4 * Changes in version ?.? (????-??-??):
6 ** Additional yylex/yyparse arguments
8 The new directive %param declare additional argument to both yylex
9 and yyparse. The %lex-param, %parse-param, and %param directives
10 support one or more arguments. Instead of
12 %lex-param {arg1_type *arg1}
13 %lex-param {arg2_type *arg2}
14 %parse-param {arg1_type *arg1}
15 %parse-param {arg2_type *arg2}
19 %param {arg1_type *arg1} {arg2_type *arg2}
21 ** Java skeleton improvements
23 The constants for token names were moved to the Lexer interface.
24 Also, it is possible to add code to the parser's constructors using
25 "%code init" and "%define init_throws".
27 ** Variable api.tokens.prefix
29 The variable api.tokens.prefix changes the way tokens are identified in
30 the generated files. This is especially useful to avoid collisions
31 with identifiers in the target language. For instance
34 %define api.tokens.prefix "TOK_"
36 start: FILE for ERROR;
38 will generate the definition of the symbols TOK_FILE, TOK_for, and
39 TOK_ERROR in the generated sources. In particular, the scanner must
40 use these prefixed token names, although the grammar itself still
41 uses the short names (as in the sample rule given above).
43 ** Variable api.namespace
45 The "namespace" variable is renamed "api.namespace". Backward
46 compatibility is ensured, but upgrading is recommended.
48 ** Variable parse.error
50 The variable error controls the verbosity of error messages. The
51 use of the %error-verbose directive is deprecated in favor of
52 %define parse.error "verbose".
54 ** Semantic predicates
56 The new, experimental, semantic-predicate feature allows actions of
57 the form %?{ BOOLEAN-EXPRESSION }, which cause syntax errors (as for
58 YYERROR) if the expression evaluates to 0, and are evaluated immediately
59 in GLR parsers, rather than being deferred. The result is that they
60 allow the programmer to prune possible parses based on the values of
63 * Changes in version 2.5 (????-??-??):
65 ** Grammar symbol names can now contain non-initial dashes:
67 Consistently with directives (such as %error-verbose) and with
68 %define variables (e.g. push-pull), grammar symbol names may contain
69 dashes in any position except the beginning. This is a GNU
70 extension over POSIX Yacc. Thus, use of this extension is reported
71 by -Wyacc and rejected in Yacc mode (--yacc).
75 Historically, Yacc and Bison have supported positional references
76 ($n, $$) to allow access to symbol values from inside of semantic
79 Starting from this version, Bison can also accept named references.
80 When no ambiguity is possible, original symbol names may be used
83 if_stmt : "if" cond_expr "then" then_stmt ';'
84 { $if_stmt = mk_if_stmt($cond_expr, $then_stmt); }
86 In the more common case, explicit names may be declared:
88 stmt[res] : "if" expr[cond] "then" stmt[then] "else" stmt[else] ';'
89 { $res = mk_if_stmt($cond, $then, $else); }
91 Location information is also accessible using @name syntax. When
92 accessing symbol names containing dots or dashes, explicit bracketing
93 ($[sym.1]) must be used.
95 These features are experimental in this version. More user feedback
96 will help to stabilize them.
98 ** IELR(1) and canonical LR(1):
100 IELR(1) is a minimal LR(1) parser table generation algorithm. That
101 is, given any context-free grammar, IELR(1) generates parser tables
102 with the full language-recognition power of canonical LR(1) but with
103 nearly the same number of parser states as LALR(1). This reduction
104 in parser states is often an order of magnitude. More importantly,
105 because canonical LR(1)'s extra parser states may contain duplicate
106 conflicts in the case of non-LR(1) grammars, the number of conflicts
107 for IELR(1) is often an order of magnitude less as well. This can
108 significantly reduce the complexity of developing of a grammar.
110 Bison can now generate IELR(1) and canonical LR(1) parser tables in
111 place of its traditional LALR(1) parser tables, which remain the
112 default. You can specify the type of parser tables in the grammar
113 file with these directives:
117 %define lr.type canonical-lr
119 The default-reduction optimization in the parser tables can also be
120 adjusted using `%define lr.default-reductions'. For details on both
121 of these features, see the new section `Tuning LR' in the Bison
124 These features are experimental. More user feedback will help to
127 ** LAC (Lookahead Correction) for syntax error handling:
129 Canonical LR, IELR, and LALR can suffer from a couple of problems
130 upon encountering a syntax error. First, the parser might perform
131 additional parser stack reductions before discovering the syntax
132 error. Such reductions can perform user semantic actions that are
133 unexpected because they are based on an invalid token, and they
134 cause error recovery to begin in a different syntactic context than
135 the one in which the invalid token was encountered. Second, when
136 verbose error messages are enabled (with %error-verbose or the
137 obsolete `#define YYERROR_VERBOSE'), the expected token list in the
138 syntax error message can both contain invalid tokens and omit valid
141 The culprits for the above problems are %nonassoc, default
142 reductions in inconsistent states, and parser state merging. Thus,
143 IELR and LALR suffer the most. Canonical LR can suffer only if
144 %nonassoc is used or if default reductions are enabled for
147 LAC is a new mechanism within the parsing algorithm that solves
148 these problems for canonical LR, IELR, and LALR without sacrificing
149 %nonassoc, default reductions, or state merging. When LAC is in
150 use, canonical LR and IELR behave almost exactly the same for both
151 syntactically acceptable and syntactically unacceptable input.
152 While LALR still does not support the full language-recognition
153 power of canonical LR and IELR, LAC at least enables LALR's syntax
154 error handling to correctly reflect LALR's language-recognition
157 Currently, LAC is only supported for deterministic parsers in C.
158 You can enable LAC with the following directive:
160 %define parse.lac full
162 See the new section `LAC' in the Bison manual for additional
163 details including a few caveats.
165 LAC is an experimental feature. More user feedback will help to
168 ** %define improvements:
170 *** Can now be invoked via the command line:
172 Each of these command-line options
175 --define=NAME[=VALUE]
178 --force-define=NAME[=VALUE]
180 is equivalent to this grammar file declaration
182 %define NAME ["VALUE"]
184 except that the manner in which Bison processes multiple definitions
185 for the same NAME differs. Most importantly, -F and --force-define
186 quietly override %define, but -D and --define do not. For further
187 details, see the section `Bison Options' in the Bison manual.
189 *** Variables renamed:
191 The following %define variables
194 lr.keep_unreachable_states
199 lr.keep-unreachable-states
201 The old names are now deprecated but will be maintained indefinitely
202 for backward compatibility.
204 *** Values no longer need to be quoted in the grammar file:
206 If a %define value is an identifier, it no longer needs to be placed
207 within quotations marks. For example,
209 %define api.push-pull "push"
213 %define api.push-pull push
215 *** Unrecognized variables are now errors not warnings.
