, or Java. Besides the skeleton
960 that Bison uses, the directive affects the names of the generated files if
961 the grammar file's name ends in ".y".
59da312b 962
d6fb461d 963** XML Automaton Report
59da312b
JD
964
965 Bison can now generate an XML report of the LALR(1) automaton using the new
e4ab1254 966 "--xml" option. The current XML schema is experimental and may evolve. More
59da312b 967 user feedback will help to stabilize it.
c373bf8b 968
d6fb461d 969** The grammar file may now specify the name of the parser header file using
c373bf8b
JD
970 %defines. For example:
971
972 %defines "parser.h"
973
d6fb461d 974** When reporting useless rules, useless nonterminals, and unused terminals,
d80fb37a
JD
975 Bison now employs the terms "useless in grammar" instead of "useless",
976 "useless in parser" instead of "never reduced", and "unused in grammar"
977 instead of "unused".
cff03fb2 978
d6fb461d 979** Unreachable State Removal
c373bf8b
JD
980
981 Previously, Bison sometimes generated parser tables containing unreachable
31984206
JD
982 states. A state can become unreachable during conflict resolution if Bison
983 disables a shift action leading to it from a predecessor state. Bison now:
75ad86ee
JD
984
985 1. Removes unreachable states.
986
987 2. Does not report any conflicts that appeared in unreachable states.
988 WARNING: As a result, you may need to update %expect and %expect-rr
989 directives in existing grammar files.
990
991 3. For any rule used only in such states, Bison now reports the rule as
cff03fb2 992 "useless in parser due to conflicts".
75ad86ee 993
31984206
JD
994 This feature can be disabled with the following directive:
995
996 %define lr.keep_unreachable_states
997
e4ab1254 998 See the %define entry in the "Bison Declaration Summary" in the Bison manual
31984206
JD
999 for further discussion.
1000
e4ab1254 1001** Lookahead Set Correction in the ".output" Report
b1cc23c4 1002
e4ab1254
AD
1003 When instructed to generate a ".output" file including lookahead sets
1004 (using "--report=lookahead", for example), Bison now prints each reduction's
88c78747
JD
1005 lookahead set only next to the associated state's one item that (1) is
1006 associated with the same rule as the reduction and (2) has its dot at the end
1007 of its RHS. Previously, Bison also erroneously printed the lookahead set
1008 next to all of the state's other items associated with the same rule. This
e4ab1254 1009 bug affected only the ".output" file and not the generated parser source
88c78747
JD
1010 code.
1011
e4ab1254 1012** --report-file=FILE is a new option to override the default ".output" file
59da312b 1013 name.
1bb2bd75 1014
e4ab1254 1015** The "=" that used to be required in the following directives is now
02975b9a
JD
1016 deprecated:
1017
1018 %file-prefix "parser"
1019 %name-prefix "c_"
1020 %output "parser.c"
1021
e4ab1254 1022** An Alternative to "%{...%}" -- "%code QUALIFIER {CODE}"
c373bf8b
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1023
1024 Bison 2.3a provided a new set of directives as a more flexible alternative to
8e0a5e9e
JD
1025 the traditional Yacc prologue blocks. Those have now been consolidated into
1026 a single %code directive with an optional qualifier field, which identifies
1027 the purpose of the code and thus the location(s) where Bison should generate
1028 it:
1029
e4ab1254
AD
1030 1. "%code {CODE}" replaces "%after-header {CODE}"
1031 2. "%code requires {CODE}" replaces "%start-header {CODE}"
1032 3. "%code provides {CODE}" replaces "%end-header {CODE}"
1033 4. "%code top {CODE}" replaces "%before-header {CODE}"
8e0a5e9e 1034
e4ab1254
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1035 See the %code entries in section "Bison Declaration Summary" in the Bison
1036 manual for a summary of the new functionality. See the new section "Prologue
1037 Alternatives" for a detailed discussion including the advantages of %code
8e0a5e9e
JD
1038 over the traditional Yacc prologues.
1039
1040 The prologue alternatives are experimental. More user feedback will help to
1041 determine whether they should become permanent features.
1042
d6fb461d 1043** Revised warning: unset or unused mid-rule values
17bd8a73
JD
1044
1045 Since Bison 2.2, Bison has warned about mid-rule values that are set but not
1046 used within any of the actions of the parent rule. For example, Bison warns
1047 about unused $2 in:
1048
1049 exp: '1' { $$ = 1; } '+' exp { $$ = $1 + $4; };
1050
1051 Now, Bison also warns about mid-rule values that are used but not set. For
1052 example, Bison warns about unset $$ in the mid-rule action in:
1053
1054 exp: '1' { $1 = 1; } '+' exp { $$ = $2 + $4; };
1055
1056 However, Bison now disables both of these warnings by default since they
1057 sometimes prove to be false alarms in existing grammars employing the Yacc
1058 constructs $0 or $-N (where N is some positive integer).
1059
e4ab1254
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1060 To enable these warnings, specify the option "--warnings=midrule-values" or
1061 "-W", which is a synonym for "--warnings=all".
17bd8a73 1062
e4ab1254 1063** Default %destructor or %printer with "<*>" or "<>"
c373bf8b
JD
1064
1065 Bison now recognizes two separate kinds of default %destructor's and
12e35840
JD
1066 %printer's:
1067
e4ab1254 1068 1. Place "<*>" in a %destructor/%printer symbol list to define a default
12e35840
JD
1069 %destructor/%printer for all grammar symbols for which you have formally
1070 declared semantic type tags.
1071
e4ab1254 1072 2. Place "<>" in a %destructor/%printer symbol list to define a default
12e35840
JD
1073 %destructor/%printer for all grammar symbols without declared semantic
1074 type tags.
1075
e4ab1254
AD
1076 Bison no longer supports the "%symbol-default" notation from Bison 2.3a.
1077 "<*>" and "<>" combined achieve the same effect with one exception: Bison no
12e35840
JD
1078 longer applies any %destructor to a mid-rule value if that mid-rule value is
1079 not actually ever referenced using either $$ or $n in a semantic action.
1080
85894313
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1081 The default %destructor's and %printer's are experimental. More user
1082 feedback will help to determine whether they should become permanent
1083 features.
1084
e4ab1254 1085 See the section "Freeing Discarded Symbols" in the Bison manual for further
12e35840
JD
1086 details.
1087
d6fb461d 1088** %left, %right, and %nonassoc can now declare token numbers. This is required
e4ab1254 1089 by POSIX. However, see the end of section "Operator Precedence" in the Bison
ab7f29f8
JD
1090 manual for a caveat concerning the treatment of literal strings.
