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