217 *** Multiple invocations for any variable is now an error not a warning.
219 ** Unrecognized %code qualifiers are now errors not warnings.
221 ** Character literals not of length one:
223 Previously, Bison quietly converted all character literals to length
224 one. For example, without warning, Bison interpreted the operators in
225 the following grammar to be the same token:
231 Bison now warns when a character literal is not of length one. In
232 some future release, Bison will start reporting an error instead.
234 ** Destructor calls fixed for lookaheads altered in semantic actions:
236 Previously for deterministic parsers in C, if a user semantic action
237 altered yychar, the parser in some cases used the old yychar value to
238 determine which destructor to call for the lookahead upon a syntax
239 error or upon parser return. This bug has been fixed.
241 ** C++ parsers use YYRHSLOC:
243 Similarly to the C parsers, the C++ parsers now define the YYRHSLOC
244 macro and use it in the default YYLLOC_DEFAULT. You are encouraged
245 to use it. If, for instance, your location structure has `first'
246 and `last' members, instead of
248 # define YYLLOC_DEFAULT(Current, Rhs, N) \
252 (Current).first = (Rhs)[1].location.first; \
253 (Current).last = (Rhs)[N].location.last; \
257 (Current).first = (Current).last = (Rhs)[0].location.last; \
263 # define YYLLOC_DEFAULT(Current, Rhs, N) \
267 (Current).first = YYRHSLOC (Rhs, 1).first; \
268 (Current).last = YYRHSLOC (Rhs, N).last; \
272 (Current).first = (Current).last = YYRHSLOC (Rhs, 0).last; \
276 ** YYLLOC_DEFAULT in C++:
278 The default implementation of YYLLOC_DEFAULT used to be issued in
279 the header file. It is now output in the implementation file, after
280 the user %code sections so that its #ifndef guard does not try to
281 override the user's YYLLOC_DEFAULT if provided.
283 ** YYFAIL now produces warnings and Java parsers no longer implement it:
285 YYFAIL has existed for many years as an undocumented feature of
286 deterministic parsers in C generated by Bison. More recently, it was
287 a documented feature of Bison's experimental Java parsers. As
288 promised in Bison 2.4.2's NEWS entry, any appearance of YYFAIL in a
289 semantic action now produces a deprecation warning, and Java parsers
290 no longer implement YYFAIL at all. For further details, including a
291 discussion of how to suppress C preprocessor warnings about YYFAIL
292 being unused, see the Bison 2.4.2 NEWS entry.
294 ** Temporary hack for adding a semicolon to the user action:
296 Previously, Bison appended a semicolon to every user action for
297 reductions when the output language defaulted to C (specifically, when
298 neither %yacc, %language, %skeleton, or equivalent command-line
299 options were specified). This allowed actions such as
301 exp: exp "+" exp { $$ = $1 + $3 };
305 exp: exp "+" exp { $$ = $1 + $3; };
307 As a first step in removing this misfeature, Bison now issues a
308 warning when it appends a semicolon. Moreover, in cases where Bison
309 cannot easily determine whether a semicolon is needed (for example, an
310 action ending with a cpp directive or a braced compound initializer),
311 it no longer appends one. Thus, the C compiler might now complain
312 about a missing semicolon where it did not before. Future releases of
313 Bison will cease to append semicolons entirely.
315 ** Verbose syntax error message fixes:
317 When %error-verbose or the obsolete `#define YYERROR_VERBOSE' is
318 specified, syntax error messages produced by the generated parser
319 include the unexpected token as well as a list of expected tokens.
320 The effect of %nonassoc on these verbose messages has been corrected
321 in two ways, but a more complete fix requires LAC, described above:
323 *** When %nonassoc is used, there can exist parser states that accept no
324 tokens, and so the parser does not always require a lookahead token
325 in order to detect a syntax error. Because no unexpected token or
326 expected tokens can then be reported, the verbose syntax error
327 message described above is suppressed, and the parser instead
328 reports the simpler message, `syntax error'. Previously, this
329 suppression was sometimes erroneously triggered by %nonassoc when a
330 lookahead was actually required. Now verbose messages are
331 suppressed only when all previous lookaheads have already been
332 shifted or discarded.
334 *** Previously, the list of expected tokens erroneously included tokens
335 that would actually induce a syntax error because conflicts for them
336 were resolved with %nonassoc in the current parser state. Such
337 tokens are now properly omitted from the list.
339 *** Expected token lists are still often wrong due to state merging
340 (from LALR or IELR) and default reductions, which can both add
341 invalid tokens and subtract valid tokens. Canonical LR almost
342 completely fixes this problem by eliminating state merging and
343 default reductions. However, there is one minor problem left even
344 when using canonical LR and even after the fixes above. That is,
345 if the resolution of a conflict with %nonassoc appears in a later
346 parser state than the one at which some syntax error is
347 discovered, the conflicted token is still erroneously included in
348 the expected token list. Bison's new LAC implementation,
349 described above, eliminates this problem and the need for
350 canonical LR. However, LAC is still experimental and is disabled
353 ** Java skeleton fixes:
355 *** A location handling bug has been fixed.
357 *** The top element of each of the value stack and location stack is now
358 cleared when popped so that it can be garbage collected.
360 *** Parser traces now print the top element of the stack.
362 ** -W/--warnings fixes:
364 *** Bison now properly recognizes the `no-' versions of categories:
366 For example, given the following command line, Bison now enables all
367 warnings except warnings for incompatibilities with POSIX Yacc:
369 bison -Wall,no-yacc gram.y
371 *** Bison now treats S/R and R/R conflicts like other warnings:
373 Previously, conflict reports were independent of Bison's normal
374 warning system. Now, Bison recognizes the warning categories
375 `conflicts-sr' and `conflicts-rr'. This change has important
376 consequences for the -W and --warnings command-line options. For
379 bison -Wno-conflicts-sr gram.y # S/R conflicts not reported
380 bison -Wno-conflicts-rr gram.y # R/R conflicts not reported
381 bison -Wnone gram.y # no conflicts are reported
382 bison -Werror gram.y # any conflict is an error
384 However, as before, if the %expect or %expect-rr directive is
385 specified, an unexpected number of conflicts is an error, and an
386 expected number of conflicts is not reported, so -W and --warning
387 then have no effect on the conflict report.
389 *** The `none' category no longer disables a preceding `error':
391 For example, for the following command line, Bison now reports
392 errors instead of warnings for incompatibilities with POSIX Yacc:
394 bison -Werror,none,yacc gram.y
396 *** The `none' category now disables all Bison warnings.