1091
d6fb461d 1092** The nonfunctional --no-parser, -n, and %no-parser options have been
b1cc23c4
JD
1093 completely removed from Bison.
1094
d6fb461d 1095* Changes in version 2.3a, 2006-09-13:
742e4900 1096
d6fb461d 1097** Instead of %union, you can define and use your own union type
ddc8ede1
PE
1098 YYSTYPE if your grammar contains at least one <type> tag.
1099 Your YYSTYPE need not be a macro; it can be a typedef.
1100 This change is for compatibility with other Yacc implementations,
1101 and is required by POSIX.
1102
d6fb461d 1103** Locations columns and lines start at 1.
cd48d21d
AD
1104 In accordance with the GNU Coding Standards and Emacs.
1105
d6fb461d 1106** You may now declare per-type and default %destructor's and %printer's:
ec5479ce
JD
1107
1108 For example:
1109
b2a0b7ca
JD
1110 %union { char *string; }
1111 %token <string> STRING1
1112 %token <string> STRING2
1113 %type <string> string1
1114 %type <string> string2
1115 %union { char character; }
1116 %token <character> CHR
1117 %type <character> chr
1118 %destructor { free ($$); } %symbol-default
1119 %destructor { free ($$); printf ("%d", @$.first_line); } STRING1 string1
1120 %destructor { } <character>
1121
1122 guarantees that, when the parser discards any user-defined symbol that has a
e4ab1254
AD
1123 semantic type tag other than "<character>", it passes its semantic value to
1124 "free". However, when the parser discards a "STRING1" or a "string1", it
1125 also prints its line number to "stdout". It performs only the second
1126 "%destructor" in this case, so it invokes "free" only once.
ec5479ce 1127
85894313
JD
1128 [Although we failed to mention this here in the 2.3a release, the default
1129 %destructor's and %printer's were experimental, and they were rewritten in
1130 future versions.]
1131
e4ab1254
AD
1132** Except for LALR(1) parsers in C with POSIX Yacc emulation enabled (with "-y",
1133 "--yacc", or "%yacc"), Bison no longer generates #define statements for
b931235e
JD
1134 associating token numbers with token names. Removing the #define statements
1135 helps to sanitize the global namespace during preprocessing, but POSIX Yacc
1136 requires them. Bison still generates an enum for token names in all cases.
1137
d6fb461d 1138** Handling of traditional Yacc prologue blocks is now more consistent but
34f98f46 1139 potentially incompatible with previous releases of Bison.
9bc0dd67
JD
1140
1141 As before, you declare prologue blocks in your grammar file with the
e4ab1254 1142 "%{ ... %}" syntax. To generate the pre-prologue, Bison concatenates all
34f98f46
JD
1143 prologue blocks that you've declared before the first %union. To generate
1144 the post-prologue, Bison concatenates all prologue blocks that you've
ddc8ede1 1145 declared after the first %union.
9bc0dd67 1146
34f98f46 1147 Previous releases of Bison inserted the pre-prologue into both the header
9bc0dd67
JD
1148 file and the code file in all cases except for LALR(1) parsers in C. In the
1149 latter case, Bison inserted it only into the code file. For parsers in C++,
1150 the point of insertion was before any token definitions (which associate
1151 token numbers with names). For parsers in C, the point of insertion was
1152 after the token definitions.
1153
1154 Now, Bison never inserts the pre-prologue into the header file. In the code
1155 file, it always inserts it before the token definitions.
1156
d6fb461d 1157** Bison now provides a more flexible alternative to the traditional Yacc
34f98f46
JD
1158 prologue blocks: %before-header, %start-header, %end-header, and
1159 %after-header.
1160
1161 For example, the following declaration order in the grammar file reflects the
1162 order in which Bison will output these code blocks. However, you are free to
1163 declare these code blocks in your grammar file in whatever order is most
1164 convenient for you:
1165
1166 %before-header {
1167 /* Bison treats this block like a pre-prologue block: it inserts it into
1168 * the code file before the contents of the header file. It does *not*
1169 * insert it into the header file. This is a good place to put
1170 * #include's that you want at the top of your code file. A common
e4ab1254 1171 * example is '#include "system.h"'. */
34f98f46
JD
1172 }
1173 %start-header {
1174 /* Bison inserts this block into both the header file and the code file.
1175 * In both files, the point of insertion is before any Bison-generated
1176 * token, semantic type, location type, and class definitions. This is a
1177 * good place to define %union dependencies, for example. */
9bc0dd67
JD
1178 }
1179 %union {
34f98f46
JD
1180 /* Unlike the traditional Yacc prologue blocks, the output order for the
1181 * new %*-header blocks is not affected by their declaration position
1182 * relative to any %union in the grammar file. */
9bc0dd67 1183 }
34f98f46
JD
1184 %end-header {
1185 /* Bison inserts this block into both the header file and the code file.
1186 * In both files, the point of insertion is after the Bison-generated
1187 * definitions. This is a good place to declare or define public
1188 * functions or data structures that depend on the Bison-generated
1189 * definitions. */
9bc0dd67 1190 }
34f98f46
JD
1191 %after-header {
1192 /* Bison treats this block like a post-prologue block: it inserts it into
1193 * the code file after the contents of the header file. It does *not*
1194 * insert it into the header file. This is a good place to declare or
1195 * define internal functions or data structures that depend on the
1196 * Bison-generated definitions. */
1197 }
1198
1199 If you have multiple occurrences of any one of the above declarations, Bison
1200 will concatenate the contents in declaration order.
9bc0dd67 1201
85894313
JD
1202 [Although we failed to mention this here in the 2.3a release, the prologue
1203 alternatives were experimental, and they were rewritten in future versions.]
1204
e4ab1254 1205** The option "--report=look-ahead" has been changed to "--report=lookahead".
9e6e7ed2
PE
1206 The old spelling still works, but is not documented and may be removed
1207 in a future release.
742e4900 1208
d6fb461d 1209* Changes in version 2.3, 2006-06-05:
4ad3ed84 1210
e4ab1254 1211** GLR grammars should now use "YYRECOVERING ()" instead of "YYRECOVERING",
4ad3ed84
PE
1212 for compatibility with LALR(1) grammars.
1213
d6fb461d 1214** It is now documented that any definition of YYSTYPE or YYLTYPE should
4ad3ed84
PE
1215 be to a type name that does not contain parentheses or brackets.
