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 ** C++ skeleton improvements
29 The C++ parser features a syntax_error exception, which can be
30 thrown from the scanner or from user rules to raise syntax errors.
31 This facilitates reporting errors caught in sub-functions (e.g.,
32 rejecting too large integral literals from a conversion function
33 used by the scanner, or rejecting invalid combinations from a
34 factory invoked by the user actions).
36 ** Variable api.tokens.prefix
38 The variable api.tokens.prefix changes the way tokens are identified in
39 the generated files. This is especially useful to avoid collisions
40 with identifiers in the target language. For instance
43 %define api.tokens.prefix "TOK_"
45 start: FILE for ERROR;
47 will generate the definition of the symbols TOK_FILE, TOK_for, and
48 TOK_ERROR in the generated sources. In particular, the scanner must
49 use these prefixed token names, although the grammar itself still
50 uses the short names (as in the sample rule given above).
52 ** Variable api.namespace
54 The "namespace" variable is renamed "api.namespace". Backward
55 compatibility is ensured, but upgrading is recommended.
57 ** Variable parse.error
59 The variable error controls the verbosity of error messages. The
60 use of the %error-verbose directive is deprecated in favor of
61 %define parse.error "verbose".
63 ** Semantic predicates
65 The new, experimental, semantic-predicate feature allows actions of
66 the form %?{ BOOLEAN-EXPRESSION }, which cause syntax errors (as for
67 YYERROR) if the expression evaluates to 0, and are evaluated immediately
68 in GLR parsers, rather than being deferred. The result is that they
69 allow the programmer to prune possible parses based on the values of
72 * Changes in version 2.5.1 (????-??-??):
74 ** Several portability problems in the test suite have been fixed:
76 This includes warnings with some compilers, unexpected behavior of
77 tools such as diff, warning messages from the test suite itself,
80 __attribute__ is not longer disabled when __STRICT_ANSI__ is defined
81 (i.e., when -std is passed to GCC).
83 ** Warnings during the build procedure have been eliminated.
85 ** Many minor improvements have been made to the manual:
87 The layout for grammar has changed to a more compact scheme. Named
88 references are motivated. The description of the automaton
89 description file is updated.
91 ** YYBACKUP works as expected.
93 ** liby is no longer asking for "rpl_fprintf" on some platforms.
95 ** Several Java fixes:
97 The Java parser no longer throws ArrayIndexOutOfBoundsException if
98 the first token leads to a syntax error. Some minor clean ups.
100 ** C++11 compatibility:
102 C and C++ parsers use nullptr instead of 0 when __cplusplus is
107 The position and location constructors (and their initialize
108 methods) accept new arguments for line and column. Several issues
109 in the documentation were fixed.
111 * Changes in version 2.5 (2011-05-14):
113 ** Grammar symbol names can now contain non-initial dashes:
115 Consistently with directives (such as %error-verbose) and with
116 %define variables (e.g. push-pull), grammar symbol names may contain
117 dashes in any position except the beginning. This is a GNU
118 extension over POSIX Yacc. Thus, use of this extension is reported
119 by -Wyacc and rejected in Yacc mode (--yacc).
123 Historically, Yacc and Bison have supported positional references
124 ($n, $$) to allow access to symbol values from inside of semantic
127 Starting from this version, Bison can also accept named references.
128 When no ambiguity is possible, original symbol names may be used
131 if_stmt : "if" cond_expr "then" then_stmt ';'
132 { $if_stmt = mk_if_stmt($cond_expr, $then_stmt); }
134 In the more common case, explicit names may be declared:
136 stmt[res] : "if" expr[cond] "then" stmt[then] "else" stmt[else] ';'
137 { $res = mk_if_stmt($cond, $then, $else); }
139 Location information is also accessible using @name syntax. When
140 accessing symbol names containing dots or dashes, explicit bracketing
141 ($[sym.1]) must be used.
143 These features are experimental in this version. More user feedback
144 will help to stabilize them.
146 ** IELR(1) and canonical LR(1):
148 IELR(1) is a minimal LR(1) parser table generation algorithm. That
149 is, given any context-free grammar, IELR(1) generates parser tables
150 with the full language-recognition power of canonical LR(1) but with
151 nearly the same number of parser states as LALR(1). This reduction
152 in parser states is often an order of magnitude. More importantly,
153 because canonical LR(1)'s extra parser states may contain duplicate
154 conflicts in the case of non-LR(1) grammars, the number of conflicts
155 for IELR(1) is often an order of magnitude less as well. This can
156 significantly reduce the complexity of developing of a grammar.
158 Bison can now generate IELR(1) and canonical LR(1) parser tables in
159 place of its traditional LALR(1) parser tables, which remain the
160 default. You can specify the type of parser tables in the grammar
161 file with these directives:
165 %define lr.type canonical-lr
167 The default-reduction optimization in the parser tables can also be
168 adjusted using `%define lr.default-reductions'. For details on both
169 of these features, see the new section `Tuning LR' in the Bison
172 These features are experimental. More user feedback will help to
175 ** LAC (Lookahead Correction) for syntax error handling:
177 Canonical LR, IELR, and LALR can suffer from a couple of problems
178 upon encountering a syntax error. First, the parser might perform
179 additional parser stack reductions before discovering the syntax
180 error. Such reductions can perform user semantic actions that are
181 unexpected because they are based on an invalid token, and they
182 cause error recovery to begin in a different syntactic context than
183 the one in which the invalid token was encountered. Second, when
184 verbose error messages are enabled (with %error-verbose or the
185 obsolete `#define YYERROR_VERBOSE'), the expected token list in the
186 syntax error message can both contain invalid tokens and omit valid
189 The culprits for the above problems are %nonassoc, default
190 reductions in inconsistent states, and parser state merging. Thus,
191 IELR and LALR suffer the most. Canonical LR can suffer only if
192 %nonassoc is used or if default reductions are enabled for
195 LAC is a new mechanism within the parsing algorithm that solves
196 these problems for canonical LR, IELR, and LALR without sacrificing
197 %nonassoc, default reductions, or state merging. When LAC is in
198 use, canonical LR and IELR behave almost exactly the same for both
199 syntactically acceptable and syntactically unacceptable input.
200 While LALR still does not support the full language-recognition
201 power of canonical LR and IELR, LAC at least enables LALR's syntax
202 error handling to correctly reflect LALR's language-recognition
205 Currently, LAC is only supported for deterministic parsers in C.
206 You can enable LAC with the following directive:
208 %define parse.lac full
210 See the new section `LAC' in the Bison manual for additional
211 details including a few caveats.
213 LAC is an experimental feature. More user feedback will help to
216 ** %define improvements:
218 *** Can now be invoked via the command line:
220 Each of these command-line options
223 --define=NAME[=VALUE]
226 --force-define=NAME[=VALUE]
228 is equivalent to this grammar file declaration
230 %define NAME ["VALUE"]
232 except that the manner in which Bison processes multiple definitions
233 for the same NAME differs. Most importantly, -F and --force-define
234 quietly override %define, but -D and --define do not. For further
235 details, see the section `Bison Options' in the Bison manual.