398 Previously, the `none' category disabled only Bison warnings for
399 which there existed a specific -W/--warning category. However,
400 given the following command line, Bison is now guaranteed to
401 suppress all warnings:
405 ** Precedence directives can now assign token number 0:
407 Since Bison 2.3b, which restored the ability of precedence
408 directives to assign token numbers, doing so for token number 0 has
409 produced an assertion failure. For example:
413 This bug has been fixed.
415 * Changes in version 2.4.3 (2010-08-05):
417 ** Bison now obeys -Werror and --warnings=error for warnings about
418 grammar rules that are useless in the parser due to conflicts.
420 ** Problems with spawning M4 on at least FreeBSD 8 and FreeBSD 9 have
423 ** Failures in the test suite for GCC 4.5 have been fixed.
425 ** Failures in the test suite for some versions of Sun Studio C++ have
428 ** Contrary to Bison 2.4.2's NEWS entry, it has been decided that
429 warnings about undefined %prec identifiers will not be converted to
430 errors in Bison 2.5. They will remain warnings, which should be
431 sufficient for POSIX while avoiding backward compatibility issues.
433 ** Minor documentation fixes.
435 * Changes in version 2.4.2 (2010-03-20):
437 ** Some portability problems that resulted in failures and livelocks
438 in the test suite on some versions of at least Solaris, AIX, HP-UX,
439 RHEL4, and Tru64 have been addressed. As a result, fatal Bison
440 errors should no longer cause M4 to report a broken pipe on the
443 ** `%prec IDENTIFIER' requires IDENTIFIER to be defined separately.
445 POSIX specifies that an error be reported for any identifier that does
446 not appear on the LHS of a grammar rule and that is not defined by
447 %token, %left, %right, or %nonassoc. Bison 2.3b and later lost this
448 error report for the case when an identifier appears only after a
449 %prec directive. It is now restored. However, for backward
450 compatibility with recent Bison releases, it is only a warning for
451 now. In Bison 2.5 and later, it will return to being an error.
452 [Between the 2.4.2 and 2.4.3 releases, it was decided that this
453 warning will not be converted to an error in Bison 2.5.]
455 ** Detection of GNU M4 1.4.6 or newer during configure is improved.
457 ** Warnings from gcc's -Wundef option about undefined YYENABLE_NLS,
458 YYLTYPE_IS_TRIVIAL, and __STRICT_ANSI__ in C/C++ parsers are now
461 ** %code is now a permanent feature.
463 A traditional Yacc prologue directive is written in the form:
467 To provide a more flexible alternative, Bison 2.3b introduced the
468 %code directive with the following forms for C/C++:
471 %code requires {CODE}
472 %code provides {CODE}
475 These forms are now considered permanent features of Bison. See the
476 %code entries in the section "Bison Declaration Summary" in the Bison
477 manual for a summary of their functionality. See the section
478 "Prologue Alternatives" for a detailed discussion including the
479 advantages of %code over the traditional Yacc prologue directive.
481 Bison's Java feature as a whole including its current usage of %code
482 is still considered experimental.
484 ** YYFAIL is deprecated and will eventually be removed.
486 YYFAIL has existed for many years as an undocumented feature of
487 deterministic parsers in C generated by Bison. Previously, it was
488 documented for Bison's experimental Java parsers. YYFAIL is no longer
489 documented for Java parsers and is formally deprecated in both cases.
490 Users are strongly encouraged to migrate to YYERROR, which is
493 Like YYERROR, you can invoke YYFAIL from a semantic action in order to
494 induce a syntax error. The most obvious difference from YYERROR is
495 that YYFAIL will automatically invoke yyerror to report the syntax
496 error so that you don't have to. However, there are several other
497 subtle differences between YYERROR and YYFAIL, and YYFAIL suffers from
498 inherent flaws when %error-verbose or `#define YYERROR_VERBOSE' is
499 used. For a more detailed discussion, see:
501 http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/bison-patches/2009-12/msg00024.html
503 The upcoming Bison 2.5 will remove YYFAIL from Java parsers, but
504 deterministic parsers in C will continue to implement it. However,
505 because YYFAIL is already flawed, it seems futile to try to make new
506 Bison features compatible with it. Thus, during parser generation,
507 Bison 2.5 will produce a warning whenever it discovers YYFAIL in a
508 rule action. In a later release, YYFAIL will be disabled for
509 %error-verbose and `#define YYERROR_VERBOSE'. Eventually, YYFAIL will
510 be removed altogether.
512 There exists at least one case where Bison 2.5's YYFAIL warning will
513 be a false positive. Some projects add phony uses of YYFAIL and other
514 Bison-defined macros for the sole purpose of suppressing C
515 preprocessor warnings (from GCC cpp's -Wunused-macros, for example).
516 To avoid Bison's future warning, such YYFAIL uses can be moved to the
517 epilogue (that is, after the second `%%') in the Bison input file. In
518 this release (2.4.2), Bison already generates its own code to suppress
519 C preprocessor warnings for YYFAIL, so projects can remove their own
520 phony uses of YYFAIL if compatibility with Bison releases prior to
521 2.4.2 is not necessary.
523 ** Internationalization.
525 Fix a regression introduced in Bison 2.4: Under some circumstances,
526 message translations were not installed although supported by the
529 * Changes in version 2.4.1 (2008-12-11):
531 ** In the GLR defines file, unexpanded M4 macros in the yylval and yylloc
532 declarations have been fixed.
534 ** Temporary hack for adding a semicolon to the user action.
536 Bison used to prepend a trailing semicolon at the end of the user
537 action for reductions. This allowed actions such as
539 exp: exp "+" exp { $$ = $1 + $3 };
543 exp: exp "+" exp { $$ = $1 + $3; };
545 Some grammars still depend on this `feature'. Bison 2.4.1 restores
546 the previous behavior in the case of C output (specifically, when
547 neither %language or %skeleton or equivalent command-line options
548 are used) to leave more time for grammars depending on the old
549 behavior to be adjusted. Future releases of Bison will disable this
552 ** A few minor improvements to the Bison manual.
554 * Changes in version 2.4 (2008-11-02):
556 ** %language is an experimental feature.
558 We first introduced this feature in test release 2.3b as a cleaner
559 alternative to %skeleton. Since then, we have discussed the possibility of
560 modifying its effect on Bison's output file names. Thus, in this release,
561 we consider %language to be an experimental feature that will likely evolve
564 ** Forward compatibility with GNU M4 has been improved.
566 ** Several bugs in the C++ skeleton and the experimental Java skeleton have been
569 * Changes in version 2.3b (2008-05-27):
571 ** The quotes around NAME that used to be required in the following directive
576 ** The directive `%pure-parser' is now deprecated in favor of:
580 which has the same effect except that Bison is more careful to warn about
581 unreasonable usage in the latter case.
585 Bison can now generate an LALR(1) parser in C with a push interface. That
586 is, instead of invoking `yyparse', which pulls tokens from `yylex', you can
587 push one token at a time to the parser using `yypush_parse', which will
588 return to the caller after processing each token. By default, the push
589 interface is disabled. Either of the following directives will enable it:
591 %define api.push_pull "push" // Just push; does not require yylex.