1216
d6fb461d 1217* Changes in version 2.2, 2006-05-19:
193d7c70 1218
d6fb461d 1219** The distribution terms for all Bison-generated parsers now permit
193d7c70
PE
1220 using the parsers in nonfree programs. Previously, this permission
1221 was granted only for Bison-generated LALR(1) parsers in C.
5f4236a0 1222
d6fb461d 1223** %name-prefix changes the namespace name in C++ outputs.
aa08666d 1224
d6fb461d 1225** The C++ parsers export their token_type.
5f4236a0 1226
d6fb461d 1227** Bison now allows multiple %union declarations, and concatenates
d6ca7905
PE
1228 their contents together.
1229
d6fb461d 1230** New warning: unused values
4d7bc38c
PE
1231 Right-hand side symbols whose values are not used are reported,
1232 if the symbols have destructors. For instance:
affac613 1233
8f3596a6 1234 exp: exp "?" exp ":" exp { $1 ? $1 : $3; }
e29f0771
AD
1235 | exp "+" exp
1236 ;
affac613 1237
8f3596a6
AD
1238 will trigger a warning about $$ and $5 in the first rule, and $3 in
1239 the second ($1 is copied to $$ by the default rule). This example
4e26c69e 1240 most likely contains three errors, and could be rewritten as:
affac613 1241
4e26c69e 1242 exp: exp "?" exp ":" exp
e29f0771
AD
1243 { $$ = $1 ? $3 : $5; free ($1 ? $5 : $3); free ($1); }
1244 | exp "+" exp
1245 { $$ = $1 ? $1 : $3; if ($1) free ($3); }
1246 ;
affac613 1247
4e26c69e
PE
1248 However, if the original actions were really intended, memory leaks
1249 and all, the warnings can be suppressed by letting Bison believe the
1250 values are used, e.g.:
721be13c 1251
8f3596a6 1252 exp: exp "?" exp ":" exp { $1 ? $1 : $3; (void) ($$, $5); }
e29f0771
AD
1253 | exp "+" exp { $$ = $1; (void) $3; }
1254 ;
721be13c 1255
84866159
AD
1256 If there are mid-rule actions, the warning is issued if no action
1257 uses it. The following triggers no warning: $1 and $3 are used.
1258
1259 exp: exp { push ($1); } '+' exp { push ($3); sum (); };
1260
721be13c
PE
1261 The warning is intended to help catching lost values and memory leaks.
1262 If a value is ignored, its associated memory typically is not reclaimed.
affac613 1263
d6fb461d 1264** %destructor vs. YYABORT, YYACCEPT, and YYERROR.
9d9b8b70
PE
1265 Destructors are now called when user code invokes YYABORT, YYACCEPT,
1266 and YYERROR, for all objects on the stack, other than objects
1267 corresponding to the right-hand side of the current rule.
a85284cf 1268
d6fb461d 1269** %expect, %expect-rr
035aa4a0
PE
1270 Incorrect numbers of expected conflicts are now actual errors,
1271 instead of warnings.
1272
d6fb461d 1273** GLR, YACC parsers.
4e26c69e
PE
1274 The %parse-params are available in the destructors (and the
1275 experimental printers) as per the documentation.
4b367315 1276
e4ab1254 1277** Bison now warns if it finds a stray "$" or "@" in an action.
ad6a9b97 1278
d6fb461d 1279** %require "VERSION"
4e26c69e
PE
1280 This specifies that the grammar file depends on features implemented
1281 in Bison version VERSION or higher.
b50d2359 1282
d6fb461d 1283** lalr1.cc: The token and value types are now class members.
e14d0ab6
AD
1284 The tokens were defined as free form enums and cpp macros. YYSTYPE
1285 was defined as a free form union. They are now class members:
e4ab1254
AD
1286 tokens are enumerations of the "yy::parser::token" struct, and the
1287 semantic values have the "yy::parser::semantic_type" type.
fb9712a9
AD
1288
1289 If you do not want or can update to this scheme, the directive
e4ab1254 1290 '%define "global_tokens_and_yystype" "1"' triggers the global
b50d2359
AD
1291 definition of tokens and YYSTYPE. This change is suitable both
1292 for previous releases of Bison, and this one.
fb9712a9 1293
b50d2359 1294 If you wish to update, then make sure older version of Bison will
e4ab1254 1295 fail using '%require "2.2"'.
fb9712a9 1296
d6fb461d 1297** DJGPP support added.
193d7c70 1298\f
d6fb461d 1299* Changes in version 2.1, 2005-09-16:
1ce59070 1300
d6fb461d 1301** The C++ lalr1.cc skeleton supports %lex-param.
e14d0ab6 1302
d6fb461d 1303** Bison-generated parsers now support the translation of diagnostics like
baf785db
PE
1304 "syntax error" into languages other than English. The default
1305 language is still English. For details, please see the new
0410a6e0
PE
1306 Internationalization section of the Bison manual. Software
1307 distributors should also see the new PACKAGING file. Thanks to
1308 Bruno Haible for this new feature.
1ce59070 1309
d6fb461d 1310** Wording in the Bison-generated parsers has been changed slightly to
1a059451
PE
1311 simplify translation. In particular, the message "memory exhausted"
1312 has replaced "parser stack overflow", as the old message was not
1313 always accurate for modern Bison-generated parsers.
1314
d6fb461d 1315** Destructors are now called when the parser aborts, for all symbols left
258b75ca
PE
1316 behind on the stack. Also, the start symbol is now destroyed after a
1317 successful parse. In both cases, the behavior was formerly inconsistent.
1318
d6fb461d 1319** When generating verbose diagnostics, Bison-generated parsers no longer
72f000b0
PE
1320 quote the literal strings associated with tokens. For example, for
1321 a syntax error associated with '%token NUM "number"' they might
1322 print 'syntax error, unexpected number' instead of 'syntax error,
1323 unexpected "number"'.
193d7c70 1324\f
d6fb461d 1325* Changes in version 2.0, 2004-12-25:
efeed023 1326
d6fb461d 1327** Possibly-incompatible changes
d7e14fc0 1328
82de6b0d
PE
1329 - Bison-generated parsers no longer default to using the alloca function
1330 (when available) to extend the parser stack, due to widespread
1331 problems in unchecked stack-overflow detection. You can "#define
1332 YYSTACK_USE_ALLOCA 1" to require the use of alloca, but please read
1333 the manual to determine safe values for YYMAXDEPTH in that case.
8dd162d3 1334
82de6b0d
PE
1335 - Error token location.