237 *** Variables renamed:
239 The following %define variables
242 lr.keep_unreachable_states
247 lr.keep-unreachable-states
249 The old names are now deprecated but will be maintained indefinitely
250 for backward compatibility.
252 *** Values no longer need to be quoted in the grammar file:
254 If a %define value is an identifier, it no longer needs to be placed
255 within quotations marks. For example,
257 %define api.push-pull "push"
261 %define api.push-pull push
263 *** Unrecognized variables are now errors not warnings.
265 *** Multiple invocations for any variable is now an error not a warning.
267 ** Unrecognized %code qualifiers are now errors not warnings.
269 ** Character literals not of length one:
271 Previously, Bison quietly converted all character literals to length
272 one. For example, without warning, Bison interpreted the operators in
273 the following grammar to be the same token:
279 Bison now warns when a character literal is not of length one. In
280 some future release, Bison will start reporting an error instead.
282 ** Destructor calls fixed for lookaheads altered in semantic actions:
284 Previously for deterministic parsers in C, if a user semantic action
285 altered yychar, the parser in some cases used the old yychar value to
286 determine which destructor to call for the lookahead upon a syntax
287 error or upon parser return. This bug has been fixed.
289 ** C++ parsers use YYRHSLOC:
291 Similarly to the C parsers, the C++ parsers now define the YYRHSLOC
292 macro and use it in the default YYLLOC_DEFAULT. You are encouraged
293 to use it. If, for instance, your location structure has `first'
294 and `last' members, instead of
296 # define YYLLOC_DEFAULT(Current, Rhs, N) \
300 (Current).first = (Rhs)[1].location.first; \
301 (Current).last = (Rhs)[N].location.last; \
305 (Current).first = (Current).last = (Rhs)[0].location.last; \
311 # define YYLLOC_DEFAULT(Current, Rhs, N) \
315 (Current).first = YYRHSLOC (Rhs, 1).first; \
316 (Current).last = YYRHSLOC (Rhs, N).last; \
320 (Current).first = (Current).last = YYRHSLOC (Rhs, 0).last; \
324 ** YYLLOC_DEFAULT in C++:
326 The default implementation of YYLLOC_DEFAULT used to be issued in
327 the header file. It is now output in the implementation file, after
328 the user %code sections so that its #ifndef guard does not try to
329 override the user's YYLLOC_DEFAULT if provided.
331 ** YYFAIL now produces warnings and Java parsers no longer implement it:
333 YYFAIL has existed for many years as an undocumented feature of
334 deterministic parsers in C generated by Bison. More recently, it was
335 a documented feature of Bison's experimental Java parsers. As
336 promised in Bison 2.4.2's NEWS entry, any appearance of YYFAIL in a
337 semantic action now produces a deprecation warning, and Java parsers
338 no longer implement YYFAIL at all. For further details, including a
339 discussion of how to suppress C preprocessor warnings about YYFAIL
340 being unused, see the Bison 2.4.2 NEWS entry.
342 ** Temporary hack for adding a semicolon to the user action:
344 Previously, Bison appended a semicolon to every user action for
345 reductions when the output language defaulted to C (specifically, when
346 neither %yacc, %language, %skeleton, or equivalent command-line
347 options were specified). This allowed actions such as
349 exp: exp "+" exp { $$ = $1 + $3 };
353 exp: exp "+" exp { $$ = $1 + $3; };
355 As a first step in removing this misfeature, Bison now issues a
356 warning when it appends a semicolon. Moreover, in cases where Bison
357 cannot easily determine whether a semicolon is needed (for example, an
358 action ending with a cpp directive or a braced compound initializer),
359 it no longer appends one. Thus, the C compiler might now complain
360 about a missing semicolon where it did not before. Future releases of
361 Bison will cease to append semicolons entirely.
363 ** Verbose syntax error message fixes:
365 When %error-verbose or the obsolete `#define YYERROR_VERBOSE' is
366 specified, syntax error messages produced by the generated parser
367 include the unexpected token as well as a list of expected tokens.
368 The effect of %nonassoc on these verbose messages has been corrected
369 in two ways, but a more complete fix requires LAC, described above:
371 *** When %nonassoc is used, there can exist parser states that accept no
372 tokens, and so the parser does not always require a lookahead token
373 in order to detect a syntax error. Because no unexpected token or
374 expected tokens can then be reported, the verbose syntax error
375 message described above is suppressed, and the parser instead
376 reports the simpler message, `syntax error'. Previously, this
377 suppression was sometimes erroneously triggered by %nonassoc when a
378 lookahead was actually required. Now verbose messages are
379 suppressed only when all previous lookaheads have already been
380 shifted or discarded.
382 *** Previously, the list of expected tokens erroneously included tokens
383 that would actually induce a syntax error because conflicts for them
384 were resolved with %nonassoc in the current parser state. Such
385 tokens are now properly omitted from the list.
387 *** Expected token lists are still often wrong due to state merging
388 (from LALR or IELR) and default reductions, which can both add
389 invalid tokens and subtract valid tokens. Canonical LR almost
390 completely fixes this problem by eliminating state merging and
391 default reductions. However, there is one minor problem left even
392 when using canonical LR and even after the fixes above. That is,
393 if the resolution of a conflict with %nonassoc appears in a later
394 parser state than the one at which some syntax error is
395 discovered, the conflicted token is still erroneously included in
396 the expected token list. Bison's new LAC implementation,
397 described above, eliminates this problem and the need for
398 canonical LR. However, LAC is still experimental and is disabled
401 ** Java skeleton fixes:
403 *** A location handling bug has been fixed.
405 *** The top element of each of the value stack and location stack is now
406 cleared when popped so that it can be garbage collected.
408 *** Parser traces now print the top element of the stack.
410 ** -W/--warnings fixes:
412 *** Bison now properly recognizes the `no-' versions of categories:
414 For example, given the following command line, Bison now enables all
415 warnings except warnings for incompatibilities with POSIX Yacc:
417 bison -Wall,no-yacc gram.y
419 *** Bison now treats S/R and R/R conflicts like other warnings:
421 Previously, conflict reports were independent of Bison's normal
422 warning system. Now, Bison recognizes the warning categories
423 `conflicts-sr' and `conflicts-rr'. This change has important
424 consequences for the -W and --warnings command-line options. For
427 bison -Wno-conflicts-sr gram.y # S/R conflicts not reported
428 bison -Wno-conflicts-rr gram.y # R/R conflicts not reported
429 bison -Wnone gram.y # no conflicts are reported
430 bison -Werror gram.y # any conflict is an error
432 However, as before, if the %expect or %expect-rr directive is
433 specified, an unexpected number of conflicts is an error, and an
434 expected number of conflicts is not reported, so -W and --warning
435 then have no effect on the conflict report.