592 %define api.push_pull "both" // Push and pull; requires yylex.
594 See the new section `A Push Parser' in the Bison manual for details.
596 The current push parsing interface is experimental and may evolve. More user
597 feedback will help to stabilize it.
599 ** The -g and --graph options now output graphs in Graphviz DOT format,
600 not VCG format. Like --graph, -g now also takes an optional FILE argument
601 and thus cannot be bundled with other short options.
605 Bison can now generate an LALR(1) parser in Java. The skeleton is
606 `data/lalr1.java'. Consider using the new %language directive instead of
607 %skeleton to select it.
609 See the new section `Java Parsers' in the Bison manual for details.
611 The current Java interface is experimental and may evolve. More user
612 feedback will help to stabilize it.
616 This new directive specifies the programming language of the generated
617 parser, which can be C (the default), C++, or Java. Besides the skeleton
618 that Bison uses, the directive affects the names of the generated files if
619 the grammar file's name ends in ".y".
621 ** XML Automaton Report
623 Bison can now generate an XML report of the LALR(1) automaton using the new
624 `--xml' option. The current XML schema is experimental and may evolve. More
625 user feedback will help to stabilize it.
627 ** The grammar file may now specify the name of the parser header file using
628 %defines. For example:
632 ** When reporting useless rules, useless nonterminals, and unused terminals,
633 Bison now employs the terms "useless in grammar" instead of "useless",
634 "useless in parser" instead of "never reduced", and "unused in grammar"
637 ** Unreachable State Removal
639 Previously, Bison sometimes generated parser tables containing unreachable
640 states. A state can become unreachable during conflict resolution if Bison
641 disables a shift action leading to it from a predecessor state. Bison now:
643 1. Removes unreachable states.
645 2. Does not report any conflicts that appeared in unreachable states.
646 WARNING: As a result, you may need to update %expect and %expect-rr
647 directives in existing grammar files.
649 3. For any rule used only in such states, Bison now reports the rule as
650 "useless in parser due to conflicts".
652 This feature can be disabled with the following directive:
654 %define lr.keep_unreachable_states
656 See the %define entry in the `Bison Declaration Summary' in the Bison manual
657 for further discussion.
659 ** Lookahead Set Correction in the `.output' Report
661 When instructed to generate a `.output' file including lookahead sets
662 (using `--report=lookahead', for example), Bison now prints each reduction's
663 lookahead set only next to the associated state's one item that (1) is
664 associated with the same rule as the reduction and (2) has its dot at the end
665 of its RHS. Previously, Bison also erroneously printed the lookahead set
666 next to all of the state's other items associated with the same rule. This
667 bug affected only the `.output' file and not the generated parser source
670 ** --report-file=FILE is a new option to override the default `.output' file
673 ** The `=' that used to be required in the following directives is now
676 %file-prefix "parser"
680 ** An Alternative to `%{...%}' -- `%code QUALIFIER {CODE}'
682 Bison 2.3a provided a new set of directives as a more flexible alternative to
683 the traditional Yacc prologue blocks. Those have now been consolidated into
684 a single %code directive with an optional qualifier field, which identifies
685 the purpose of the code and thus the location(s) where Bison should generate
688 1. `%code {CODE}' replaces `%after-header {CODE}'
689 2. `%code requires {CODE}' replaces `%start-header {CODE}'
690 3. `%code provides {CODE}' replaces `%end-header {CODE}'
691 4. `%code top {CODE}' replaces `%before-header {CODE}'
693 See the %code entries in section `Bison Declaration Summary' in the Bison
694 manual for a summary of the new functionality. See the new section `Prologue
695 Alternatives' for a detailed discussion including the advantages of %code
696 over the traditional Yacc prologues.
698 The prologue alternatives are experimental. More user feedback will help to
699 determine whether they should become permanent features.
701 ** Revised warning: unset or unused mid-rule values
703 Since Bison 2.2, Bison has warned about mid-rule values that are set but not
704 used within any of the actions of the parent rule. For example, Bison warns
707 exp: '1' { $$ = 1; } '+' exp { $$ = $1 + $4; };
709 Now, Bison also warns about mid-rule values that are used but not set. For
710 example, Bison warns about unset $$ in the mid-rule action in:
712 exp: '1' { $1 = 1; } '+' exp { $$ = $2 + $4; };
714 However, Bison now disables both of these warnings by default since they
715 sometimes prove to be false alarms in existing grammars employing the Yacc
716 constructs $0 or $-N (where N is some positive integer).
718 To enable these warnings, specify the option `--warnings=midrule-values' or
719 `-W', which is a synonym for `--warnings=all'.
721 ** Default %destructor or %printer with `<*>' or `<>'
723 Bison now recognizes two separate kinds of default %destructor's and
726 1. Place `<*>' in a %destructor/%printer symbol list to define a default
727 %destructor/%printer for all grammar symbols for which you have formally
728 declared semantic type tags.
730 2. Place `<>' in a %destructor/%printer symbol list to define a default
731 %destructor/%printer for all grammar symbols without declared semantic
734 Bison no longer supports the `%symbol-default' notation from Bison 2.3a.
735 `<*>' and `<>' combined achieve the same effect with one exception: Bison no
736 longer applies any %destructor to a mid-rule value if that mid-rule value is
737 not actually ever referenced using either $$ or $n in a semantic action.
739 The default %destructor's and %printer's are experimental. More user
740 feedback will help to determine whether they should become permanent
743 See the section `Freeing Discarded Symbols' in the Bison manual for further
746 ** %left, %right, and %nonassoc can now declare token numbers. This is required
747 by POSIX. However, see the end of section `Operator Precedence' in the Bison
748 manual for a caveat concerning the treatment of literal strings.
750 ** The nonfunctional --no-parser, -n, and %no-parser options have been
751 completely removed from Bison.
753 * Changes in version 2.3a, 2006-09-13:
755 ** Instead of %union, you can define and use your own union type
756 YYSTYPE if your grammar contains at least one <type> tag.
757 Your YYSTYPE need not be a macro; it can be a typedef.
758 This change is for compatibility with other Yacc implementations,
759 and is required by POSIX.
761 ** Locations columns and lines start at 1.
762 In accordance with the GNU Coding Standards and Emacs.
764 ** You may now declare per-type and default %destructor's and %printer's:
768 %union { char *string; }
769 %token <string> STRING1
770 %token <string> STRING2
771 %type <string> string1
772 %type <string> string2
773 %union { char character; }
774 %token <character> CHR
775 %type <character> chr
776 %destructor { free ($$); } %symbol-default
777 %destructor { free ($$); printf ("%d", @$.first_line); } STRING1 string1
778 %destructor { } <character>
780 guarantees that, when the parser discards any user-defined symbol that has a
781 semantic type tag other than `<character>', it passes its semantic value to
782 `free'. However, when the parser discards a `STRING1' or a `string1', it
783 also prints its line number to `stdout'. It performs only the second
784 `%destructor' in this case, so it invokes `free' only once.