1336 During error recovery, the location of the syntax error is updated
1337 to cover the whole sequence covered by the error token: it includes
1338 the shifted symbols thrown away during the first part of the error
1339 recovery, and the lookahead rejected during the second part.
18d192f0 1340
82de6b0d
PE
1341 - Semicolon changes:
1342 . Stray semicolons are no longer allowed at the start of a grammar.
1343 . Semicolons are now required after in-grammar declarations.
e342c3be 1344
82de6b0d
PE
1345 - Unescaped newlines are no longer allowed in character constants or
1346 string literals. They were never portable, and GCC 3.4.0 has
1347 dropped support for them. Better diagnostics are now generated if
1348 forget a closing quote.
8dd162d3 1349
82de6b0d 1350 - NUL bytes are no longer allowed in Bison string literals, unfortunately.
f74b6f91 1351
d6fb461d 1352** New features
1452af69 1353
82de6b0d 1354 - GLR grammars now support locations.
4febdd96 1355
82de6b0d
PE
1356 - New directive: %initial-action.
1357 This directive allows the user to run arbitrary code (including
1358 initializing @$) from yyparse before parsing starts.
1452af69 1359
82de6b0d
PE
1360 - A new directive "%expect-rr N" specifies the expected number of
1361 reduce/reduce conflicts in GLR parsers.
1452af69 1362
e4ab1254 1363 - %token numbers can now be hexadecimal integers, e.g., "%token FOO 0x12d".
82de6b0d 1364 This is a GNU extension.
4febdd96 1365
e4ab1254 1366 - The option "--report=lookahead" was changed to "--report=look-ahead".
9e6e7ed2 1367 [However, this was changed back after 2.3.]
1452af69 1368
82de6b0d 1369 - Experimental %destructor support has been added to lalr1.cc.
1452af69 1370
82de6b0d
PE
1371 - New configure option --disable-yacc, to disable installation of the
1372 yacc command and -ly library introduced in 1.875 for POSIX conformance.
6040d338 1373
d6fb461d 1374** Bug fixes
d5a3fe37 1375
82de6b0d
PE
1376 - For now, %expect-count violations are now just warnings, not errors.
1377 This is for compatibility with Bison 1.75 and earlier (when there are
1378 reduce/reduce conflicts) and with Bison 1.30 and earlier (when there
1379 are too many or too few shift/reduce conflicts). However, in future
1380 versions of Bison we plan to improve the %expect machinery so that
1381 these violations will become errors again.
3473d0f8 1382
82de6b0d
PE
1383 - Within Bison itself, numbers (e.g., goto numbers) are no longer
1384 arbitrarily limited to 16-bit counts.
d600ee67 1385
82de6b0d 1386 - Semicolons are now allowed before "|" in grammar rules, as POSIX requires.
d600ee67 1387\f
d6fb461d 1388* Changes in version 1.875, 2003-01-01:
963fcc17 1389
d6fb461d 1390** The documentation license has been upgraded to version 1.2
dc546b0f 1391 of the GNU Free Documentation License.
75eb3bc4 1392
d6fb461d 1393** syntax error processing
75eb3bc4 1394
dc546b0f
PE
1395 - In Yacc-style parsers YYLLOC_DEFAULT is now used to compute error
1396 locations too. This fixes bugs in error-location computation.
75eb3bc4 1397
dc546b0f
PE
1398 - %destructor
1399 It is now possible to reclaim the memory associated to symbols
1400 discarded during error recovery. This feature is still experimental.
20daca06 1401
dc546b0f
PE
1402 - %error-verbose
1403 This new directive is preferred over YYERROR_VERBOSE.
74724a70 1404
dc546b0f
PE
1405 - #defining yyerror to steal internal variables is discouraged.
1406 It is not guaranteed to work forever.
d1de5372 1407
d6fb461d 1408** POSIX conformance
d1de5372 1409
dc546b0f
PE
1410 - Semicolons are once again optional at the end of grammar rules.
1411 This reverts to the behavior of Bison 1.33 and earlier, and improves
1412 compatibility with Yacc.
74724a70 1413
e4ab1254
AD
1414 - "parse error" -> "syntax error"
1415 Bison now uniformly uses the term "syntax error"; formerly, the code
1416 and manual sometimes used the term "parse error" instead. POSIX
1417 requires "syntax error" in diagnostics, and it was thought better to
dc546b0f 1418 be consistent.
74724a70 1419
dc546b0f
PE
1420 - The documentation now emphasizes that yylex and yyerror must be
1421 declared before use. C99 requires this.
d1de5372 1422
dc546b0f
PE
1423 - Bison now parses C99 lexical constructs like UCNs and
1424 backslash-newline within C escape sequences, as POSIX 1003.1-2001 requires.
d1de5372 1425
dc546b0f
PE
1426 - File names are properly escaped in C output. E.g., foo\bar.y is
1427 output as "foo\\bar.y".
6780ca7a 1428
dc546b0f 1429 - Yacc command and library now available
e4ab1254 1430 The Bison distribution now installs a "yacc" command, as POSIX requires.
dc546b0f
PE
1431 Also, Bison now installs a small library liby.a containing
1432 implementations of Yacc-compatible yyerror and main functions.
1433 This library is normally not useful, but POSIX requires it.
6e649e65 1434
dc546b0f 1435 - Type clashes now generate warnings, not errors.
6e649e65 1436
dc546b0f
PE
1437 - If the user does not define YYSTYPE as a macro, Bison now declares it
1438 using typedef instead of defining it as a macro.
1439 For consistency, YYLTYPE is also declared instead of defined.
9501dc6e 1440
d6fb461d 1441** Other compatibility issues
886a425c 1442
e4ab1254
AD
1443 - %union directives can now have a tag before the "{", e.g., the
1444 directive "%union foo {...}" now generates the C code
1445 "typedef union foo { ... } YYSTYPE;"; this is for Yacc compatibility.
1446 The default union tag is "YYSTYPE", for compatibility with Solaris 9 Yacc.
1447 For consistency, YYLTYPE's struct tag is now "YYLTYPE" not "yyltype".
dc546b0f 1448 This is for compatibility with both Yacc and Bison 1.35.
72f889cc 1449
e4ab1254 1450 - ";" is output before the terminating "}" of an action, for
dc546b0f 1451 compatibility with Bison 1.35.
886a425c 1452
dc546b0f 1453 - Bison now uses a Yacc-style format for conflict reports, e.g.,
e4ab1254 1454 "conflicts: 2 shift/reduce, 1 reduce/reduce".