437 *** The `none' category no longer disables a preceding `error':
439 For example, for the following command line, Bison now reports
440 errors instead of warnings for incompatibilities with POSIX Yacc:
442 bison -Werror,none,yacc gram.y
444 *** The `none' category now disables all Bison warnings:
446 Previously, the `none' category disabled only Bison warnings for
447 which there existed a specific -W/--warning category. However,
448 given the following command line, Bison is now guaranteed to
449 suppress all warnings:
453 ** Precedence directives can now assign token number 0:
455 Since Bison 2.3b, which restored the ability of precedence
456 directives to assign token numbers, doing so for token number 0 has
457 produced an assertion failure. For example:
461 This bug has been fixed.
463 * Changes in version 2.4.3 (2010-08-05):
465 ** Bison now obeys -Werror and --warnings=error for warnings about
466 grammar rules that are useless in the parser due to conflicts.
468 ** Problems with spawning M4 on at least FreeBSD 8 and FreeBSD 9 have
471 ** Failures in the test suite for GCC 4.5 have been fixed.
473 ** Failures in the test suite for some versions of Sun Studio C++ have
476 ** Contrary to Bison 2.4.2's NEWS entry, it has been decided that
477 warnings about undefined %prec identifiers will not be converted to
478 errors in Bison 2.5. They will remain warnings, which should be
479 sufficient for POSIX while avoiding backward compatibility issues.
481 ** Minor documentation fixes.
483 * Changes in version 2.4.2 (2010-03-20):
485 ** Some portability problems that resulted in failures and livelocks
486 in the test suite on some versions of at least Solaris, AIX, HP-UX,
487 RHEL4, and Tru64 have been addressed. As a result, fatal Bison
488 errors should no longer cause M4 to report a broken pipe on the
491 ** `%prec IDENTIFIER' requires IDENTIFIER to be defined separately.
493 POSIX specifies that an error be reported for any identifier that does
494 not appear on the LHS of a grammar rule and that is not defined by
495 %token, %left, %right, or %nonassoc. Bison 2.3b and later lost this
496 error report for the case when an identifier appears only after a
497 %prec directive. It is now restored. However, for backward
498 compatibility with recent Bison releases, it is only a warning for
499 now. In Bison 2.5 and later, it will return to being an error.
500 [Between the 2.4.2 and 2.4.3 releases, it was decided that this
501 warning will not be converted to an error in Bison 2.5.]
503 ** Detection of GNU M4 1.4.6 or newer during configure is improved.
505 ** Warnings from gcc's -Wundef option about undefined YYENABLE_NLS,
506 YYLTYPE_IS_TRIVIAL, and __STRICT_ANSI__ in C/C++ parsers are now
509 ** %code is now a permanent feature.
511 A traditional Yacc prologue directive is written in the form:
515 To provide a more flexible alternative, Bison 2.3b introduced the
516 %code directive with the following forms for C/C++:
519 %code requires {CODE}
520 %code provides {CODE}
523 These forms are now considered permanent features of Bison. See the
524 %code entries in the section "Bison Declaration Summary" in the Bison
525 manual for a summary of their functionality. See the section
526 "Prologue Alternatives" for a detailed discussion including the
527 advantages of %code over the traditional Yacc prologue directive.
529 Bison's Java feature as a whole including its current usage of %code
530 is still considered experimental.
532 ** YYFAIL is deprecated and will eventually be removed.
534 YYFAIL has existed for many years as an undocumented feature of
535 deterministic parsers in C generated by Bison. Previously, it was
536 documented for Bison's experimental Java parsers. YYFAIL is no longer
537 documented for Java parsers and is formally deprecated in both cases.
538 Users are strongly encouraged to migrate to YYERROR, which is
541 Like YYERROR, you can invoke YYFAIL from a semantic action in order to
542 induce a syntax error. The most obvious difference from YYERROR is
543 that YYFAIL will automatically invoke yyerror to report the syntax
544 error so that you don't have to. However, there are several other
545 subtle differences between YYERROR and YYFAIL, and YYFAIL suffers from
546 inherent flaws when %error-verbose or `#define YYERROR_VERBOSE' is
547 used. For a more detailed discussion, see:
549 http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/bison-patches/2009-12/msg00024.html
551 The upcoming Bison 2.5 will remove YYFAIL from Java parsers, but
552 deterministic parsers in C will continue to implement it. However,
553 because YYFAIL is already flawed, it seems futile to try to make new
554 Bison features compatible with it. Thus, during parser generation,
555 Bison 2.5 will produce a warning whenever it discovers YYFAIL in a
556 rule action. In a later release, YYFAIL will be disabled for
557 %error-verbose and `#define YYERROR_VERBOSE'. Eventually, YYFAIL will
558 be removed altogether.
560 There exists at least one case where Bison 2.5's YYFAIL warning will
561 be a false positive. Some projects add phony uses of YYFAIL and other
562 Bison-defined macros for the sole purpose of suppressing C
563 preprocessor warnings (from GCC cpp's -Wunused-macros, for example).
564 To avoid Bison's future warning, such YYFAIL uses can be moved to the
565 epilogue (that is, after the second `%%') in the Bison input file. In
566 this release (2.4.2), Bison already generates its own code to suppress
567 C preprocessor warnings for YYFAIL, so projects can remove their own
568 phony uses of YYFAIL if compatibility with Bison releases prior to
569 2.4.2 is not necessary.
571 ** Internationalization.
573 Fix a regression introduced in Bison 2.4: Under some circumstances,
574 message translations were not installed although supported by the
577 * Changes in version 2.4.1 (2008-12-11):
579 ** In the GLR defines file, unexpanded M4 macros in the yylval and yylloc
580 declarations have been fixed.
582 ** Temporary hack for adding a semicolon to the user action.
584 Bison used to prepend a trailing semicolon at the end of the user
585 action for reductions. This allowed actions such as
587 exp: exp "+" exp { $$ = $1 + $3 };
591 exp: exp "+" exp { $$ = $1 + $3; };
593 Some grammars still depend on this `feature'. Bison 2.4.1 restores
594 the previous behavior in the case of C output (specifically, when
595 neither %language or %skeleton or equivalent command-line options
596 are used) to leave more time for grammars depending on the old
597 behavior to be adjusted. Future releases of Bison will disable this
600 ** A few minor improvements to the Bison manual.
602 * Changes in version 2.4 (2008-11-02):
604 ** %language is an experimental feature.
606 We first introduced this feature in test release 2.3b as a cleaner
607 alternative to %skeleton. Since then, we have discussed the possibility of
608 modifying its effect on Bison's output file names. Thus, in this release,
609 we consider %language to be an experimental feature that will likely evolve
612 ** Forward compatibility with GNU M4 has been improved.
614 ** Several bugs in the C++ skeleton and the experimental Java skeleton have been
617 * Changes in version 2.3b (2008-05-27):
619 ** The quotes around NAME that used to be required in the following directive
624 ** The directive `%pure-parser' is now deprecated in favor of:
628 which has the same effect except that Bison is more careful to warn about
629 unreasonable usage in the latter case.