786 [Although we failed to mention this here in the 2.3a release, the default
787 %destructor's and %printer's were experimental, and they were rewritten in
790 ** Except for LALR(1) parsers in C with POSIX Yacc emulation enabled (with `-y',
791 `--yacc', or `%yacc'), Bison no longer generates #define statements for
792 associating token numbers with token names. Removing the #define statements
793 helps to sanitize the global namespace during preprocessing, but POSIX Yacc
794 requires them. Bison still generates an enum for token names in all cases.
796 ** Handling of traditional Yacc prologue blocks is now more consistent but
797 potentially incompatible with previous releases of Bison.
799 As before, you declare prologue blocks in your grammar file with the
800 `%{ ... %}' syntax. To generate the pre-prologue, Bison concatenates all
801 prologue blocks that you've declared before the first %union. To generate
802 the post-prologue, Bison concatenates all prologue blocks that you've
803 declared after the first %union.
805 Previous releases of Bison inserted the pre-prologue into both the header
806 file and the code file in all cases except for LALR(1) parsers in C. In the
807 latter case, Bison inserted it only into the code file. For parsers in C++,
808 the point of insertion was before any token definitions (which associate
809 token numbers with names). For parsers in C, the point of insertion was
810 after the token definitions.
812 Now, Bison never inserts the pre-prologue into the header file. In the code
813 file, it always inserts it before the token definitions.
815 ** Bison now provides a more flexible alternative to the traditional Yacc
816 prologue blocks: %before-header, %start-header, %end-header, and
819 For example, the following declaration order in the grammar file reflects the
820 order in which Bison will output these code blocks. However, you are free to
821 declare these code blocks in your grammar file in whatever order is most
825 /* Bison treats this block like a pre-prologue block: it inserts it into
826 * the code file before the contents of the header file. It does *not*
827 * insert it into the header file. This is a good place to put
828 * #include's that you want at the top of your code file. A common
829 * example is `#include "system.h"'. */
832 /* Bison inserts this block into both the header file and the code file.
833 * In both files, the point of insertion is before any Bison-generated
834 * token, semantic type, location type, and class definitions. This is a
835 * good place to define %union dependencies, for example. */
838 /* Unlike the traditional Yacc prologue blocks, the output order for the
839 * new %*-header blocks is not affected by their declaration position
840 * relative to any %union in the grammar file. */
843 /* Bison inserts this block into both the header file and the code file.
844 * In both files, the point of insertion is after the Bison-generated
845 * definitions. This is a good place to declare or define public
846 * functions or data structures that depend on the Bison-generated
850 /* Bison treats this block like a post-prologue block: it inserts it into
851 * the code file after the contents of the header file. It does *not*
852 * insert it into the header file. This is a good place to declare or
853 * define internal functions or data structures that depend on the
854 * Bison-generated definitions. */
857 If you have multiple occurrences of any one of the above declarations, Bison
858 will concatenate the contents in declaration order.
860 [Although we failed to mention this here in the 2.3a release, the prologue
861 alternatives were experimental, and they were rewritten in future versions.]
863 ** The option `--report=look-ahead' has been changed to `--report=lookahead'.
864 The old spelling still works, but is not documented and may be removed
867 * Changes in version 2.3, 2006-06-05:
869 ** GLR grammars should now use `YYRECOVERING ()' instead of `YYRECOVERING',
870 for compatibility with LALR(1) grammars.
872 ** It is now documented that any definition of YYSTYPE or YYLTYPE should
873 be to a type name that does not contain parentheses or brackets.
875 * Changes in version 2.2, 2006-05-19:
877 ** The distribution terms for all Bison-generated parsers now permit
878 using the parsers in nonfree programs. Previously, this permission
879 was granted only for Bison-generated LALR(1) parsers in C.
881 ** %name-prefix changes the namespace name in C++ outputs.
883 ** The C++ parsers export their token_type.
885 ** Bison now allows multiple %union declarations, and concatenates
886 their contents together.
888 ** New warning: unused values
889 Right-hand side symbols whose values are not used are reported,
890 if the symbols have destructors. For instance:
892 exp: exp "?" exp ":" exp { $1 ? $1 : $3; }
896 will trigger a warning about $$ and $5 in the first rule, and $3 in
897 the second ($1 is copied to $$ by the default rule). This example
898 most likely contains three errors, and could be rewritten as:
900 exp: exp "?" exp ":" exp
901 { $$ = $1 ? $3 : $5; free ($1 ? $5 : $3); free ($1); }
903 { $$ = $1 ? $1 : $3; if ($1) free ($3); }
906 However, if the original actions were really intended, memory leaks
907 and all, the warnings can be suppressed by letting Bison believe the
908 values are used, e.g.:
910 exp: exp "?" exp ":" exp { $1 ? $1 : $3; (void) ($$, $5); }
911 | exp "+" exp { $$ = $1; (void) $3; }
914 If there are mid-rule actions, the warning is issued if no action
915 uses it. The following triggers no warning: $1 and $3 are used.
917 exp: exp { push ($1); } '+' exp { push ($3); sum (); };
919 The warning is intended to help catching lost values and memory leaks.
920 If a value is ignored, its associated memory typically is not reclaimed.
922 ** %destructor vs. YYABORT, YYACCEPT, and YYERROR.
923 Destructors are now called when user code invokes YYABORT, YYACCEPT,
924 and YYERROR, for all objects on the stack, other than objects
925 corresponding to the right-hand side of the current rule.
927 ** %expect, %expect-rr
928 Incorrect numbers of expected conflicts are now actual errors,
931 ** GLR, YACC parsers.
932 The %parse-params are available in the destructors (and the
933 experimental printers) as per the documentation.
935 ** Bison now warns if it finds a stray `$' or `@' in an action.
937 ** %require "VERSION"
938 This specifies that the grammar file depends on features implemented
939 in Bison version VERSION or higher.
941 ** lalr1.cc: The token and value types are now class members.
942 The tokens were defined as free form enums and cpp macros. YYSTYPE
943 was defined as a free form union. They are now class members:
944 tokens are enumerations of the `yy::parser::token' struct, and the
945 semantic values have the `yy::parser::semantic_type' type.
947 If you do not want or can update to this scheme, the directive
948 `%define "global_tokens_and_yystype" "1"' triggers the global
949 definition of tokens and YYSTYPE. This change is suitable both
950 for previous releases of Bison, and this one.
952 If you wish to update, then make sure older version of Bison will
953 fail using `%require "2.2"'.
955 ** DJGPP support added.
957 * Changes in version 2.1, 2005-09-16:
959 ** The C++ lalr1.cc skeleton supports %lex-param.