437c2d80 1455
e4ab1254 1456 - "yystype" and "yyltype" are now obsolescent macros instead of being
dc546b0f
PE
1457 typedefs or tags; they are no longer documented and are planned to be
1458 withdrawn in a future release.
2a8d363a 1459
d6fb461d 1460** GLR parser notes
2a8d363a 1461
dc546b0f
PE
1462 - GLR and inline
1463 Users of Bison have to decide how they handle the portability of the
e4ab1254 1464 C keyword "inline".
959e5f51 1465
e4ab1254
AD
1466 - "parsing stack overflow..." -> "parser stack overflow"
1467 GLR parsers now report "parser stack overflow" as per the Bison manual.
900c5db5 1468
18ad57b3
AD
1469** %parse-param and %lex-param
1470 The macros YYPARSE_PARAM and YYLEX_PARAM provide a means to pass
1471 additional context to yyparse and yylex. They suffer from several
1472 shortcomings:
1473
1474 - a single argument only can be added,
1475 - their types are weak (void *),
242cc08e 1476 - this context is not passed to ancillary functions such as yyerror,
18ad57b3
AD
1477 - only yacc.c parsers support them.
1478
1479 The new %parse-param/%lex-param directives provide a more precise control.
1480 For instance:
1481
1482 %parse-param {int *nastiness}
1483 %lex-param {int *nastiness}
1484 %parse-param {int *randomness}
1485
1486 results in the following signatures:
1487
1488 int yylex (int *nastiness);
1489 int yyparse (int *nastiness, int *randomness);
1490
1491 or, if both %pure-parser and %locations are used:
1492
1493 int yylex (YYSTYPE *lvalp, YYLTYPE *llocp, int *nastiness);
1494 int yyparse (int *nastiness, int *randomness);
1495
d6fb461d 1496** Bison now warns if it detects conflicting outputs to the same file,
e4ab1254 1497 e.g., it generates a warning for "bison -d -o foo.h foo.y" since
dc546b0f 1498 that command outputs both code and header to foo.h.
6e40b4eb 1499
d6fb461d 1500** #line in output files
dc546b0f 1501 - --no-line works properly.
6e40b4eb 1502
d6fb461d 1503** Bison can no longer be built by a K&R C compiler; it requires C89 or
6e40b4eb
AD
1504 later to be built. This change originally took place a few versions
1505 ago, but nobody noticed until we recently asked someone to try
1506 building Bison with a K&R C compiler.
d600ee67 1507\f
d6fb461d 1508* Changes in version 1.75, 2002-10-14:
7933f2b5 1509
d6fb461d 1510** Bison should now work on 64-bit hosts.
7933f2b5 1511
d6fb461d 1512** Indonesian translation thanks to Tedi Heriyanto.
7933f2b5 1513
d6fb461d 1514** GLR parsers
f50adbbd
AD
1515 Fix spurious parse errors.
1516
d6fb461d 1517** Pure parsers
f50adbbd
AD
1518 Some people redefine yyerror to steal yyparse' private variables.
1519 Reenable this trick until an official feature replaces it.
1520
d6fb461d 1521** Type Clashes
d90c934c
AD
1522 In agreement with POSIX and with other Yaccs, leaving a default
1523 action is valid when $$ is untyped, and $1 typed:
1524
e29f0771 1525 untyped: ... typed;
d90c934c
AD
1526
1527 but the converse remains an error:
1528
e29f0771 1529 typed: ... untyped;
d90c934c 1530
d6fb461d 1531** Values of mid-rule actions
d90c934c
AD
1532 The following code:
1533
e29f0771 1534 foo: { ... } { $$ = $1; } ...
d90c934c
AD
1535
1536 was incorrectly rejected: $1 is defined in the second mid-rule
1537 action, and is equal to the $$ of the first mid-rule action.
d600ee67 1538\f
d6fb461d 1539* Changes in version 1.50, 2002-10-04:
adc8c848 1540
d6fb461d 1541** GLR parsing
676385e2
PH
1542 The declaration
1543 %glr-parser
1544 causes Bison to produce a Generalized LR (GLR) parser, capable of handling
1545 almost any context-free grammar, ambiguous or not. The new declarations
e8832397 1546 %dprec and %merge on grammar rules allow parse-time resolution of
676385e2
PH
1547 ambiguities. Contributed by Paul Hilfinger.
1548
7933f2b5 1549 Unfortunately Bison 1.50 does not work properly on 64-bit hosts
420f93c8
PE
1550 like the Alpha, so please stick to 32-bit hosts for now.
1551
d6fb461d 1552** Output Directory
8c165d89 1553 When not in Yacc compatibility mode, when the output file was not
e4ab1254
AD
1554 specified, running "bison foo/bar.y" created "foo/bar.c". It
1555 now creates "bar.c".
8c165d89 1556
d6fb461d 1557** Undefined token
007a50a4 1558 The undefined token was systematically mapped to 2 which prevented
e88dbdbf 1559 the use of 2 by the user. This is no longer the case.
007a50a4 1560
d6fb461d 1561** Unknown token numbers
e88dbdbf 1562 If yylex returned an out of range value, yyparse could die. This is
007a50a4
AD
1563 no longer the case.
1564
d6fb461d 1565** Error token
e88dbdbf 1566 According to POSIX, the error token must be 256.
23c5a174
AD
1567 Bison extends this requirement by making it a preference: *if* the
1568 user specified that one of her tokens is numbered 256, then error
1569 will be mapped onto another number.
1570
d6fb461d 1571** Verbose error messages
e4ab1254 1572 They no longer report "..., expecting error or..." for states where
217598da
AD
1573 error recovery is possible.
1574
d6fb461d 1575** End token
e4ab1254 1576 Defaults to "$end" instead of "$".
217598da 1577
d6fb461d 1578** Error recovery now conforms to documentation and to POSIX
68cd8af3
PE
1579 When a Bison-generated parser encounters a syntax error, it now pops
1580 the stack until it finds a state that allows shifting the error
1581 token. Formerly, it popped the stack until it found a state that
1582 allowed some non-error action other than a default reduction on the
1583 error token. The new behavior has long been the documented behavior,
1584 and has long been required by POSIX. For more details, please see
337116ba
PE
1585 Paul Eggert, "Reductions during Bison error handling" (2002-05-20)
1586 <http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/bug-bison/2002-05/msg00038.html>.