633 Bison can now generate an LALR(1) parser in C with a push interface. That
634 is, instead of invoking `yyparse', which pulls tokens from `yylex', you can
635 push one token at a time to the parser using `yypush_parse', which will
636 return to the caller after processing each token. By default, the push
637 interface is disabled. Either of the following directives will enable it:
639 %define api.push_pull "push" // Just push; does not require yylex.
640 %define api.push_pull "both" // Push and pull; requires yylex.
642 See the new section `A Push Parser' in the Bison manual for details.
644 The current push parsing interface is experimental and may evolve. More user
645 feedback will help to stabilize it.
647 ** The -g and --graph options now output graphs in Graphviz DOT format,
648 not VCG format. Like --graph, -g now also takes an optional FILE argument
649 and thus cannot be bundled with other short options.
653 Bison can now generate an LALR(1) parser in Java. The skeleton is
654 `data/lalr1.java'. Consider using the new %language directive instead of
655 %skeleton to select it.
657 See the new section `Java Parsers' in the Bison manual for details.
659 The current Java interface is experimental and may evolve. More user
660 feedback will help to stabilize it.
664 This new directive specifies the programming language of the generated
665 parser, which can be C (the default), C++, or Java. Besides the skeleton
666 that Bison uses, the directive affects the names of the generated files if
667 the grammar file's name ends in ".y".
669 ** XML Automaton Report
671 Bison can now generate an XML report of the LALR(1) automaton using the new
672 `--xml' option. The current XML schema is experimental and may evolve. More
673 user feedback will help to stabilize it.
675 ** The grammar file may now specify the name of the parser header file using
676 %defines. For example:
680 ** When reporting useless rules, useless nonterminals, and unused terminals,
681 Bison now employs the terms "useless in grammar" instead of "useless",
682 "useless in parser" instead of "never reduced", and "unused in grammar"
685 ** Unreachable State Removal
687 Previously, Bison sometimes generated parser tables containing unreachable
688 states. A state can become unreachable during conflict resolution if Bison
689 disables a shift action leading to it from a predecessor state. Bison now:
691 1. Removes unreachable states.
693 2. Does not report any conflicts that appeared in unreachable states.
694 WARNING: As a result, you may need to update %expect and %expect-rr
695 directives in existing grammar files.
697 3. For any rule used only in such states, Bison now reports the rule as
698 "useless in parser due to conflicts".
700 This feature can be disabled with the following directive:
702 %define lr.keep_unreachable_states
704 See the %define entry in the `Bison Declaration Summary' in the Bison manual
705 for further discussion.
707 ** Lookahead Set Correction in the `.output' Report
709 When instructed to generate a `.output' file including lookahead sets
710 (using `--report=lookahead', for example), Bison now prints each reduction's
711 lookahead set only next to the associated state's one item that (1) is
712 associated with the same rule as the reduction and (2) has its dot at the end
713 of its RHS. Previously, Bison also erroneously printed the lookahead set
714 next to all of the state's other items associated with the same rule. This
715 bug affected only the `.output' file and not the generated parser source
718 ** --report-file=FILE is a new option to override the default `.output' file
721 ** The `=' that used to be required in the following directives is now
724 %file-prefix "parser"
728 ** An Alternative to `%{...%}' -- `%code QUALIFIER {CODE}'
730 Bison 2.3a provided a new set of directives as a more flexible alternative to
731 the traditional Yacc prologue blocks. Those have now been consolidated into
732 a single %code directive with an optional qualifier field, which identifies
733 the purpose of the code and thus the location(s) where Bison should generate
736 1. `%code {CODE}' replaces `%after-header {CODE}'
737 2. `%code requires {CODE}' replaces `%start-header {CODE}'
738 3. `%code provides {CODE}' replaces `%end-header {CODE}'
739 4. `%code top {CODE}' replaces `%before-header {CODE}'
741 See the %code entries in section `Bison Declaration Summary' in the Bison
742 manual for a summary of the new functionality. See the new section `Prologue
743 Alternatives' for a detailed discussion including the advantages of %code
744 over the traditional Yacc prologues.
746 The prologue alternatives are experimental. More user feedback will help to
747 determine whether they should become permanent features.
749 ** Revised warning: unset or unused mid-rule values
751 Since Bison 2.2, Bison has warned about mid-rule values that are set but not
752 used within any of the actions of the parent rule. For example, Bison warns
755 exp: '1' { $$ = 1; } '+' exp { $$ = $1 + $4; };
757 Now, Bison also warns about mid-rule values that are used but not set. For
758 example, Bison warns about unset $$ in the mid-rule action in:
760 exp: '1' { $1 = 1; } '+' exp { $$ = $2 + $4; };
762 However, Bison now disables both of these warnings by default since they
763 sometimes prove to be false alarms in existing grammars employing the Yacc
764 constructs $0 or $-N (where N is some positive integer).
766 To enable these warnings, specify the option `--warnings=midrule-values' or
767 `-W', which is a synonym for `--warnings=all'.
769 ** Default %destructor or %printer with `<*>' or `<>'
771 Bison now recognizes two separate kinds of default %destructor's and
774 1. Place `<*>' in a %destructor/%printer symbol list to define a default
775 %destructor/%printer for all grammar symbols for which you have formally
776 declared semantic type tags.
778 2. Place `<>' in a %destructor/%printer symbol list to define a default
779 %destructor/%printer for all grammar symbols without declared semantic
782 Bison no longer supports the `%symbol-default' notation from Bison 2.3a.
783 `<*>' and `<>' combined achieve the same effect with one exception: Bison no
784 longer applies any %destructor to a mid-rule value if that mid-rule value is
785 not actually ever referenced using either $$ or $n in a semantic action.
787 The default %destructor's and %printer's are experimental. More user
788 feedback will help to determine whether they should become permanent
791 See the section `Freeing Discarded Symbols' in the Bison manual for further
794 ** %left, %right, and %nonassoc can now declare token numbers. This is required
795 by POSIX. However, see the end of section `Operator Precedence' in the Bison
796 manual for a caveat concerning the treatment of literal strings.
798 ** The nonfunctional --no-parser, -n, and %no-parser options have been
799 completely removed from Bison.
801 * Changes in version 2.3a, 2006-09-13:
803 ** Instead of %union, you can define and use your own union type
804 YYSTYPE if your grammar contains at least one <type> tag.
805 Your YYSTYPE need not be a macro; it can be a typedef.
806 This change is for compatibility with other Yacc implementations,
807 and is required by POSIX.
809 ** Locations columns and lines start at 1.