961 ** Bison-generated parsers now support the translation of diagnostics like
962 "syntax error" into languages other than English. The default
963 language is still English. For details, please see the new
964 Internationalization section of the Bison manual. Software
965 distributors should also see the new PACKAGING file. Thanks to
966 Bruno Haible for this new feature.
968 ** Wording in the Bison-generated parsers has been changed slightly to
969 simplify translation. In particular, the message "memory exhausted"
970 has replaced "parser stack overflow", as the old message was not
971 always accurate for modern Bison-generated parsers.
973 ** Destructors are now called when the parser aborts, for all symbols left
974 behind on the stack. Also, the start symbol is now destroyed after a
975 successful parse. In both cases, the behavior was formerly inconsistent.
977 ** When generating verbose diagnostics, Bison-generated parsers no longer
978 quote the literal strings associated with tokens. For example, for
979 a syntax error associated with '%token NUM "number"' they might
980 print 'syntax error, unexpected number' instead of 'syntax error,
981 unexpected "number"'.
983 * Changes in version 2.0, 2004-12-25:
985 ** Possibly-incompatible changes
987 - Bison-generated parsers no longer default to using the alloca function
988 (when available) to extend the parser stack, due to widespread
989 problems in unchecked stack-overflow detection. You can "#define
990 YYSTACK_USE_ALLOCA 1" to require the use of alloca, but please read
991 the manual to determine safe values for YYMAXDEPTH in that case.
993 - Error token location.
994 During error recovery, the location of the syntax error is updated
995 to cover the whole sequence covered by the error token: it includes
996 the shifted symbols thrown away during the first part of the error
997 recovery, and the lookahead rejected during the second part.
1000 . Stray semicolons are no longer allowed at the start of a grammar.
1001 . Semicolons are now required after in-grammar declarations.
1003 - Unescaped newlines are no longer allowed in character constants or
1004 string literals. They were never portable, and GCC 3.4.0 has
1005 dropped support for them. Better diagnostics are now generated if
1006 forget a closing quote.
1008 - NUL bytes are no longer allowed in Bison string literals, unfortunately.
1012 - GLR grammars now support locations.
1014 - New directive: %initial-action.
1015 This directive allows the user to run arbitrary code (including
1016 initializing @$) from yyparse before parsing starts.
1018 - A new directive "%expect-rr N" specifies the expected number of
1019 reduce/reduce conflicts in GLR parsers.
1021 - %token numbers can now be hexadecimal integers, e.g., `%token FOO 0x12d'.
1022 This is a GNU extension.
1024 - The option `--report=lookahead' was changed to `--report=look-ahead'.
1025 [However, this was changed back after 2.3.]
1027 - Experimental %destructor support has been added to lalr1.cc.
1029 - New configure option --disable-yacc, to disable installation of the
1030 yacc command and -ly library introduced in 1.875 for POSIX conformance.
1034 - For now, %expect-count violations are now just warnings, not errors.
1035 This is for compatibility with Bison 1.75 and earlier (when there are
1036 reduce/reduce conflicts) and with Bison 1.30 and earlier (when there
1037 are too many or too few shift/reduce conflicts). However, in future
1038 versions of Bison we plan to improve the %expect machinery so that
1039 these violations will become errors again.
1041 - Within Bison itself, numbers (e.g., goto numbers) are no longer
1042 arbitrarily limited to 16-bit counts.
1044 - Semicolons are now allowed before "|" in grammar rules, as POSIX requires.
1046 * Changes in version 1.875, 2003-01-01:
1048 ** The documentation license has been upgraded to version 1.2
1049 of the GNU Free Documentation License.
1051 ** syntax error processing
1053 - In Yacc-style parsers YYLLOC_DEFAULT is now used to compute error
1054 locations too. This fixes bugs in error-location computation.
1057 It is now possible to reclaim the memory associated to symbols
1058 discarded during error recovery. This feature is still experimental.
1061 This new directive is preferred over YYERROR_VERBOSE.
1063 - #defining yyerror to steal internal variables is discouraged.
1064 It is not guaranteed to work forever.
1066 ** POSIX conformance
1068 - Semicolons are once again optional at the end of grammar rules.
1069 This reverts to the behavior of Bison 1.33 and earlier, and improves
1070 compatibility with Yacc.
1072 - `parse error' -> `syntax error'
1073 Bison now uniformly uses the term `syntax error'; formerly, the code
1074 and manual sometimes used the term `parse error' instead. POSIX
1075 requires `syntax error' in diagnostics, and it was thought better to
1078 - The documentation now emphasizes that yylex and yyerror must be
1079 declared before use. C99 requires this.
1081 - Bison now parses C99 lexical constructs like UCNs and
1082 backslash-newline within C escape sequences, as POSIX 1003.1-2001 requires.
1084 - File names are properly escaped in C output. E.g., foo\bar.y is
1085 output as "foo\\bar.y".
1087 - Yacc command and library now available
1088 The Bison distribution now installs a `yacc' command, as POSIX requires.
1089 Also, Bison now installs a small library liby.a containing
1090 implementations of Yacc-compatible yyerror and main functions.
1091 This library is normally not useful, but POSIX requires it.
1093 - Type clashes now generate warnings, not errors.
1095 - If the user does not define YYSTYPE as a macro, Bison now declares it
1096 using typedef instead of defining it as a macro.
1097 For consistency, YYLTYPE is also declared instead of defined.
1099 ** Other compatibility issues
1101 - %union directives can now have a tag before the `{', e.g., the
1102 directive `%union foo {...}' now generates the C code
1103 `typedef union foo { ... } YYSTYPE;'; this is for Yacc compatibility.
1104 The default union tag is `YYSTYPE', for compatibility with Solaris 9 Yacc.
1105 For consistency, YYLTYPE's struct tag is now `YYLTYPE' not `yyltype'.
1106 This is for compatibility with both Yacc and Bison 1.35.
1108 - `;' is output before the terminating `}' of an action, for
1109 compatibility with Bison 1.35.
1111 - Bison now uses a Yacc-style format for conflict reports, e.g.,
1112 `conflicts: 2 shift/reduce, 1 reduce/reduce'.
1114 - `yystype' and `yyltype' are now obsolescent macros instead of being
1115 typedefs or tags; they are no longer documented and are planned to be
1116 withdrawn in a future release.
1121 Users of Bison have to decide how they handle the portability of the
1124 - `parsing stack overflow...' -> `parser stack overflow'
1125 GLR parsers now report `parser stack overflow' as per the Bison manual.
1127 ** Bison now warns if it detects conflicting outputs to the same file,
1128 e.g., it generates a warning for `bison -d -o foo.h foo.y' since
1129 that command outputs both code and header to foo.h.
1131 ** #line in output files
1132 - --no-line works properly.