68cd8af3 1587
d6fb461d 1588** Traces
5504898e
AD
1589 Popped tokens and nonterminals are now reported.
1590
d6fb461d 1591** Larger grammars
a861a339
PE
1592 Larger grammars are now supported (larger token numbers, larger grammar
1593 size (= sum of the LHS and RHS lengths), larger LALR tables).
1594 Formerly, many of these numbers ran afoul of 16-bit limits;
1595 now these limits are 32 bits on most hosts.
355e7c1c 1596
d6fb461d 1597** Explicit initial rule
643a5994
AD
1598 Bison used to play hacks with the initial rule, which the user does
1599 not write. It is now explicit, and visible in the reports and
1600 graphs as rule 0.
23c5a174 1601
d6fb461d 1602** Useless rules
643a5994 1603 Before, Bison reported the useless rules, but, although not used,
77714df2 1604 included them in the parsers. They are now actually removed.
23c5a174 1605
d6fb461d 1606** Useless rules, useless nonterminals
6b98e4b5
AD
1607 They are now reported, as a warning, with their locations.
1608
d6fb461d 1609** Rules never reduced
e8832397
AD
1610 Rules that can never be reduced because of conflicts are now
1611 reported.
1612
e4ab1254 1613** Incorrect "Token not used"
11652ab3
AD
1614 On a grammar such as
1615
e29f0771
AD
1616 %token useless useful
1617 %%
1618 exp: '0' %prec useful;
11652ab3
AD
1619
1620 where a token was used to set the precedence of the last rule,
e4ab1254 1621 bison reported both "useful" and "useless" as useless tokens.
11652ab3 1622
d6fb461d 1623** Revert the C++ namespace changes introduced in 1.31
77714df2 1624 as they caused too many portability hassles.
0179dd65 1625
d6fb461d 1626** Default locations
b2d52318
AD
1627 By an accident of design, the default computation of @$ was
1628 performed after another default computation was performed: @$ = @1.
1629 The latter is now removed: YYLLOC_DEFAULT is fully responsible of
1630 the computation of @$.
adc8c848 1631
d6fb461d 1632** Token end-of-file
b7c49edf
AD
1633 The token end of file may be specified by the user, in which case,
1634 the user symbol is used in the reports, the graphs, and the verbose
e4ab1254 1635 error messages instead of "$end", which remains being the default.
b7c49edf 1636 For instance
e29f0771 1637 %token MYEOF 0
b7c49edf 1638 or
e29f0771 1639 %token MYEOF 0 "end of file"
fdbcd8e2 1640
d6fb461d 1641** Semantic parser
fdbcd8e2
AD
1642 This old option, which has been broken for ages, is removed.
1643
d6fb461d 1644** New translations
a861a339 1645 Brazilian Portuguese, thanks to Alexandre Folle de Menezes.
84614e13
AD
1646 Croatian, thanks to Denis Lackovic.
1647
d6fb461d 1648** Incorrect token definitions
e4ab1254
AD
1649 When given
1650 %token 'a' "A"
1651 bison used to output
1652 #define 'a' 65
b87f8b21 1653
d6fb461d 1654** Token definitions as enums
77714df2
AD
1655 Tokens are output both as the traditional #define's, and, provided
1656 the compiler supports ANSI C or is a C++ compiler, as enums.
e88dbdbf 1657 This lets debuggers display names instead of integers.
77714df2 1658
d6fb461d 1659** Reports
ec3bc396
AD
1660 In addition to --verbose, bison supports --report=THINGS, which
1661 produces additional information:
b408954b
AD
1662 - itemset
1663 complete the core item sets with their closure
e4ab1254 1664 - lookahead [changed to "look-ahead" in 1.875e through 2.3, but changed back]
9e6e7ed2 1665 explicitly associate lookahead tokens to items
b408954b
AD
1666 - solved
1667 describe shift/reduce conflicts solving.
1668 Bison used to systematically output this information on top of
1669 the report. Solved conflicts are now attached to their states.
ec3bc396 1670
d6fb461d 1671** Type clashes
9af3fbce
AD
1672 Previous versions don't complain when there is a type clash on
1673 the default action if the rule has a mid-rule action, such as in:
1674
e29f0771
AD
1675 %type <foo> bar
1676 %%
1677 bar: '0' {} '0';
9af3fbce
AD
1678
1679 This is fixed.
a861a339 1680
d6fb461d 1681** GNU M4 is now required when using Bison.
f987e9d2 1682\f
d6fb461d 1683* Changes in version 1.35, 2002-03-25:
76551463 1684
d6fb461d 1685** C Skeleton
76551463
AD
1686 Some projects use Bison's C parser with C++ compilers, and define
1687 YYSTYPE as a class. The recent adjustment of C parsers for data
1688 alignment and 64 bit architectures made this impossible.
1689
1690 Because for the time being no real solution for C++ parser
1691 generation exists, kludges were implemented in the parser to
1692 maintain this use. In the future, when Bison has C++ parsers, this
1693 kludge will be disabled.
1694
1695 This kludge also addresses some C++ problems when the stack was
1696 extended.
76551463 1697\f
d6fb461d 1698* Changes in version 1.34, 2002-03-12:
76551463 1699
d6fb461d 1700** File name clashes are detected
76551463 1701 $ bison foo.y -d -o foo.x
e4ab1254 1702 fatal error: header and parser would both be named "foo.x"
76551463 1703
e4ab1254 1704** A missing ";" at the end of a rule triggers a warning
76551463
AD
1705 In accordance with POSIX, and in agreement with other
1706 Yacc implementations, Bison will mandate this semicolon in the near
1707 future. This eases the implementation of a Bison parser of Bison
1708 grammars by making this grammar LALR(1) instead of LR(2). To
1709 facilitate the transition, this release introduces a warning.
1710
d6fb461d 1711** Revert the C++ namespace changes introduced in 1.31, as they caused too
76551463
AD
1712 many portability hassles.
1713
d6fb461d 1714** DJGPP support added.
76551463 1715
d6fb461d 1716** Fix test suite portability problems.
76551463 1717\f
d6fb461d 1718* Changes in version 1.33, 2002-02-07:
76551463 1719
d6fb461d 1720** Fix C++ issues
76551463
AD
1721 Groff could not be compiled for the definition of size_t was lacking
1722 under some conditions.