810 In accordance with the GNU Coding Standards and Emacs.
812 ** You may now declare per-type and default %destructor's and %printer's:
816 %union { char *string; }
817 %token <string> STRING1
818 %token <string> STRING2
819 %type <string> string1
820 %type <string> string2
821 %union { char character; }
822 %token <character> CHR
823 %type <character> chr
824 %destructor { free ($$); } %symbol-default
825 %destructor { free ($$); printf ("%d", @$.first_line); } STRING1 string1
826 %destructor { } <character>
828 guarantees that, when the parser discards any user-defined symbol that has a
829 semantic type tag other than `<character>', it passes its semantic value to
830 `free'. However, when the parser discards a `STRING1' or a `string1', it
831 also prints its line number to `stdout'. It performs only the second
832 `%destructor' in this case, so it invokes `free' only once.
834 [Although we failed to mention this here in the 2.3a release, the default
835 %destructor's and %printer's were experimental, and they were rewritten in
838 ** Except for LALR(1) parsers in C with POSIX Yacc emulation enabled (with `-y',
839 `--yacc', or `%yacc'), Bison no longer generates #define statements for
840 associating token numbers with token names. Removing the #define statements
841 helps to sanitize the global namespace during preprocessing, but POSIX Yacc
842 requires them. Bison still generates an enum for token names in all cases.
844 ** Handling of traditional Yacc prologue blocks is now more consistent but
845 potentially incompatible with previous releases of Bison.
847 As before, you declare prologue blocks in your grammar file with the
848 `%{ ... %}' syntax. To generate the pre-prologue, Bison concatenates all
849 prologue blocks that you've declared before the first %union. To generate
850 the post-prologue, Bison concatenates all prologue blocks that you've
851 declared after the first %union.
853 Previous releases of Bison inserted the pre-prologue into both the header
854 file and the code file in all cases except for LALR(1) parsers in C. In the
855 latter case, Bison inserted it only into the code file. For parsers in C++,
856 the point of insertion was before any token definitions (which associate
857 token numbers with names). For parsers in C, the point of insertion was
858 after the token definitions.
860 Now, Bison never inserts the pre-prologue into the header file. In the code
861 file, it always inserts it before the token definitions.
863 ** Bison now provides a more flexible alternative to the traditional Yacc
864 prologue blocks: %before-header, %start-header, %end-header, and
867 For example, the following declaration order in the grammar file reflects the
868 order in which Bison will output these code blocks. However, you are free to
869 declare these code blocks in your grammar file in whatever order is most
873 /* Bison treats this block like a pre-prologue block: it inserts it into
874 * the code file before the contents of the header file. It does *not*
875 * insert it into the header file. This is a good place to put
876 * #include's that you want at the top of your code file. A common
877 * example is `#include "system.h"'. */
880 /* Bison inserts this block into both the header file and the code file.
881 * In both files, the point of insertion is before any Bison-generated
882 * token, semantic type, location type, and class definitions. This is a
883 * good place to define %union dependencies, for example. */
886 /* Unlike the traditional Yacc prologue blocks, the output order for the
887 * new %*-header blocks is not affected by their declaration position
888 * relative to any %union in the grammar file. */
891 /* Bison inserts this block into both the header file and the code file.
892 * In both files, the point of insertion is after the Bison-generated
893 * definitions. This is a good place to declare or define public
894 * functions or data structures that depend on the Bison-generated
898 /* Bison treats this block like a post-prologue block: it inserts it into
899 * the code file after the contents of the header file. It does *not*
900 * insert it into the header file. This is a good place to declare or
901 * define internal functions or data structures that depend on the
902 * Bison-generated definitions. */
905 If you have multiple occurrences of any one of the above declarations, Bison
906 will concatenate the contents in declaration order.
908 [Although we failed to mention this here in the 2.3a release, the prologue
909 alternatives were experimental, and they were rewritten in future versions.]
911 ** The option `--report=look-ahead' has been changed to `--report=lookahead'.
912 The old spelling still works, but is not documented and may be removed
915 * Changes in version 2.3, 2006-06-05:
917 ** GLR grammars should now use `YYRECOVERING ()' instead of `YYRECOVERING',
918 for compatibility with LALR(1) grammars.
920 ** It is now documented that any definition of YYSTYPE or YYLTYPE should
921 be to a type name that does not contain parentheses or brackets.
923 * Changes in version 2.2, 2006-05-19:
925 ** The distribution terms for all Bison-generated parsers now permit
926 using the parsers in nonfree programs. Previously, this permission
927 was granted only for Bison-generated LALR(1) parsers in C.
929 ** %name-prefix changes the namespace name in C++ outputs.
931 ** The C++ parsers export their token_type.
933 ** Bison now allows multiple %union declarations, and concatenates
934 their contents together.
936 ** New warning: unused values
937 Right-hand side symbols whose values are not used are reported,
938 if the symbols have destructors. For instance:
940 exp: exp "?" exp ":" exp { $1 ? $1 : $3; }
944 will trigger a warning about $$ and $5 in the first rule, and $3 in
945 the second ($1 is copied to $$ by the default rule). This example
946 most likely contains three errors, and could be rewritten as:
948 exp: exp "?" exp ":" exp
949 { $$ = $1 ? $3 : $5; free ($1 ? $5 : $3); free ($1); }
951 { $$ = $1 ? $1 : $3; if ($1) free ($3); }
954 However, if the original actions were really intended, memory leaks
955 and all, the warnings can be suppressed by letting Bison believe the
956 values are used, e.g.:
958 exp: exp "?" exp ":" exp { $1 ? $1 : $3; (void) ($$, $5); }
959 | exp "+" exp { $$ = $1; (void) $3; }
962 If there are mid-rule actions, the warning is issued if no action
963 uses it. The following triggers no warning: $1 and $3 are used.
965 exp: exp { push ($1); } '+' exp { push ($3); sum (); };
967 The warning is intended to help catching lost values and memory leaks.
968 If a value is ignored, its associated memory typically is not reclaimed.
970 ** %destructor vs. YYABORT, YYACCEPT, and YYERROR.
971 Destructors are now called when user code invokes YYABORT, YYACCEPT,
972 and YYERROR, for all objects on the stack, other than objects
973 corresponding to the right-hand side of the current rule.
975 ** %expect, %expect-rr
976 Incorrect numbers of expected conflicts are now actual errors,
979 ** GLR, YACC parsers.
980 The %parse-params are available in the destructors (and the
981 experimental printers) as per the documentation.
983 ** Bison now warns if it finds a stray `$' or `@' in an action.
985 ** %require "VERSION"
986 This specifies that the grammar file depends on features implemented
987 in Bison version VERSION or higher.
989 ** lalr1.cc: The token and value types are now class members.
990 The tokens were defined as free form enums and cpp macros. YYSTYPE
991 was defined as a free form union. They are now class members:
992 tokens are enumerations of the `yy::parser::token' struct, and the
993 semantic values have the `yy::parser::semantic_type' type.
995 If you do not want or can update to this scheme, the directive
996 `%define "global_tokens_and_yystype" "1"' triggers the global
997 definition of tokens and YYSTYPE. This change is suitable both
998 for previous releases of Bison, and this one.
1000 If you wish to update, then make sure older version of Bison will
1001 fail using `%require "2.2"'.
1003 ** DJGPP support added.
1005 * Changes in version 2.1, 2005-09-16:
1007 ** The C++ lalr1.cc skeleton supports %lex-param.
1009 ** Bison-generated parsers now support the translation of diagnostics like
1010 "syntax error" into languages other than English. The default
1011 language is still English. For details, please see the new
1012 Internationalization section of the Bison manual. Software
1013 distributors should also see the new PACKAGING file. Thanks to
1014 Bruno Haible for this new feature.
1016 ** Wording in the Bison-generated parsers has been changed slightly to
1017 simplify translation. In particular, the message "memory exhausted"
1018 has replaced "parser stack overflow", as the old message was not
1019 always accurate for modern Bison-generated parsers.
1021 ** Destructors are now called when the parser aborts, for all symbols left
1022 behind on the stack. Also, the start symbol is now destroyed after a
1023 successful parse. In both cases, the behavior was formerly inconsistent.
1025 ** When generating verbose diagnostics, Bison-generated parsers no longer
1026 quote the literal strings associated with tokens. For example, for
1027 a syntax error associated with '%token NUM "number"' they might
1028 print 'syntax error, unexpected number' instead of 'syntax error,
1029 unexpected "number"'.
1031 * Changes in version 2.0, 2004-12-25:
1033 ** Possibly-incompatible changes
1035 - Bison-generated parsers no longer default to using the alloca function
1036 (when available) to extend the parser stack, due to widespread
1037 problems in unchecked stack-overflow detection. You can "#define
1038 YYSTACK_USE_ALLOCA 1" to require the use of alloca, but please read
1039 the manual to determine safe values for YYMAXDEPTH in that case.
1041 - Error token location.
1042 During error recovery, the location of the syntax error is updated
1043 to cover the whole sequence covered by the error token: it includes
1044 the shifted symbols thrown away during the first part of the error
1045 recovery, and the lookahead rejected during the second part.
1047 - Semicolon changes:
1048 . Stray semicolons are no longer allowed at the start of a grammar.
1049 . Semicolons are now required after in-grammar declarations.
1051 - Unescaped newlines are no longer allowed in character constants or
1052 string literals. They were never portable, and GCC 3.4.0 has
1053 dropped support for them. Better diagnostics are now generated if
1054 forget a closing quote.
1056 - NUL bytes are no longer allowed in Bison string literals, unfortunately.
1060 - GLR grammars now support locations.
1062 - New directive: %initial-action.
1063 This directive allows the user to run arbitrary code (including
1064 initializing @$) from yyparse before parsing starts.
1066 - A new directive "%expect-rr N" specifies the expected number of
1067 reduce/reduce conflicts in GLR parsers.
1069 - %token numbers can now be hexadecimal integers, e.g., `%token FOO 0x12d'.
1070 This is a GNU extension.
1072 - The option `--report=lookahead' was changed to `--report=look-ahead'.
1073 [However, this was changed back after 2.3.]
1075 - Experimental %destructor support has been added to lalr1.cc.
1077 - New configure option --disable-yacc, to disable installation of the
1078 yacc command and -ly library introduced in 1.875 for POSIX conformance.
1082 - For now, %expect-count violations are now just warnings, not errors.
1083 This is for compatibility with Bison 1.75 and earlier (when there are
1084 reduce/reduce conflicts) and with Bison 1.30 and earlier (when there
1085 are too many or too few shift/reduce conflicts). However, in future
1086 versions of Bison we plan to improve the %expect machinery so that
1087 these violations will become errors again.
1089 - Within Bison itself, numbers (e.g., goto numbers) are no longer
1090 arbitrarily limited to 16-bit counts.
1092 - Semicolons are now allowed before "|" in grammar rules, as POSIX requires.
1094 * Changes in version 1.875, 2003-01-01:
1096 ** The documentation license has been upgraded to version 1.2
1097 of the GNU Free Documentation License.
1099 ** syntax error processing
1101 - In Yacc-style parsers YYLLOC_DEFAULT is now used to compute error
1102 locations too. This fixes bugs in error-location computation.
1105 It is now possible to reclaim the memory associated to symbols
1106 discarded during error recovery. This feature is still experimental.
1109 This new directive is preferred over YYERROR_VERBOSE.
1111 - #defining yyerror to steal internal variables is discouraged.
1112 It is not guaranteed to work forever.
1114 ** POSIX conformance
1116 - Semicolons are once again optional at the end of grammar rules.
1117 This reverts to the behavior of Bison 1.33 and earlier, and improves
1118 compatibility with Yacc.
1120 - `parse error' -> `syntax error'
1121 Bison now uniformly uses the term `syntax error'; formerly, the code
1122 and manual sometimes used the term `parse error' instead. POSIX
1123 requires `syntax error' in diagnostics, and it was thought better to
1126 - The documentation now emphasizes that yylex and yyerror must be
1127 declared before use. C99 requires this.
1129 - Bison now parses C99 lexical constructs like UCNs and
1130 backslash-newline within C escape sequences, as POSIX 1003.1-2001 requires.
1132 - File names are properly escaped in C output. E.g., foo\bar.y is
1133 output as "foo\\bar.y".
1135 - Yacc command and library now available
1136 The Bison distribution now installs a `yacc' command, as POSIX requires.
1137 Also, Bison now installs a small library liby.a containing
1138 implementations of Yacc-compatible yyerror and main functions.
1139 This library is normally not useful, but POSIX requires it.
1141 - Type clashes now generate warnings, not errors.
1143 - If the user does not define YYSTYPE as a macro, Bison now declares it
1144 using typedef instead of defining it as a macro.
1145 For consistency, YYLTYPE is also declared instead of defined.
1147 ** Other compatibility issues
1149 - %union directives can now have a tag before the `{', e.g., the
1150 directive `%union foo {...}' now generates the C code
1151 `typedef union foo { ... } YYSTYPE;'; this is for Yacc compatibility.
1152 The default union tag is `YYSTYPE', for compatibility with Solaris 9 Yacc.
1153 For consistency, YYLTYPE's struct tag is now `YYLTYPE' not `yyltype'.
1154 This is for compatibility with both Yacc and Bison 1.35.
1156 - `;' is output before the terminating `}' of an action, for
1157 compatibility with Bison 1.35.
1159 - Bison now uses a Yacc-style format for conflict reports, e.g.,
1160 `conflicts: 2 shift/reduce, 1 reduce/reduce'.
1162 - `yystype' and `yyltype' are now obsolescent macros instead of being
1163 typedefs or tags; they are no longer documented and are planned to be
1164 withdrawn in a future release.
1169 Users of Bison have to decide how they handle the portability of the
1172 - `parsing stack overflow...' -> `parser stack overflow'
1173 GLR parsers now report `parser stack overflow' as per the Bison manual.
1175 ** Bison now warns if it detects conflicting outputs to the same file,
1176 e.g., it generates a warning for `bison -d -o foo.h foo.y' since
1177 that command outputs both code and header to foo.h.
1179 ** #line in output files
1180 - --no-line works properly.
1182 ** Bison can no longer be built by a K&R C compiler; it requires C89 or
1183 later to be built. This change originally took place a few versions
1184 ago, but nobody noticed until we recently asked someone to try
1185 building Bison with a K&R C compiler.
1187 * Changes in version 1.75, 2002-10-14:
1189 ** Bison should now work on 64-bit hosts.
1191 ** Indonesian translation thanks to Tedi Heriyanto.
1194 Fix spurious parse errors.
1197 Some people redefine yyerror to steal yyparse' private variables.
1198 Reenable this trick until an official feature replaces it.
1201 In agreement with POSIX and with other Yaccs, leaving a default
1202 action is valid when $$ is untyped, and $1 typed:
1206 but the converse remains an error:
1210 ** Values of mid-rule actions
1213 foo: { ... } { $$ = $1; } ...
1215 was incorrectly rejected: $1 is defined in the second mid-rule
1216 action, and is equal to the $$ of the first mid-rule action.
1218 * Changes in version 1.50, 2002-10-04:
1223 causes Bison to produce a Generalized LR (GLR) parser, capable of handling
1224 almost any context-free grammar, ambiguous or not. The new declarations
1225 %dprec and %merge on grammar rules allow parse-time resolution of
1226 ambiguities. Contributed by Paul Hilfinger.
1228 Unfortunately Bison 1.50 does not work properly on 64-bit hosts
1229 like the Alpha, so please stick to 32-bit hosts for now.
1232 When not in Yacc compatibility mode, when the output file was not
1233 specified, running `bison foo/bar.y' created `foo/bar.c'. It
1234 now creates `bar.c'.
1237 The undefined token was systematically mapped to 2 which prevented
1238 the use of 2 by the user. This is no longer the case.
1240 ** Unknown token numbers
1241 If yylex returned an out of range value, yyparse could die. This is
1245 According to POSIX, the error token must be 256.
1246 Bison extends this requirement by making it a preference: *if* the
1247 user specified that one of her tokens is numbered 256, then error
1248 will be mapped onto another number.
1250 ** Verbose error messages
1251 They no longer report `..., expecting error or...' for states where
1252 error recovery is possible.
1255 Defaults to `$end' instead of `$'.
1257 ** Error recovery now conforms to documentation and to POSIX
1258 When a Bison-generated parser encounters a syntax error, it now pops
1259 the stack until it finds a state that allows shifting the error
1260 token. Formerly, it popped the stack until it found a state that
1261 allowed some non-error action other than a default reduction on the
1262 error token. The new behavior has long been the documented behavior,
1263 and has long been required by POSIX. For more details, please see
1264 Paul Eggert, "Reductions during Bison error handling" (2002-05-20)
1265 <http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/bug-bison/2002-05/msg00038.html>.
1268 Popped tokens and nonterminals are now reported.
1271 Larger grammars are now supported (larger token numbers, larger grammar
1272 size (= sum of the LHS and RHS lengths), larger LALR tables).
1273 Formerly, many of these numbers ran afoul of 16-bit limits;
1274 now these limits are 32 bits on most hosts.
1276 ** Explicit initial rule
1277 Bison used to play hacks with the initial rule, which the user does
1278 not write. It is now explicit, and visible in the reports and
1282 Before, Bison reported the useless rules, but, although not used,
1283 included them in the parsers. They are now actually removed.
1285 ** Useless rules, useless nonterminals
1286 They are now reported, as a warning, with their locations.
1288 ** Rules never reduced
1289 Rules that can never be reduced because of conflicts are now
1292 ** Incorrect `Token not used'
1293 On a grammar such as
1295 %token useless useful
1297 exp: '0' %prec useful;
1299 where a token was used to set the precedence of the last rule,
1300 bison reported both `useful' and `useless' as useless tokens.
1302 ** Revert the C++ namespace changes introduced in 1.31
1303 as they caused too many portability hassles.
1305 ** Default locations
1306 By an accident of design, the default computation of @$ was
1307 performed after another default computation was performed: @$ = @1.
1308 The latter is now removed: YYLLOC_DEFAULT is fully responsible of
1309 the computation of @$.
1311 ** Token end-of-file
1312 The token end of file may be specified by the user, in which case,
1313 the user symbol is used in the reports, the graphs, and the verbose
1314 error messages instead of `$end', which remains being the default.
1318 %token MYEOF 0 "end of file"
1321 This old option, which has been broken for ages, is removed.
1324 Brazilian Portuguese, thanks to Alexandre Folle de Menezes.
1325 Croatian, thanks to Denis Lackovic.
1327 ** Incorrect token definitions
1328 When given `%token 'a' "A"', Bison used to output `#define 'a' 65'.
1330 ** Token definitions as enums
1331 Tokens are output both as the traditional #define's, and, provided
1332 the compiler supports ANSI C or is a C++ compiler, as enums.
1333 This lets debuggers display names instead of integers.
1336 In addition to --verbose, bison supports --report=THINGS, which
1337 produces additional information:
1339 complete the core item sets with their closure
1340 - lookahead [changed to `look-ahead' in 1.875e through 2.3, but changed back]
1341 explicitly associate lookahead tokens to items
1343 describe shift/reduce conflicts solving.
1344 Bison used to systematically output this information on top of
1345 the report. Solved conflicts are now attached to their states.
1348 Previous versions don't complain when there is a type clash on
1349 the default action if the rule has a mid-rule action, such as in:
1357 ** GNU M4 is now required when using Bison.
1359 * Changes in version 1.35, 2002-03-25:
1362 Some projects use Bison's C parser with C++ compilers, and define
1363 YYSTYPE as a class. The recent adjustment of C parsers for data
1364 alignment and 64 bit architectures made this impossible.
1366 Because for the time being no real solution for C++ parser
1367 generation exists, kludges were implemented in the parser to
1368 maintain this use. In the future, when Bison has C++ parsers, this
1369 kludge will be disabled.
1371 This kludge also addresses some C++ problems when the stack was
1374 * Changes in version 1.34, 2002-03-12:
1376 ** File name clashes are detected
1377 $ bison foo.y -d -o foo.x
1378 fatal error: header and parser would both be named `foo.x'
1380 ** A missing `;' at the end of a rule triggers a warning
1381 In accordance with POSIX, and in agreement with other
1382 Yacc implementations, Bison will mandate this semicolon in the near
1383 future. This eases the implementation of a Bison parser of Bison
1384 grammars by making this grammar LALR(1) instead of LR(2). To
1385 facilitate the transition, this release introduces a warning.
1387 ** Revert the C++ namespace changes introduced in 1.31, as they caused too
1388 many portability hassles.
1390 ** DJGPP support added.
1392 ** Fix test suite portability problems.
1394 * Changes in version 1.33, 2002-02-07:
1397 Groff could not be compiled for the definition of size_t was lacking
1398 under some conditions.
1403 * Changes in version 1.32, 2002-01-23:
1405 ** Fix Yacc output file names
1407 ** Portability fixes
1409 ** Italian, Dutch translations
1411 * Changes in version 1.31, 2002-01-14:
1415 ** GNU Gettext and %expect
1416 GNU Gettext asserts 10 s/r conflicts, but there are 7. Now that
1417 Bison dies on incorrect %expectations, we fear there will be
1418 too many bug reports for Gettext, so _for the time being_, %expect
1419 does not trigger an error when the input file is named `plural.y'.
1421 ** Use of alloca in parsers
1422 If YYSTACK_USE_ALLOCA is defined to 0, then the parsers will use
1423 malloc exclusively. Since 1.29, but was not NEWS'ed.
1425 alloca is used only when compiled with GCC, to avoid portability
1428 ** yyparse now returns 2 if memory is exhausted; formerly it dumped core.
1430 ** When the generated parser lacks debugging code, YYDEBUG is now 0
1431 (as POSIX requires) instead of being undefined.
1434 Bison has always permitted actions such as { $$ = $1 }: it adds the
1435 ending semicolon. Now if in Yacc compatibility mode, the semicolon
1436 is no longer output: one has to write { $$ = $1; }.
1438 ** Better C++ compliance
1439 The output parsers try to respect C++ namespaces.
1440 [This turned out to be a failed experiment, and it was reverted later.]
1443 Fixed bugs when reporting useless nonterminals.
1446 The parsers work properly on 64 bit hosts.
1449 Some calls to strerror resulted in scrambled or missing error messages.
1452 When the number of shift/reduce conflicts is correct, don't issue
1455 ** The verbose report includes the rule line numbers.
1457 ** Rule line numbers are fixed in traces.
1459 ** Swedish translation
1462 Verbose parse error messages from the parsers are better looking.
1463 Before: parse error: unexpected `'/'', expecting `"number"' or `'-'' or `'(''
1464 Now: parse error: unexpected '/', expecting "number" or '-' or '('
1466 ** Fixed parser memory leaks.
1467 When the generated parser was using malloc to extend its stacks, the
1468 previous allocations were not freed.
1470 ** Fixed verbose output file.
1471 Some newlines were missing.
1472 Some conflicts in state descriptions were missing.
1474 ** Fixed conflict report.
1475 Option -v was needed to get the result.
1479 Mismatches are errors, not warnings.
1481 ** Fixed incorrect processing of some invalid input.
1483 ** Fixed CPP guards: 9foo.h uses BISON_9FOO_H instead of 9FOO_H.
1485 ** Fixed some typos in the documentation.
1487 ** %token MY_EOF 0 is supported.
1488 Before, MY_EOF was silently renumbered as 257.
1490 ** doc/refcard.tex is updated.
1492 ** %output, %file-prefix, %name-prefix.
1496 New, aliasing `--output-file'.
1498 * Changes in version 1.30, 2001-10-26:
1500 ** `--defines' and `--graph' have now an optional argument which is the
1501 output file name. `-d' and `-g' do not change; they do not take any
1504 ** `%source_extension' and `%header_extension' are removed, failed
1507 ** Portability fixes.
1509 * Changes in version 1.29, 2001-09-07:
1511 ** The output file does not define const, as this caused problems when used
1512 with common autoconfiguration schemes. If you still use ancient compilers
1513 that lack const, compile with the equivalent of the C compiler option
1514 `-Dconst='. autoconf's AC_C_CONST macro provides one way to do this.
1516 ** Added `-g' and `--graph'.
1518 ** The Bison manual is now distributed under the terms of the GNU FDL.
1520 ** The input and the output files has automatically a similar extension.
1522 ** Russian translation added.
1524 ** NLS support updated; should hopefully be less troublesome.
1526 ** Added the old Bison reference card.
1528 ** Added `--locations' and `%locations'.
1530 ** Added `-S' and `--skeleton'.
1532 ** `%raw', `-r', `--raw' is disabled.
1534 ** Special characters are escaped when output. This solves the problems
1535 of the #line lines with path names including backslashes.
1538 `%yacc', `%fixed_output_files', `%defines', `%no_parser', `%verbose',
1539 `%debug', `%source_extension' and `%header_extension'.
1542 Automatic location tracking.
1544 * Changes in version 1.28, 1999-07-06:
1546 ** Should compile better now with K&R compilers.
1550 ** Fixed a problem with escaping the double quote character.
1552 ** There is now a FAQ.
1554 * Changes in version 1.27:
1556 ** The make rule which prevented bison.simple from being created on
1557 some systems has been fixed.
1559 * Changes in version 1.26:
1561 ** Bison now uses automake.
1563 ** New mailing lists: <bug-bison@gnu.org> and <help-bison@gnu.org>.
1565 ** Token numbers now start at 257 as previously documented, not 258.
1567 ** Bison honors the TMPDIR environment variable.
1569 ** A couple of buffer overruns have been fixed.
1571 ** Problems when closing files should now be reported.
1573 ** Generated parsers should now work even on operating systems which do
1574 not provide alloca().
1576 * Changes in version 1.25, 1995-10-16:
1578 ** Errors in the input grammar are not fatal; Bison keeps reading
1579 the grammar file, and reports all the errors found in it.
1581 ** Tokens can now be specified as multiple-character strings: for
1582 example, you could use "<=" for a token which looks like <=, instead
1583 of chosing a name like LESSEQ.
1585 ** The %token_table declaration says to write a table of tokens (names
1586 and numbers) into the parser file. The yylex function can use this
1587 table to recognize multiple-character string tokens, or for other
1590 ** The %no_lines declaration says not to generate any #line preprocessor
1591 directives in the parser file.
1593 ** The %raw declaration says to use internal Bison token numbers, not
1594 Yacc-compatible token numbers, when token names are defined as macros.
1596 ** The --no-parser option produces the parser tables without including
1597 the parser engine; a project can now use its own parser engine.
1598 The actions go into a separate file called NAME.act, in the form of
1599 a switch statement body.
1601 * Changes in version 1.23:
1603 The user can define YYPARSE_PARAM as the name of an argument to be
1604 passed into yyparse. The argument should have type void *. It should
1605 actually point to an object. Grammar actions can access the variable
1606 by casting it to the proper pointer type.
1608 Line numbers in output file corrected.
1610 * Changes in version 1.22:
1612 --help option added.
1614 * Changes in version 1.20:
1616 Output file does not redefine const for C++.
1624 Copyright (C) 1995-2012 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
1626 This file is part of Bison, the GNU Parser Generator.
1628 This program is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify
1629 it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
1630 the Free Software Foundation, either version 3 of the License, or
1631 (at your option) any later version.
1633 This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
1634 but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
1635 MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the
1636 GNU General Public License for more details.
1638 You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
1639 along with this program. If not, see <http://www.gnu.org/licenses/>.