1134 ** Bison can no longer be built by a K&R C compiler; it requires C89 or
1135 later to be built. This change originally took place a few versions
1136 ago, but nobody noticed until we recently asked someone to try
1137 building Bison with a K&R C compiler.
1139 * Changes in version 1.75, 2002-10-14:
1141 ** Bison should now work on 64-bit hosts.
1143 ** Indonesian translation thanks to Tedi Heriyanto.
1146 Fix spurious parse errors.
1149 Some people redefine yyerror to steal yyparse' private variables.
1150 Reenable this trick until an official feature replaces it.
1153 In agreement with POSIX and with other Yaccs, leaving a default
1154 action is valid when $$ is untyped, and $1 typed:
1158 but the converse remains an error:
1162 ** Values of mid-rule actions
1165 foo: { ... } { $$ = $1; } ...
1167 was incorrectly rejected: $1 is defined in the second mid-rule
1168 action, and is equal to the $$ of the first mid-rule action.
1170 * Changes in version 1.50, 2002-10-04:
1175 causes Bison to produce a Generalized LR (GLR) parser, capable of handling
1176 almost any context-free grammar, ambiguous or not. The new declarations
1177 %dprec and %merge on grammar rules allow parse-time resolution of
1178 ambiguities. Contributed by Paul Hilfinger.
1180 Unfortunately Bison 1.50 does not work properly on 64-bit hosts
1181 like the Alpha, so please stick to 32-bit hosts for now.
1184 When not in Yacc compatibility mode, when the output file was not
1185 specified, running `bison foo/bar.y' created `foo/bar.c'. It
1186 now creates `bar.c'.
1189 The undefined token was systematically mapped to 2 which prevented
1190 the use of 2 by the user. This is no longer the case.
1192 ** Unknown token numbers
1193 If yylex returned an out of range value, yyparse could die. This is
1197 According to POSIX, the error token must be 256.
1198 Bison extends this requirement by making it a preference: *if* the
1199 user specified that one of her tokens is numbered 256, then error
1200 will be mapped onto another number.
1202 ** Verbose error messages
1203 They no longer report `..., expecting error or...' for states where
1204 error recovery is possible.
1207 Defaults to `$end' instead of `$'.
1209 ** Error recovery now conforms to documentation and to POSIX
1210 When a Bison-generated parser encounters a syntax error, it now pops
1211 the stack until it finds a state that allows shifting the error
1212 token. Formerly, it popped the stack until it found a state that
1213 allowed some non-error action other than a default reduction on the
1214 error token. The new behavior has long been the documented behavior,
1215 and has long been required by POSIX. For more details, please see
1216 Paul Eggert, "Reductions during Bison error handling" (2002-05-20)
1217 <http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/bug-bison/2002-05/msg00038.html>.
1220 Popped tokens and nonterminals are now reported.
1223 Larger grammars are now supported (larger token numbers, larger grammar
1224 size (= sum of the LHS and RHS lengths), larger LALR tables).
1225 Formerly, many of these numbers ran afoul of 16-bit limits;
1226 now these limits are 32 bits on most hosts.
1228 ** Explicit initial rule
1229 Bison used to play hacks with the initial rule, which the user does
1230 not write. It is now explicit, and visible in the reports and
1234 Before, Bison reported the useless rules, but, although not used,
1235 included them in the parsers. They are now actually removed.
1237 ** Useless rules, useless nonterminals
1238 They are now reported, as a warning, with their locations.
1240 ** Rules never reduced
1241 Rules that can never be reduced because of conflicts are now
1244 ** Incorrect `Token not used'
1245 On a grammar such as
1247 %token useless useful
1249 exp: '0' %prec useful;
1251 where a token was used to set the precedence of the last rule,
1252 bison reported both `useful' and `useless' as useless tokens.
1254 ** Revert the C++ namespace changes introduced in 1.31
1255 as they caused too many portability hassles.
1257 ** Default locations
1258 By an accident of design, the default computation of @$ was
1259 performed after another default computation was performed: @$ = @1.
1260 The latter is now removed: YYLLOC_DEFAULT is fully responsible of
1261 the computation of @$.
1263 ** Token end-of-file
1264 The token end of file may be specified by the user, in which case,
1265 the user symbol is used in the reports, the graphs, and the verbose
1266 error messages instead of `$end', which remains being the default.
1270 %token MYEOF 0 "end of file"
1273 This old option, which has been broken for ages, is removed.
1276 Brazilian Portuguese, thanks to Alexandre Folle de Menezes.
1277 Croatian, thanks to Denis Lackovic.
1279 ** Incorrect token definitions
1280 When given `%token 'a' "A"', Bison used to output `#define 'a' 65'.
1282 ** Token definitions as enums
1283 Tokens are output both as the traditional #define's, and, provided
1284 the compiler supports ANSI C or is a C++ compiler, as enums.
1285 This lets debuggers display names instead of integers.
1288 In addition to --verbose, bison supports --report=THINGS, which
1289 produces additional information:
1291 complete the core item sets with their closure
1292 - lookahead [changed to `look-ahead' in 1.875e through 2.3, but changed back]
1293 explicitly associate lookahead tokens to items
1295 describe shift/reduce conflicts solving.
1296 Bison used to systematically output this information on top of
1297 the report. Solved conflicts are now attached to their states.
1300 Previous versions don't complain when there is a type clash on
1301 the default action if the rule has a mid-rule action, such as in:
1309 ** GNU M4 is now required when using Bison.
1311 * Changes in version 1.35, 2002-03-25:
1314 Some projects use Bison's C parser with C++ compilers, and define
1315 YYSTYPE as a class. The recent adjustment of C parsers for data
1316 alignment and 64 bit architectures made this impossible.
1318 Because for the time being no real solution for C++ parser
1319 generation exists, kludges were implemented in the parser to
1320 maintain this use. In the future, when Bison has C++ parsers, this
1321 kludge will be disabled.
1323 This kludge also addresses some C++ problems when the stack was
1326 * Changes in version 1.34, 2002-03-12:
1328 ** File name clashes are detected
1329 $ bison foo.y -d -o foo.x
1330 fatal error: header and parser would both be named `foo.x'
1332 ** A missing `;' at the end of a rule triggers a warning
1333 In accordance with POSIX, and in agreement with other
1334 Yacc implementations, Bison will mandate this semicolon in the near
1335 future. This eases the implementation of a Bison parser of Bison
1336 grammars by making this grammar LALR(1) instead of LR(2). To
1337 facilitate the transition, this release introduces a warning.
1339 ** Revert the C++ namespace changes introduced in 1.31, as they caused too
1340 many portability hassles.
1342 ** DJGPP support added.
1344 ** Fix test suite portability problems.
1346 * Changes in version 1.33, 2002-02-07:
1349 Groff could not be compiled for the definition of size_t was lacking
1350 under some conditions.