1723
d6fb461d 1724** Catch invalid @n
76551463
AD
1725 As is done with $n.
1726\f
d6fb461d 1727* Changes in version 1.32, 2002-01-23:
76551463 1728
d6fb461d 1729** Fix Yacc output file names
76551463 1730
d6fb461d 1731** Portability fixes
76551463 1732
d6fb461d 1733** Italian, Dutch translations
76551463 1734\f
d6fb461d 1735* Changes in version 1.31, 2002-01-14:
52d1aeee 1736
d6fb461d 1737** Many Bug Fixes
52d1aeee 1738
d6fb461d 1739** GNU Gettext and %expect
52d1aeee
MA
1740 GNU Gettext asserts 10 s/r conflicts, but there are 7. Now that
1741 Bison dies on incorrect %expectations, we fear there will be
1742 too many bug reports for Gettext, so _for the time being_, %expect
e4ab1254 1743 does not trigger an error when the input file is named "plural.y".
52d1aeee 1744
d6fb461d 1745** Use of alloca in parsers
52d1aeee
MA
1746 If YYSTACK_USE_ALLOCA is defined to 0, then the parsers will use
1747 malloc exclusively. Since 1.29, but was not NEWS'ed.
1748
1749 alloca is used only when compiled with GCC, to avoid portability
1750 problems as on AIX.
1751
d6fb461d 1752** yyparse now returns 2 if memory is exhausted; formerly it dumped core.
b47dbebe 1753
d6fb461d 1754** When the generated parser lacks debugging code, YYDEBUG is now 0
52d1aeee
MA
1755 (as POSIX requires) instead of being undefined.
1756
d6fb461d 1757** User Actions
52d1aeee
MA
1758 Bison has always permitted actions such as { $$ = $1 }: it adds the
1759 ending semicolon. Now if in Yacc compatibility mode, the semicolon
1760 is no longer output: one has to write { $$ = $1; }.
1761
d6fb461d 1762** Better C++ compliance
52d1aeee 1763 The output parsers try to respect C++ namespaces.
76551463 1764 [This turned out to be a failed experiment, and it was reverted later.]
52d1aeee 1765
d6fb461d 1766** Reduced Grammars
52d1aeee
MA
1767 Fixed bugs when reporting useless nonterminals.
1768
d6fb461d 1769** 64 bit hosts
52d1aeee
MA
1770 The parsers work properly on 64 bit hosts.
1771
d6fb461d 1772** Error messages
52d1aeee
MA
1773 Some calls to strerror resulted in scrambled or missing error messages.
1774
d6fb461d 1775** %expect
52d1aeee
MA
1776 When the number of shift/reduce conflicts is correct, don't issue
1777 any warning.
1778
d6fb461d 1779** The verbose report includes the rule line numbers.
52d1aeee 1780
d6fb461d 1781** Rule line numbers are fixed in traces.
52d1aeee 1782
d6fb461d 1783** Swedish translation
52d1aeee 1784
d6fb461d 1785** Parse errors
52d1aeee
MA
1786 Verbose parse error messages from the parsers are better looking.
1787 Before: parse error: unexpected `'/'', expecting `"number"' or `'-'' or `'(''
1788 Now: parse error: unexpected '/', expecting "number" or '-' or '('
1789
d6fb461d 1790** Fixed parser memory leaks.
52d1aeee
MA
1791 When the generated parser was using malloc to extend its stacks, the
1792 previous allocations were not freed.
1793
d6fb461d 1794** Fixed verbose output file.
52d1aeee
MA
1795 Some newlines were missing.
1796 Some conflicts in state descriptions were missing.
1797
d6fb461d 1798** Fixed conflict report.
52d1aeee
MA
1799 Option -v was needed to get the result.
1800
d6fb461d 1801** %expect
52d1aeee
MA
1802 Was not used.
1803 Mismatches are errors, not warnings.
1804
d6fb461d 1805** Fixed incorrect processing of some invalid input.
52d1aeee 1806
d6fb461d 1807** Fixed CPP guards: 9foo.h uses BISON_9FOO_H instead of 9FOO_H.
52d1aeee 1808
d6fb461d 1809** Fixed some typos in the documentation.
52d1aeee 1810
d6fb461d 1811** %token MY_EOF 0 is supported.
52d1aeee
MA
1812 Before, MY_EOF was silently renumbered as 257.
1813
d6fb461d 1814** doc/refcard.tex is updated.
52d1aeee 1815
d6fb461d 1816** %output, %file-prefix, %name-prefix.
52d1aeee
MA
1817 New.
1818
d6fb461d 1819** --output
e4ab1254 1820 New, aliasing "--output-file".
52d1aeee 1821\f
d6fb461d 1822* Changes in version 1.30, 2001-10-26:
342b8b6e 1823
e4ab1254
AD
1824** "--defines" and "--graph" have now an optional argument which is the
1825 output file name. "-d" and "-g" do not change; they do not take any
342b8b6e
AD
1826 argument.
1827
e4ab1254 1828** "%source_extension" and "%header_extension" are removed, failed
342b8b6e
AD
1829 experiment.
1830
d6fb461d 1831** Portability fixes.
f987e9d2 1832\f
d6fb461d 1833* Changes in version 1.29, 2001-09-07:
342b8b6e 1834
d6fb461d 1835** The output file does not define const, as this caused problems when used
342b8b6e
AD
1836 with common autoconfiguration schemes. If you still use ancient compilers
1837 that lack const, compile with the equivalent of the C compiler option
e4ab1254 1838 "-Dconst=". Autoconf's AC_C_CONST macro provides one way to do this.
342b8b6e 1839
e4ab1254 1840** Added "-g" and "--graph".
f87a2205 1841
d6fb461d 1842** The Bison manual is now distributed under the terms of the GNU FDL.
f2b5126e 1843
d6fb461d 1844** The input and the output files has automatically a similar extension.
234a3be3 1845
d6fb461d 1846** Russian translation added.
f87a2205 1847
d6fb461d 1848** NLS support updated; should hopefully be less troublesome.
f87a2205 1849
d6fb461d 1850** Added the old Bison reference card.
c33638bb 1851
e4ab1254 1852** Added "--locations" and "%locations".
6deb4447 1853
e4ab1254 1854** Added "-S" and "--skeleton".
cd5bd6ac 1855
e4ab1254 1856** "%raw", "-r", "--raw" is disabled.
62ab6972 1857
d6fb461d 1858** Special characters are escaped when output. This solves the problems
cd5bd6ac
AD
1859 of the #line lines with path names including backslashes.