1355 * Changes in version 1.32, 2002-01-23:
1357 ** Fix Yacc output file names
1359 ** Portability fixes
1361 ** Italian, Dutch translations
1363 * Changes in version 1.31, 2002-01-14:
1367 ** GNU Gettext and %expect
1368 GNU Gettext asserts 10 s/r conflicts, but there are 7. Now that
1369 Bison dies on incorrect %expectations, we fear there will be
1370 too many bug reports for Gettext, so _for the time being_, %expect
1371 does not trigger an error when the input file is named `plural.y'.
1373 ** Use of alloca in parsers
1374 If YYSTACK_USE_ALLOCA is defined to 0, then the parsers will use
1375 malloc exclusively. Since 1.29, but was not NEWS'ed.
1377 alloca is used only when compiled with GCC, to avoid portability
1380 ** yyparse now returns 2 if memory is exhausted; formerly it dumped core.
1382 ** When the generated parser lacks debugging code, YYDEBUG is now 0
1383 (as POSIX requires) instead of being undefined.
1386 Bison has always permitted actions such as { $$ = $1 }: it adds the
1387 ending semicolon. Now if in Yacc compatibility mode, the semicolon
1388 is no longer output: one has to write { $$ = $1; }.
1390 ** Better C++ compliance
1391 The output parsers try to respect C++ namespaces.
1392 [This turned out to be a failed experiment, and it was reverted later.]
1395 Fixed bugs when reporting useless nonterminals.
1398 The parsers work properly on 64 bit hosts.
1401 Some calls to strerror resulted in scrambled or missing error messages.
1404 When the number of shift/reduce conflicts is correct, don't issue
1407 ** The verbose report includes the rule line numbers.
1409 ** Rule line numbers are fixed in traces.
1411 ** Swedish translation
1414 Verbose parse error messages from the parsers are better looking.
1415 Before: parse error: unexpected `'/'', expecting `"number"' or `'-'' or `'(''
1416 Now: parse error: unexpected '/', expecting "number" or '-' or '('
1418 ** Fixed parser memory leaks.
1419 When the generated parser was using malloc to extend its stacks, the
1420 previous allocations were not freed.
1422 ** Fixed verbose output file.
1423 Some newlines were missing.
1424 Some conflicts in state descriptions were missing.
1426 ** Fixed conflict report.
1427 Option -v was needed to get the result.
1431 Mismatches are errors, not warnings.
1433 ** Fixed incorrect processing of some invalid input.
1435 ** Fixed CPP guards: 9foo.h uses BISON_9FOO_H instead of 9FOO_H.
1437 ** Fixed some typos in the documentation.
1439 ** %token MY_EOF 0 is supported.
1440 Before, MY_EOF was silently renumbered as 257.
1442 ** doc/refcard.tex is updated.
1444 ** %output, %file-prefix, %name-prefix.
1448 New, aliasing `--output-file'.
1450 * Changes in version 1.30, 2001-10-26:
1452 ** `--defines' and `--graph' have now an optional argument which is the
1453 output file name. `-d' and `-g' do not change; they do not take any
1456 ** `%source_extension' and `%header_extension' are removed, failed
1459 ** Portability fixes.
1461 * Changes in version 1.29, 2001-09-07:
1463 ** The output file does not define const, as this caused problems when used
1464 with common autoconfiguration schemes. If you still use ancient compilers
1465 that lack const, compile with the equivalent of the C compiler option
1466 `-Dconst='. autoconf's AC_C_CONST macro provides one way to do this.
1468 ** Added `-g' and `--graph'.
1470 ** The Bison manual is now distributed under the terms of the GNU FDL.
1472 ** The input and the output files has automatically a similar extension.
1474 ** Russian translation added.
1476 ** NLS support updated; should hopefully be less troublesome.
1478 ** Added the old Bison reference card.
1480 ** Added `--locations' and `%locations'.
1482 ** Added `-S' and `--skeleton'.
1484 ** `%raw', `-r', `--raw' is disabled.
1486 ** Special characters are escaped when output. This solves the problems
1487 of the #line lines with path names including backslashes.
1490 `%yacc', `%fixed_output_files', `%defines', `%no_parser', `%verbose',
1491 `%debug', `%source_extension' and `%header_extension'.
1494 Automatic location tracking.
1496 * Changes in version 1.28, 1999-07-06:
1498 ** Should compile better now with K&R compilers.
1502 ** Fixed a problem with escaping the double quote character.
1504 ** There is now a FAQ.
1506 * Changes in version 1.27:
1508 ** The make rule which prevented bison.simple from being created on
1509 some systems has been fixed.
1511 * Changes in version 1.26:
1513 ** Bison now uses automake.
1515 ** New mailing lists: <bug-bison@gnu.org> and <help-bison@gnu.org>.
1517 ** Token numbers now start at 257 as previously documented, not 258.
1519 ** Bison honors the TMPDIR environment variable.
1521 ** A couple of buffer overruns have been fixed.
1523 ** Problems when closing files should now be reported.
1525 ** Generated parsers should now work even on operating systems which do
1526 not provide alloca().
1528 * Changes in version 1.25, 1995-10-16:
1530 ** Errors in the input grammar are not fatal; Bison keeps reading
1531 the grammar file, and reports all the errors found in it.
1533 ** Tokens can now be specified as multiple-character strings: for
1534 example, you could use "<=" for a token which looks like <=, instead
1535 of chosing a name like LESSEQ.
1537 ** The %token_table declaration says to write a table of tokens (names
1538 and numbers) into the parser file. The yylex function can use this
1539 table to recognize multiple-character string tokens, or for other
1542 ** The %no_lines declaration says not to generate any #line preprocessor
1543 directives in the parser file.
1545 ** The %raw declaration says to use internal Bison token numbers, not
1546 Yacc-compatible token numbers, when token names are defined as macros.
1548 ** The --no-parser option produces the parser tables without including
1549 the parser engine; a project can now use its own parser engine.
1550 The actions go into a separate file called NAME.act, in the form of
1551 a switch statement body.
1553 * Changes in version 1.23:
1555 The user can define YYPARSE_PARAM as the name of an argument to be
1556 passed into yyparse. The argument should have type void *. It should
1557 actually point to an object. Grammar actions can access the variable
1558 by casting it to the proper pointer type.
1560 Line numbers in output file corrected.
1562 * Changes in version 1.22:
1564 --help option added.
1566 * Changes in version 1.20:
1568 Output file does not redefine const for C++.
1576 Copyright (C) 1995-2011 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
1578 This file is part of Bison, the GNU Parser Generator.
1580 This program is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify
1581 it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
1582 the Free Software Foundation, either version 3 of the License, or
1583 (at your option) any later version.
1585 This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
1586 but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
1587 MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the
1588 GNU General Public License for more details.
1590 You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
1591 along with this program. If not, see <http://www.gnu.org/licenses/>.