1860
d6fb461d 1861** New directives.
e4ab1254
AD
1862 "%yacc", "%fixed_output_files", "%defines", "%no_parser", "%verbose",
1863 "%debug", "%source_extension" and "%header_extension".
f987e9d2 1864
d6fb461d 1865** @$
f987e9d2 1866 Automatic location tracking.
f87a2205 1867\f
d6fb461d 1868* Changes in version 1.28, 1999-07-06:
d2e00347 1869
d6fb461d 1870** Should compile better now with K&R compilers.
d2e00347 1871
d6fb461d 1872** Added NLS.
d2e00347 1873
d6fb461d 1874** Fixed a problem with escaping the double quote character.
d2e00347 1875
d6fb461d 1876** There is now a FAQ.
d2e00347 1877\f
d6fb461d 1878* Changes in version 1.27:
5c31c3c2 1879
d6fb461d 1880** The make rule which prevented bison.simple from being created on
5c31c3c2
JT
1881 some systems has been fixed.
1882\f
d6fb461d 1883* Changes in version 1.26:
4be07551 1884
7e508a2b 1885** Bison now uses Automake.
4be07551 1886
d6fb461d 1887** New mailing lists: <bug-bison@gnu.org> and <help-bison@gnu.org>.
4be07551 1888
d6fb461d 1889** Token numbers now start at 257 as previously documented, not 258.
4be07551 1890
d6fb461d 1891** Bison honors the TMPDIR environment variable.
4be07551 1892
d6fb461d 1893** A couple of buffer overruns have been fixed.
f51dbca1 1894
d6fb461d 1895** Problems when closing files should now be reported.
f51dbca1 1896
d6fb461d 1897** Generated parsers should now work even on operating systems which do
f51dbca1 1898 not provide alloca().
4be07551 1899\f
d6fb461d 1900* Changes in version 1.25, 1995-10-16:
df8878c5 1901
d6fb461d 1902** Errors in the input grammar are not fatal; Bison keeps reading
df8878c5 1903the grammar file, and reports all the errors found in it.
8c44d3ec 1904
d6fb461d 1905** Tokens can now be specified as multiple-character strings: for
df8878c5 1906example, you could use "<=" for a token which looks like <=, instead
7e508a2b 1907of choosing a name like LESSEQ.
df8878c5 1908
d6fb461d 1909** The %token_table declaration says to write a table of tokens (names
df8878c5
RS
1910and numbers) into the parser file. The yylex function can use this
1911table to recognize multiple-character string tokens, or for other
1912purposes.
1913
d6fb461d 1914** The %no_lines declaration says not to generate any #line preprocessor
df8878c5
RS
1915directives in the parser file.
1916
d6fb461d 1917** The %raw declaration says to use internal Bison token numbers, not
df8878c5
RS
1918Yacc-compatible token numbers, when token names are defined as macros.
1919
d6fb461d 1920** The --no-parser option produces the parser tables without including
df8878c5
RS
1921the parser engine; a project can now use its own parser engine.
1922The actions go into a separate file called NAME.act, in the form of
1923a switch statement body.
1924\f
d6fb461d 1925* Changes in version 1.23:
6780ca7a 1926
4d019228
DM
1927The user can define YYPARSE_PARAM as the name of an argument to be
1928passed into yyparse. The argument should have type void *. It should
1929actually point to an object. Grammar actions can access the variable
1930by casting it to the proper pointer type.
6780ca7a 1931
6780ca7a 1932Line numbers in output file corrected.
6780ca7a 1933\f
d6fb461d 1934* Changes in version 1.22:
6780ca7a
DM
1935
1936--help option added.
6780ca7a 1937\f
d6fb461d 1938* Changes in version 1.20:
6780ca7a
DM
1939
1940Output file does not redefine const for C++.
9f4503d6 1941
76551463
AD
1942-----
1943
c932d613 1944Copyright (C) 1995-2012 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
76551463 1945
8defe11b 1946This file is part of Bison, the GNU Parser Generator.
76551463 1947
f16b0819 1948This program is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify
76551463 1949it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
f16b0819
PE
1950the Free Software Foundation, either version 3 of the License, or
1951(at your option) any later version.
76551463 1952
f16b0819 1953This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
76551463
AD
1954but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
1955MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the
1956GNU General Public License for more details.
1957
1958You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
f16b0819 1959along with this program. If not, see <http://www.gnu.org/licenses/>.
7e508a2b
AD
1960
1961 LocalWords: yacc YYBACKUP glr GCC lalr ArrayIndexOutOfBoundsException nullptr
1962 LocalWords: cplusplus liby rpl fprintf mfcalc Wyacc stmt cond expr mk sym lr
1963 LocalWords: IELR ielr Lookahead YYERROR nonassoc LALR's api lookaheads yychar
1964 LocalWords: destructor lookahead YYRHSLOC YYLLOC Rhs ifndef YYFAIL cpp sr rr
1965 LocalWords: preprocessor initializer Wno Wnone Werror FreeBSD prec livelocks
1966 LocalWords: Solaris AIX UX RHEL Tru LHS gcc's Wundef YYENABLE NLS YYLTYPE VCG
1967 LocalWords: yyerror cpp's Wunused yylval yylloc prepend yyparse yylex yypush
1968 LocalWords: Graphviz xml nonterminals midrule destructor's YYSTYPE typedef ly
1969 LocalWords: CHR chr printf stdout namespace preprocessing enum pre include's
1970 LocalWords: YYRECOVERING nonfree destructors YYABORT YYACCEPT params enums de
1971 LocalWords: struct yystype DJGPP lex param Haible NUM alloca YYSTACK NUL goto
1972 LocalWords: YYMAXDEPTH Unescaped UCNs YYLTYPE's yyltype typedefs inline Yaccs
1973 LocalWords: Heriyanto Reenable dprec Hilfinger Eggert MYEOF Folle Menezes EOF
242cc08e 1974 LocalWords: Lackovic define's itemset Groff Gettext malloc NEWS'ed YYDEBUG YY
7e508a2b 1975 LocalWords: namespaces strerror const autoconfiguration Dconst Autoconf's FDL
242cc08e
AD
1976 LocalWords: Automake TMPDIR LESSEQ ylwrap endif yydebug YYTOKEN YYLSP ival hh
1977 LocalWords: extern YYTOKENTYPE TOKENTYPE yytokentype tokentype STYPE lval pdf
7287be84
AD
1978 LocalWords: lang yyoutput dvi html ps POSIX lvalp llocp calc yyo fval Wmaybe
1979 LocalWords: yyvsp pragmas noreturn java's
7e508a2b
AD
1980
1981Local Variables:
1982mode: outline
e4ab1254 1983fill-column: 76
7e508a2b 1984End: