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1 GNU Bison NEWS
2
3 * Noteworthy changes in release ?.? (????-??-??) [?]
4
5 ** Future changes
6
7 Bison will stop adding a semicolon at the end of the actions:
8
9 foo.y:2.22: warning: a ';' might be needed at the end of action code
10 exp: "num" { $$ = $1 }
11 ^
12 foo.y:2.22: future versions of Bison will not add the ';'
13
14 Like other GNU packages, Bison will start using some of the C99 features
15 for its own code, especially the definition of variables after statements.
16 The generated C parsers still aim at C90.
17
18 ** Incompatible changes
19
20 *** Obsolete features
21
22 Support for YYFAIL is removed (deprecated in Bison 2.4.2): use YYERROR.
23
24 Support for yystype and yyltype is removed (deprecated in Bison 1.875):
25 use YYSTYPE and YYLTYPE.
26
27 Support for YYLEX_PARAM and YYPARSE_PARAM is removed (deprecated in Bison
28 1.875): use %lex-param, %parse-param, or %param.
29
30 ** Bug fixes
31
32 *** The epilogue is no longer affected by internal #defines
33
34 The glr.c skeleton uses defines such as #define yylval (yystackp->yyval) in
35 generated code. These weren't properly undefined before the inclusion of
36 the user epilogue, so functions such as the following were butchered by the
37 preprocessor expansion:
38
39 int yylex (YYSTYPE *yylval);
40
41 This is has been fixed: yylval, yynerrs, yychar, and yylloc are now valid
42 identifiers for user-provided variables.
43
44 *** stdio.h is no longer needed when locations are enabled (yacc.c)
45
46 Changes in Bison 2.7 introduced a dependency on FILE and fprintf when
47 locations are enabled. This is fixed.
48
49 ** Diagnostics reported by Bison
50
51 Most of these features were contributed by Théophile Ranquet and Victor
52 Santet.
53
54 *** Carets
55
56 Version 2.7 introduced caret errors, for a prettier output. These are now
57 activated by default. The old format can still be used by invoking Bison
58 with -fno-caret (or -fnone).
59
60 *** Enhancements of the -Werror option
61
62 The -Werror=CATEGORY option is now recognized, and will treat specified
63 warnings as errors. The warnings need not have been explicitly activated
64 using the -W option, this is similar to what GCC 4.7 does.
65
66 For example, given the following command line, Bison will treat both
67 warnings related to POSIX Yacc incompatibilities and S/R conflicts as
68 errors (and only those):
69
70 $ bison -Werror=yacc,error=conflicts-sr input.y
71
72 If no categories are specified, -Werror will make all active warnings into
73 errors. For example, the following line does the same the previous example:
74
75 $ bison -Werror -Wnone -Wyacc -Wconflicts-sr input.y
76
77 (By default -Wconflicts-sr,conflicts-rr,deprecated,other is enabled.)
78
79 Note that the categories in this -Werror option may not be prefixed with
80 "no-". However, -Wno-error[=CATEGORY] is valid.
81
82 Note that -y enables -Werror=yacc. Therefore it is now possible to require
83 Yacc-like behavior (e.g., always generate y.tab.c), but to report
84 incompatibilities as warnings: "-y -Wno-error=yacc".
85
86 *** The display of warnings is now richer
87
88 The option that controls a given warning is now displayed:
89
90 foo.y:4.6: warning: type clash on default action: <foo> != <bar> [-Wother]
91
92 In the case of warnings treated as errors, the prefix is changed from
93 "warning: " to "error: ", and the suffix is displayed, in a manner similar
94 to GCC, as [-Werror=CATEGORY].
95
96 For instance, where the previous version of Bison would report (and exit
97 with failure):
98
99 bison: warnings being treated as errors
100 input.y:1.1: warning: stray ',' treated as white space
101
102 it now reports:
103
104 input.y:1.1: error: stray ',' treated as white space [-Werror=other]
105
106 *** Deprecated constructs
107
108 The new 'deprecated' warning category flags obsolete constructs whose
109 support will be discontinued. It is enabled by default. These warnings
110 used to be reported as 'other' warnings.
111
112 *** Useless semantic types
113
114 Bison now warns about useless (uninhabited) semantic types. Since
115 semantic types are not declared to Bison (they are defined in the opaque
116 %union structure), it is %printer/%destructor directives about useless
117 types that trigger the warning:
118
119 %token <type1> term
120 %type <type2> nterm
121 %printer {} <type1> <type3>
122 %destructor {} <type2> <type4>
123 %%
124 nterm: term { $$ = $1; };
125
126 3.28-34: warning: type <type3> is used, but is not associated to any symbol
127 4.28-34: warning: type <type4> is used, but is not associated to any symbol
128
129 *** Undefined but unused symbols
130
131 Bison used to raise an error for undefined symbols that are not used in
132 the grammar. This is now only a warning.
133
134 %printer {} symbol1
135 %destructor {} symbol2
136 %type <type> symbol3
137 %%
138 exp: "a";
139
140 *** Useless destructors or printers
141
142 Bison now warns about useless destructors or printers. In the following
143 example, the printer for <type1>, and the destructor for <type2> are
144 useless: all symbols of <type1> (token1) already have a printer, and all
145 symbols of type <type2> (token2) already have a destructor.
146
147 %token <type1> token1
148 <type2> token2
149 <type3> token3
150 <type4> token4
151 %printer {} token1 <type1> <type3>
152 %destructor {} token2 <type2> <type4>
153
154 *** Conflicts
155
156 The warnings and error messages about shift/reduce and reduce/reduce
157 conflicts have been normalized. For instance on the following foo.y file:
158
159 %glr-parser
160 %%
161 exp: exp '+' exp | '0' | '0';
162
163 compare the previous version of bison:
164
165 $ bison foo.y
166 foo.y: conflicts: 1 shift/reduce, 2 reduce/reduce
167 $ bison -Werror foo.y
168 bison: warnings being treated as errors
169 foo.y: conflicts: 1 shift/reduce, 2 reduce/reduce
170
171 with the new behavior:
172
173 $ bison foo.y
174 foo.y: warning: 1 shift/reduce conflict [-Wconflicts-sr]
175 foo.y: warning: 2 reduce/reduce conflicts [-Wconflicts-rr]
176 $ bison -Werror foo.y
177 foo.y: error: 1 shift/reduce conflict [-Werror=conflicts-sr]
178 foo.y: error: 2 reduce/reduce conflicts [-Werror=conflicts-rr]
179
180 When %expect or %expect-rr is used, such as with bar.y:
181
182 %expect 0
183 %glr-parser
184 %%
185 exp: exp '+' exp | '0' | '0';
186
187 Former behavior:
188
189 $ bison bar.y
190 bar.y: conflicts: 1 shift/reduce, 2 reduce/reduce
191 bar.y: expected 0 shift/reduce conflicts
192 bar.y: expected 0 reduce/reduce conflicts
193
194 New one:
195
196 $ bison bar.y
197 bar.y: error: shift/reduce conflicts: 1 found, 0 expected
198 bar.y: error: reduce/reduce conflicts: 2 found, 0 expected
199
200 ** Additional yylex/yyparse arguments
201
202 The new directive %param declares additional arguments to both yylex and
203 yyparse. The %lex-param, %parse-param, and %param directives support one
204 or more arguments. Instead of
205
206 %lex-param {arg1_type *arg1}
207 %lex-param {arg2_type *arg2}
208 %parse-param {arg1_type *arg1}
209 %parse-param {arg2_type *arg2}
210
211 one may now declare
212
213 %param {arg1_type *arg1} {arg2_type *arg2}
214
215 ** Java skeleton improvements
216
217 Contributed by Paolo Bonzini.
218
219 The constants for token names were moved to the Lexer interface. Also, it
220 is possible to add code to the parser's constructors using "%code init"
221 and "%define init_throws".
222
223 ** C++ skeletons improvements
224
225 *** The parser header is no longer mandatory (lalr1.cc, glr.cc)
226
227 Using %defines is now optional. Without it, the needed support classes
228 are defined in the generated parser, instead of additional files (such as
229 location.hh, position.hh and stack.hh).
230
231 *** Locations are no longer mandatory (lalr1.cc, glr.cc)
232
233 Both lalr1.cc and glr.cc no longer require %location.
234
235 *** syntax_error exception (lalr1.cc)
236
237 The C++ parser features a syntax_error exception, which can be
238 thrown from the scanner or from user rules to raise syntax errors.
239 This facilitates reporting errors caught in sub-functions (e.g.,
240 rejecting too large integral literals from a conversion function
241 used by the scanner, or rejecting invalid combinations from a
242 factory invoked by the user actions).
243
244 ** Renamed %define variables
245
246 The following variables have been renamed for consistency. Backward
247 compatibility is ensured, but upgrading is recommended.
248
249 lr.default-reductions -> lr.default-reduction
250 lr.keep-unreachable-states -> lr.keep-unreachable-state
251 namespace -> api.namespace
252 stype -> api.value.type
253
254 ** Variable api.token.prefix
255
256 The variable api.token.prefix changes the way tokens are identified in
257 the generated files. This is especially useful to avoid collisions
258 with identifiers in the target language. For instance
259
260 %token FILE for ERROR
261 %define api.token.prefix "TOK_"
262 %%
263 start: FILE for ERROR;
264
265 will generate the definition of the symbols TOK_FILE, TOK_for, and
266 TOK_ERROR in the generated sources. In particular, the scanner must
267 use these prefixed token names, although the grammar itself still
268 uses the short names (as in the sample rule given above).
269
270 ** Variable parse.error
271
272 This variable controls the verbosity of error messages. The use of the
273 %error-verbose directive is deprecated in favor of "%define parse.error
274 verbose".
275
276 ** Semantic predicates
277
278 Contributed by Paul Hilfinger.
279
280 The new, experimental, semantic-predicate feature allows actions of the
281 form "%?{ BOOLEAN-EXPRESSION }", which cause syntax errors (as for
282 YYERROR) if the expression evaluates to 0, and are evaluated immediately
283 in GLR parsers, rather than being deferred. The result is that they allow
284 the programmer to prune possible parses based on the values of run-time
285 expressions.
286
287 ** The directive %expect-rr is now an error in non GLR mode
288
289 It used to be an error only if used in non GLR mode, _and_ if there are
290 reduce/reduce conflicts.
291
292 * Noteworthy changes in release 2.7 (2012-12-12) [stable]
293
294 ** Bug fixes
295
296 Warnings about uninitialized yylloc in yyparse have been fixed.
297
298 Restored C90 compliance (yet no report was ever made).
299
300 ** Diagnostics are improved
301
302 *** Changes in the format of error messages
303
304 This used to be the format of many error reports:
305
306 input.y:2.7-12: %type redeclaration for exp
307 input.y:1.7-12: previous declaration
308
309 It is now:
310
311 input.y:2.7-12: error: %type redeclaration for exp
312 input.y:1.7-12: previous declaration
313
314 *** New format for error reports: carets
315
316 Caret errors have been added to Bison:
317
318 input.y:2.7-12: error: %type redeclaration for exp
319 %type <sval> exp
320 ^^^^^^
321 input.y:1.7-12: previous declaration
322 %type <ival> exp
323 ^^^^^^
324
325 or
326
327 input.y:3.20-23: error: ambiguous reference: '$exp'
328 exp: exp '+' exp { $exp = $1 + $3; };
329 ^^^^
330 input.y:3.1-3: refers to: $exp at $$
331 exp: exp '+' exp { $exp = $1 + $3; };
332 ^^^
333 input.y:3.6-8: refers to: $exp at $1
334 exp: exp '+' exp { $exp = $1 + $3; };
335 ^^^
336 input.y:3.14-16: refers to: $exp at $3
337 exp: exp '+' exp { $exp = $1 + $3; };
338 ^^^
339
340 The default behaviour for now is still not to display these unless
341 explictly asked with -fcaret (or -fall). However, in a later release, it
342 will be made the default behavior (but may still be deactivated with
343 -fno-caret).
344
345 ** New value for %define variable: api.pure full
346
347 The %define variable api.pure requests a pure (reentrant) parser. However,
348 for historical reasons, using it in a location-tracking Yacc parser
349 resulted in a yyerror function that did not take a location as a
350 parameter. With this new value, the user may request a better pure parser,
351 where yyerror does take a location as a parameter (in location-tracking
352 parsers).
353
354 The use of "%define api.pure true" is deprecated in favor of this new
355 "%define api.pure full".
356
357 ** New %define variable: api.location.type (glr.cc, lalr1.cc, lalr1.java)
358
359 The %define variable api.location.type defines the name of the type to use
360 for locations. When defined, Bison no longer generates the position.hh
361 and location.hh files, nor does the parser will include them: the user is
362 then responsible to define her type.
363
364 This can be used in programs with several parsers to factor their location
365 and position files: let one of them generate them, and the others just use
366 them.
367
368 This feature was actually introduced, but not documented, in Bison 2.5,
369 under the name "location_type" (which is maintained for backward
370 compatibility).
371
372 For consistency, lalr1.java's %define variables location_type and
373 position_type are deprecated in favor of api.location.type and
374 api.position.type.
375
376 ** Exception safety (lalr1.cc)
377
378 The parse function now catches exceptions, uses the %destructors to
379 release memory (the lookahead symbol and the symbols pushed on the stack)
380 before re-throwing the exception.
381
382 This feature is somewhat experimental. User feedback would be
383 appreciated.
384
385 ** Graph improvements in DOT and XSLT
386
387 The graphical presentation of the states is more readable: their shape is
388 now rectangular, the state number is clearly displayed, and the items are
389 numbered and left-justified.
390
391 The reductions are now explicitly represented as transitions to other
392 diamond shaped nodes.
393
394 These changes are present in both --graph output and xml2dot.xsl XSLT
395 processing, with minor (documented) differences.
396
397 ** %language is no longer an experimental feature.
398
399 The introduction of this feature, in 2.4, was four years ago. The
400 --language option and the %language directive are no longer experimental.
401
402 ** Documentation
403
404 The sections about shift/reduce and reduce/reduce conflicts resolution
405 have been fixed and extended.
406
407 Although introduced more than four years ago, XML and Graphviz reports
408 were not properly documented.
409
410 The translation of mid-rule actions is now described.
411
412 * Noteworthy changes in release 2.6.5 (2012-11-07) [stable]
413
414 We consider compiler warnings about Bison generated parsers to be bugs.
415 Rather than working around them in your own project, please consider
416 reporting them to us.
417
418 ** Bug fixes
419
420 Warnings about uninitialized yylval and/or yylloc for push parsers with a
421 pure interface have been fixed for GCC 4.0 up to 4.8, and Clang 2.9 to
422 3.2.
423
424 Other issues in the test suite have been addressed.
425
426 Nul characters are correctly displayed in error messages.
427
428 When possible, yylloc is correctly initialized before calling yylex. It
429 is no longer necessary to initialize it in the %initial-action.
430
431 * Noteworthy changes in release 2.6.4 (2012-10-23) [stable]
432
433 Bison 2.6.3's --version was incorrect. This release fixes this issue.
434
435 * Noteworthy changes in release 2.6.3 (2012-10-22) [stable]
436
437 ** Bug fixes
438
439 Bugs and portability issues in the test suite have been fixed.
440
441 Some errors in translations have been addressed, and --help now directs
442 users to the appropriate place to report them.
443
444 Stray Info files shipped by accident are removed.
445
446 Incorrect definitions of YY_, issued by yacc.c when no parser header is
447 generated, are removed.
448
449 All the generated headers are self-contained.
450
451 ** Header guards (yacc.c, glr.c, glr.cc)
452
453 In order to avoid collisions, the header guards are now
454 YY_<PREFIX>_<FILE>_INCLUDED, instead of merely <PREFIX>_<FILE>.
455 For instance the header generated from
456
457 %define api.prefix "calc"
458 %defines "lib/parse.h"
459
460 will use YY_CALC_LIB_PARSE_H_INCLUDED as guard.
461
462 ** Fix compiler warnings in the generated parser (yacc.c, glr.c)
463
464 The compilation of pure parsers (%define api.pure) can trigger GCC
465 warnings such as:
466
467 input.c: In function 'yyparse':
468 input.c:1503:12: warning: 'yylval' may be used uninitialized in this
469 function [-Wmaybe-uninitialized]
470 *++yyvsp = yylval;
471 ^
472
473 This is now fixed; pragmas to avoid these warnings are no longer needed.
474
475 Warnings from clang ("equality comparison with extraneous parentheses" and
476 "function declared 'noreturn' should not return") have also been
477 addressed.
478
479 * Noteworthy changes in release 2.6.2 (2012-08-03) [stable]
480
481 ** Bug fixes
482
483 Buffer overruns, complaints from Flex, and portability issues in the test
484 suite have been fixed.
485
486 ** Spaces in %lex- and %parse-param (lalr1.cc, glr.cc)
487
488 Trailing end-of-lines in %parse-param or %lex-param would result in
489 invalid C++. This is fixed.
490
491 ** Spurious spaces and end-of-lines
492
493 The generated files no longer end (nor start) with empty lines.
494
495 * Noteworthy changes in release 2.6.1 (2012-07-30) [stable]
496
497 Bison no longer executes user-specified M4 code when processing a grammar.
498
499 ** Future Changes
500
501 In addition to the removal of the features announced in Bison 2.6, the
502 next major release will remove the "Temporary hack for adding a semicolon
503 to the user action", as announced in the release 2.5. Instead of:
504
505 exp: exp "+" exp { $$ = $1 + $3 };
506
507 write:
508
509 exp: exp "+" exp { $$ = $1 + $3; };
510
511 ** Bug fixes
512
513 *** Type names are now properly escaped.
514
515 *** glr.cc: set_debug_level and debug_level work as expected.
516
517 *** Stray @ or $ in actions
518
519 While Bison used to warn about stray $ or @ in action rules, it did not
520 for other actions such as printers, destructors, or initial actions. It
521 now does.
522
523 ** Type names in actions
524
525 For consistency with rule actions, it is now possible to qualify $$ by a
526 type-name in destructors, printers, and initial actions. For instance:
527
528 %printer { fprintf (yyo, "(%d, %f)", $<ival>$, $<fval>$); } <*> <>;
529
530 will display two values for each typed and untyped symbol (provided
531 that YYSTYPE has both "ival" and "fval" fields).
532
533 * Noteworthy changes in release 2.6 (2012-07-19) [stable]
534
535 ** Future changes
536
537 The next major release of Bison will drop support for the following
538 deprecated features. Please report disagreements to bug-bison@gnu.org.
539
540 *** K&R C parsers
541
542 Support for generating parsers in K&R C will be removed. Parsers
543 generated for C support ISO C90, and are tested with ISO C99 and ISO C11
544 compilers.
545
546 *** Features deprecated since Bison 1.875
547
548 The definitions of yystype and yyltype will be removed; use YYSTYPE and
549 YYLTYPE.
550
551 YYPARSE_PARAM and YYLEX_PARAM, deprecated in favor of %parse-param and
552 %lex-param, will no longer be supported.
553
554 Support for the preprocessor symbol YYERROR_VERBOSE will be removed, use
555 %error-verbose.
556
557 *** The generated header will be included (yacc.c)
558
559 Instead of duplicating the content of the generated header (definition of
560 YYSTYPE, yyparse declaration etc.), the generated parser will include it,
561 as is already the case for GLR or C++ parsers. This change is deferred
562 because existing versions of ylwrap (e.g., Automake 1.12.1) do not support
563 it.
564
565 ** Generated Parser Headers
566
567 *** Guards (yacc.c, glr.c, glr.cc)
568
569 The generated headers are now guarded, as is already the case for C++
570 parsers (lalr1.cc). For instance, with --defines=foo.h:
571
572 #ifndef YY_FOO_H
573 # define YY_FOO_H
574 ...
575 #endif /* !YY_FOO_H */
576
577 *** New declarations (yacc.c, glr.c)
578
579 The generated header now declares yydebug and yyparse. Both honor
580 --name-prefix=bar_, and yield
581
582 int bar_parse (void);
583
584 rather than
585
586 #define yyparse bar_parse
587 int yyparse (void);
588
589 in order to facilitate the inclusion of several parser headers inside a
590 single compilation unit.
591
592 *** Exported symbols in C++
593
594 The symbols YYTOKEN_TABLE and YYERROR_VERBOSE, which were defined in the
595 header, are removed, as they prevent the possibility of including several
596 generated headers from a single compilation unit.
597
598 *** YYLSP_NEEDED
599
600 For the same reasons, the undocumented and unused macro YYLSP_NEEDED is no
601 longer defined.
602
603 ** New %define variable: api.prefix
604
605 Now that the generated headers are more complete and properly protected
606 against multiple inclusions, constant names, such as YYSTYPE are a
607 problem. While yyparse and others are properly renamed by %name-prefix,
608 YYSTYPE, YYDEBUG and others have never been affected by it. Because it
609 would introduce backward compatibility issues in projects not expecting
610 YYSTYPE to be renamed, instead of changing the behavior of %name-prefix,
611 it is deprecated in favor of a new %define variable: api.prefix.
612
613 The following examples compares both:
614
615 %name-prefix "bar_" | %define api.prefix "bar_"
616 %token <ival> FOO %token <ival> FOO
617 %union { int ival; } %union { int ival; }
618 %% %%
619 exp: 'a'; exp: 'a';
620
621 bison generates:
622
623 #ifndef BAR_FOO_H #ifndef BAR_FOO_H
624 # define BAR_FOO_H # define BAR_FOO_H
625
626 /* Enabling traces. */ /* Enabling traces. */
627 # ifndef YYDEBUG | # ifndef BAR_DEBUG
628 > # if defined YYDEBUG
629 > # if YYDEBUG
630 > # define BAR_DEBUG 1
631 > # else
632 > # define BAR_DEBUG 0
633 > # endif
634 > # else
635 # define YYDEBUG 0 | # define BAR_DEBUG 0
636 > # endif
637 # endif | # endif
638
639 # if YYDEBUG | # if BAR_DEBUG
640 extern int bar_debug; extern int bar_debug;
641 # endif # endif
642
643 /* Tokens. */ /* Tokens. */
644 # ifndef YYTOKENTYPE | # ifndef BAR_TOKENTYPE
645 # define YYTOKENTYPE | # define BAR_TOKENTYPE
646 enum yytokentype { | enum bar_tokentype {
647 FOO = 258 FOO = 258
648 }; };
649 # endif # endif
650
651 #if ! defined YYSTYPE \ | #if ! defined BAR_STYPE \
652 && ! defined YYSTYPE_IS_DECLARED | && ! defined BAR_STYPE_IS_DECLARED
653 typedef union YYSTYPE | typedef union BAR_STYPE
654 { {
655 int ival; int ival;
656 } YYSTYPE; | } BAR_STYPE;
657 # define YYSTYPE_IS_DECLARED 1 | # define BAR_STYPE_IS_DECLARED 1
658 #endif #endif
659
660 extern YYSTYPE bar_lval; | extern BAR_STYPE bar_lval;
661
662 int bar_parse (void); int bar_parse (void);
663
664 #endif /* !BAR_FOO_H */ #endif /* !BAR_FOO_H */
665
666 * Noteworthy changes in release 2.5.1 (2012-06-05) [stable]
667
668 ** Future changes:
669
670 The next major release will drop support for generating parsers in K&R C.
671
672 ** yacc.c: YYBACKUP works as expected.
673
674 ** glr.c improvements:
675
676 *** Location support is eliminated when not requested:
677
678 GLR parsers used to include location-related code even when locations were
679 not requested, and therefore not even usable.
680
681 *** __attribute__ is preserved:
682
683 __attribute__ is no longer disabled when __STRICT_ANSI__ is defined (i.e.,
684 when -std is passed to GCC).
685
686 ** lalr1.java: several fixes:
687
688 The Java parser no longer throws ArrayIndexOutOfBoundsException if the
689 first token leads to a syntax error. Some minor clean ups.
690
691 ** Changes for C++:
692
693 *** C++11 compatibility:
694
695 C and C++ parsers use "nullptr" instead of "0" when __cplusplus is 201103L
696 or higher.
697
698 *** Header guards
699
700 The header files such as "parser.hh", "location.hh", etc. used a constant
701 name for preprocessor guards, for instance:
702
703 #ifndef BISON_LOCATION_HH
704 # define BISON_LOCATION_HH
705 ...
706 #endif // !BISON_LOCATION_HH
707
708 The inclusion guard is now computed from "PREFIX/FILE-NAME", where lower
709 case characters are converted to upper case, and series of
710 non-alphanumerical characters are converted to an underscore.
711
712 With "bison -o lang++/parser.cc", "location.hh" would now include:
713
714 #ifndef YY_LANG_LOCATION_HH
715 # define YY_LANG_LOCATION_HH
716 ...
717 #endif // !YY_LANG_LOCATION_HH
718
719 *** C++ locations:
720
721 The position and location constructors (and their initialize methods)
722 accept new arguments for line and column. Several issues in the
723 documentation were fixed.
724
725 ** liby is no longer asking for "rpl_fprintf" on some platforms.
726
727 ** Changes in the manual:
728
729 *** %printer is documented
730
731 The "%printer" directive, supported since at least Bison 1.50, is finally
732 documented. The "mfcalc" example is extended to demonstrate it.
733
734 For consistency with the C skeletons, the C++ parsers now also support
735 "yyoutput" (as an alias to "debug_stream ()").
736
737 *** Several improvements have been made:
738
739 The layout for grammar excerpts was changed to a more compact scheme.
740 Named references are motivated. The description of the automaton
741 description file (*.output) is updated to the current format. Incorrect
742 index entries were fixed. Some other errors were fixed.
743
744 ** Building bison:
745
746 *** Conflicting prototypes with recent/modified Flex.
747
748 Fixed build problems with the current, unreleased, version of Flex, and
749 some modified versions of 2.5.35, which have modified function prototypes.
750
751 *** Warnings during the build procedure have been eliminated.
752
753 *** Several portability problems in the test suite have been fixed:
754
755 This includes warnings with some compilers, unexpected behavior of tools
756 such as diff, warning messages from the test suite itself, etc.
757
758 *** The install-pdf target works properly:
759
760 Running "make install-pdf" (or -dvi, -html, -info, and -ps) no longer
761 halts in the middle of its course.
762
763 * Changes in version 2.5 (2011-05-14):
764
765 ** Grammar symbol names can now contain non-initial dashes:
766
767 Consistently with directives (such as %error-verbose) and with
768 %define variables (e.g. push-pull), grammar symbol names may contain
769 dashes in any position except the beginning. This is a GNU
770 extension over POSIX Yacc. Thus, use of this extension is reported
771 by -Wyacc and rejected in Yacc mode (--yacc).
772
773 ** Named references:
774
775 Historically, Yacc and Bison have supported positional references
776 ($n, $$) to allow access to symbol values from inside of semantic
777 actions code.
778
779 Starting from this version, Bison can also accept named references.
780 When no ambiguity is possible, original symbol names may be used
781 as named references:
782
783 if_stmt : "if" cond_expr "then" then_stmt ';'
784 { $if_stmt = mk_if_stmt($cond_expr, $then_stmt); }
785
786 In the more common case, explicit names may be declared:
787
788 stmt[res] : "if" expr[cond] "then" stmt[then] "else" stmt[else] ';'
789 { $res = mk_if_stmt($cond, $then, $else); }
790
791 Location information is also accessible using @name syntax. When
792 accessing symbol names containing dots or dashes, explicit bracketing
793 ($[sym.1]) must be used.
794
795 These features are experimental in this version. More user feedback
796 will help to stabilize them.
797 Contributed by Alex Rozenman.
798
799 ** IELR(1) and canonical LR(1):
800
801 IELR(1) is a minimal LR(1) parser table generation algorithm. That
802 is, given any context-free grammar, IELR(1) generates parser tables
803 with the full language-recognition power of canonical LR(1) but with
804 nearly the same number of parser states as LALR(1). This reduction
805 in parser states is often an order of magnitude. More importantly,
806 because canonical LR(1)'s extra parser states may contain duplicate
807 conflicts in the case of non-LR(1) grammars, the number of conflicts
808 for IELR(1) is often an order of magnitude less as well. This can
809 significantly reduce the complexity of developing of a grammar.
810
811 Bison can now generate IELR(1) and canonical LR(1) parser tables in
812 place of its traditional LALR(1) parser tables, which remain the
813 default. You can specify the type of parser tables in the grammar
814 file with these directives:
815
816 %define lr.type lalr
817 %define lr.type ielr
818 %define lr.type canonical-lr
819
820 The default-reduction optimization in the parser tables can also be
821 adjusted using "%define lr.default-reductions". For details on both
822 of these features, see the new section "Tuning LR" in the Bison
823 manual.
824
825 These features are experimental. More user feedback will help to
826 stabilize them.
827
828 ** LAC (Lookahead Correction) for syntax error handling:
829
830 Canonical LR, IELR, and LALR can suffer from a couple of problems
831 upon encountering a syntax error. First, the parser might perform
832 additional parser stack reductions before discovering the syntax
833 error. Such reductions can perform user semantic actions that are
834 unexpected because they are based on an invalid token, and they
835 cause error recovery to begin in a different syntactic context than
836 the one in which the invalid token was encountered. Second, when
837 verbose error messages are enabled (with %error-verbose or the
838 obsolete "#define YYERROR_VERBOSE"), the expected token list in the
839 syntax error message can both contain invalid tokens and omit valid
840 tokens.
841
842 The culprits for the above problems are %nonassoc, default
843 reductions in inconsistent states, and parser state merging. Thus,
844 IELR and LALR suffer the most. Canonical LR can suffer only if
845 %nonassoc is used or if default reductions are enabled for
846 inconsistent states.
847
848 LAC is a new mechanism within the parsing algorithm that solves
849 these problems for canonical LR, IELR, and LALR without sacrificing
850 %nonassoc, default reductions, or state merging. When LAC is in
851 use, canonical LR and IELR behave almost exactly the same for both
852 syntactically acceptable and syntactically unacceptable input.
853 While LALR still does not support the full language-recognition
854 power of canonical LR and IELR, LAC at least enables LALR's syntax
855 error handling to correctly reflect LALR's language-recognition
856 power.
857
858 Currently, LAC is only supported for deterministic parsers in C.
859 You can enable LAC with the following directive:
860
861 %define parse.lac full
862
863 See the new section "LAC" in the Bison manual for additional
864 details including a few caveats.
865
866 LAC is an experimental feature. More user feedback will help to
867 stabilize it.
868
869 ** %define improvements:
870
871 *** Can now be invoked via the command line:
872
873 Each of these command-line options
874
875 -D NAME[=VALUE]
876 --define=NAME[=VALUE]
877
878 -F NAME[=VALUE]
879 --force-define=NAME[=VALUE]
880
881 is equivalent to this grammar file declaration
882
883 %define NAME ["VALUE"]
884
885 except that the manner in which Bison processes multiple definitions
886 for the same NAME differs. Most importantly, -F and --force-define
887 quietly override %define, but -D and --define do not. For further
888 details, see the section "Bison Options" in the Bison manual.
889
890 *** Variables renamed:
891
892 The following %define variables
893
894 api.push_pull
895 lr.keep_unreachable_states
896
897 have been renamed to
898
899 api.push-pull
900 lr.keep-unreachable-states
901
902 The old names are now deprecated but will be maintained indefinitely
903 for backward compatibility.
904
905 *** Values no longer need to be quoted in the grammar file:
906
907 If a %define value is an identifier, it no longer needs to be placed
908 within quotations marks. For example,
909
910 %define api.push-pull "push"
911
912 can be rewritten as
913
914 %define api.push-pull push
915
916 *** Unrecognized variables are now errors not warnings.
917
918 *** Multiple invocations for any variable is now an error not a warning.
919
920 ** Unrecognized %code qualifiers are now errors not warnings.
921
922 ** Character literals not of length one:
923
924 Previously, Bison quietly converted all character literals to length
925 one. For example, without warning, Bison interpreted the operators in
926 the following grammar to be the same token:
927
928 exp: exp '++'
929 | exp '+' exp
930 ;
931
932 Bison now warns when a character literal is not of length one. In
933 some future release, Bison will start reporting an error instead.
934
935 ** Destructor calls fixed for lookaheads altered in semantic actions:
936
937 Previously for deterministic parsers in C, if a user semantic action
938 altered yychar, the parser in some cases used the old yychar value to
939 determine which destructor to call for the lookahead upon a syntax
940 error or upon parser return. This bug has been fixed.
941
942 ** C++ parsers use YYRHSLOC:
943
944 Similarly to the C parsers, the C++ parsers now define the YYRHSLOC
945 macro and use it in the default YYLLOC_DEFAULT. You are encouraged
946 to use it. If, for instance, your location structure has "first"
947 and "last" members, instead of
948
949 # define YYLLOC_DEFAULT(Current, Rhs, N) \
950 do \
951 if (N) \
952 { \
953 (Current).first = (Rhs)[1].location.first; \
954 (Current).last = (Rhs)[N].location.last; \
955 } \
956 else \
957 { \
958 (Current).first = (Current).last = (Rhs)[0].location.last; \
959 } \
960 while (false)
961
962 use:
963
964 # define YYLLOC_DEFAULT(Current, Rhs, N) \
965 do \
966 if (N) \
967 { \
968 (Current).first = YYRHSLOC (Rhs, 1).first; \
969 (Current).last = YYRHSLOC (Rhs, N).last; \
970 } \
971 else \
972 { \
973 (Current).first = (Current).last = YYRHSLOC (Rhs, 0).last; \
974 } \
975 while (false)
976
977 ** YYLLOC_DEFAULT in C++:
978
979 The default implementation of YYLLOC_DEFAULT used to be issued in
980 the header file. It is now output in the implementation file, after
981 the user %code sections so that its #ifndef guard does not try to
982 override the user's YYLLOC_DEFAULT if provided.
983
984 ** YYFAIL now produces warnings and Java parsers no longer implement it:
985
986 YYFAIL has existed for many years as an undocumented feature of
987 deterministic parsers in C generated by Bison. More recently, it was
988 a documented feature of Bison's experimental Java parsers. As
989 promised in Bison 2.4.2's NEWS entry, any appearance of YYFAIL in a
990 semantic action now produces a deprecation warning, and Java parsers
991 no longer implement YYFAIL at all. For further details, including a
992 discussion of how to suppress C preprocessor warnings about YYFAIL
993 being unused, see the Bison 2.4.2 NEWS entry.
994
995 ** Temporary hack for adding a semicolon to the user action:
996
997 Previously, Bison appended a semicolon to every user action for
998 reductions when the output language defaulted to C (specifically, when
999 neither %yacc, %language, %skeleton, or equivalent command-line
1000 options were specified). This allowed actions such as
1001
1002 exp: exp "+" exp { $$ = $1 + $3 };
1003
1004 instead of
1005
1006 exp: exp "+" exp { $$ = $1 + $3; };
1007
1008 As a first step in removing this misfeature, Bison now issues a
1009 warning when it appends a semicolon. Moreover, in cases where Bison
1010 cannot easily determine whether a semicolon is needed (for example, an
1011 action ending with a cpp directive or a braced compound initializer),
1012 it no longer appends one. Thus, the C compiler might now complain
1013 about a missing semicolon where it did not before. Future releases of
1014 Bison will cease to append semicolons entirely.
1015
1016 ** Verbose syntax error message fixes:
1017
1018 When %error-verbose or the obsolete "#define YYERROR_VERBOSE" is
1019 specified, syntax error messages produced by the generated parser
1020 include the unexpected token as well as a list of expected tokens.
1021 The effect of %nonassoc on these verbose messages has been corrected
1022 in two ways, but a more complete fix requires LAC, described above:
1023
1024 *** When %nonassoc is used, there can exist parser states that accept no
1025 tokens, and so the parser does not always require a lookahead token
1026 in order to detect a syntax error. Because no unexpected token or
1027 expected tokens can then be reported, the verbose syntax error
1028 message described above is suppressed, and the parser instead
1029 reports the simpler message, "syntax error". Previously, this
1030 suppression was sometimes erroneously triggered by %nonassoc when a
1031 lookahead was actually required. Now verbose messages are
1032 suppressed only when all previous lookaheads have already been
1033 shifted or discarded.
1034
1035 *** Previously, the list of expected tokens erroneously included tokens
1036 that would actually induce a syntax error because conflicts for them
1037 were resolved with %nonassoc in the current parser state. Such
1038 tokens are now properly omitted from the list.
1039
1040 *** Expected token lists are still often wrong due to state merging
1041 (from LALR or IELR) and default reductions, which can both add
1042 invalid tokens and subtract valid tokens. Canonical LR almost
1043 completely fixes this problem by eliminating state merging and
1044 default reductions. However, there is one minor problem left even
1045 when using canonical LR and even after the fixes above. That is,
1046 if the resolution of a conflict with %nonassoc appears in a later
1047 parser state than the one at which some syntax error is
1048 discovered, the conflicted token is still erroneously included in
1049 the expected token list. Bison's new LAC implementation,
1050 described above, eliminates this problem and the need for
1051 canonical LR. However, LAC is still experimental and is disabled
1052 by default.
1053
1054 ** Java skeleton fixes:
1055
1056 *** A location handling bug has been fixed.
1057
1058 *** The top element of each of the value stack and location stack is now
1059 cleared when popped so that it can be garbage collected.
1060
1061 *** Parser traces now print the top element of the stack.
1062
1063 ** -W/--warnings fixes:
1064
1065 *** Bison now properly recognizes the "no-" versions of categories:
1066
1067 For example, given the following command line, Bison now enables all
1068 warnings except warnings for incompatibilities with POSIX Yacc:
1069
1070 bison -Wall,no-yacc gram.y
1071
1072 *** Bison now treats S/R and R/R conflicts like other warnings:
1073
1074 Previously, conflict reports were independent of Bison's normal
1075 warning system. Now, Bison recognizes the warning categories
1076 "conflicts-sr" and "conflicts-rr". This change has important
1077 consequences for the -W and --warnings command-line options. For
1078 example:
1079
1080 bison -Wno-conflicts-sr gram.y # S/R conflicts not reported
1081 bison -Wno-conflicts-rr gram.y # R/R conflicts not reported
1082 bison -Wnone gram.y # no conflicts are reported
1083 bison -Werror gram.y # any conflict is an error
1084
1085 However, as before, if the %expect or %expect-rr directive is
1086 specified, an unexpected number of conflicts is an error, and an
1087 expected number of conflicts is not reported, so -W and --warning
1088 then have no effect on the conflict report.
1089
1090 *** The "none" category no longer disables a preceding "error":
1091
1092 For example, for the following command line, Bison now reports
1093 errors instead of warnings for incompatibilities with POSIX Yacc:
1094
1095 bison -Werror,none,yacc gram.y
1096
1097 *** The "none" category now disables all Bison warnings:
1098
1099 Previously, the "none" category disabled only Bison warnings for
1100 which there existed a specific -W/--warning category. However,
1101 given the following command line, Bison is now guaranteed to
1102 suppress all warnings:
1103
1104 bison -Wnone gram.y
1105
1106 ** Precedence directives can now assign token number 0:
1107
1108 Since Bison 2.3b, which restored the ability of precedence
1109 directives to assign token numbers, doing so for token number 0 has
1110 produced an assertion failure. For example:
1111
1112 %left END 0
1113
1114 This bug has been fixed.
1115
1116 * Changes in version 2.4.3 (2010-08-05):
1117
1118 ** Bison now obeys -Werror and --warnings=error for warnings about
1119 grammar rules that are useless in the parser due to conflicts.
1120
1121 ** Problems with spawning M4 on at least FreeBSD 8 and FreeBSD 9 have
1122 been fixed.
1123
1124 ** Failures in the test suite for GCC 4.5 have been fixed.
1125
1126 ** Failures in the test suite for some versions of Sun Studio C++ have
1127 been fixed.
1128
1129 ** Contrary to Bison 2.4.2's NEWS entry, it has been decided that
1130 warnings about undefined %prec identifiers will not be converted to
1131 errors in Bison 2.5. They will remain warnings, which should be
1132 sufficient for POSIX while avoiding backward compatibility issues.
1133
1134 ** Minor documentation fixes.
1135
1136 * Changes in version 2.4.2 (2010-03-20):
1137
1138 ** Some portability problems that resulted in failures and livelocks
1139 in the test suite on some versions of at least Solaris, AIX, HP-UX,
1140 RHEL4, and Tru64 have been addressed. As a result, fatal Bison
1141 errors should no longer cause M4 to report a broken pipe on the
1142 affected platforms.
1143
1144 ** "%prec IDENTIFIER" requires IDENTIFIER to be defined separately.
1145
1146 POSIX specifies that an error be reported for any identifier that does
1147 not appear on the LHS of a grammar rule and that is not defined by
1148 %token, %left, %right, or %nonassoc. Bison 2.3b and later lost this
1149 error report for the case when an identifier appears only after a
1150 %prec directive. It is now restored. However, for backward
1151 compatibility with recent Bison releases, it is only a warning for
1152 now. In Bison 2.5 and later, it will return to being an error.
1153 [Between the 2.4.2 and 2.4.3 releases, it was decided that this
1154 warning will not be converted to an error in Bison 2.5.]
1155
1156 ** Detection of GNU M4 1.4.6 or newer during configure is improved.
1157
1158 ** Warnings from gcc's -Wundef option about undefined YYENABLE_NLS,
1159 YYLTYPE_IS_TRIVIAL, and __STRICT_ANSI__ in C/C++ parsers are now
1160 avoided.
1161
1162 ** %code is now a permanent feature.
1163
1164 A traditional Yacc prologue directive is written in the form:
1165
1166 %{CODE%}
1167
1168 To provide a more flexible alternative, Bison 2.3b introduced the
1169 %code directive with the following forms for C/C++:
1170
1171 %code {CODE}
1172 %code requires {CODE}
1173 %code provides {CODE}
1174 %code top {CODE}
1175
1176 These forms are now considered permanent features of Bison. See the
1177 %code entries in the section "Bison Declaration Summary" in the Bison
1178 manual for a summary of their functionality. See the section
1179 "Prologue Alternatives" for a detailed discussion including the
1180 advantages of %code over the traditional Yacc prologue directive.
1181
1182 Bison's Java feature as a whole including its current usage of %code
1183 is still considered experimental.
1184
1185 ** YYFAIL is deprecated and will eventually be removed.
1186
1187 YYFAIL has existed for many years as an undocumented feature of
1188 deterministic parsers in C generated by Bison. Previously, it was
1189 documented for Bison's experimental Java parsers. YYFAIL is no longer
1190 documented for Java parsers and is formally deprecated in both cases.
1191 Users are strongly encouraged to migrate to YYERROR, which is
1192 specified by POSIX.
1193
1194 Like YYERROR, you can invoke YYFAIL from a semantic action in order to
1195 induce a syntax error. The most obvious difference from YYERROR is
1196 that YYFAIL will automatically invoke yyerror to report the syntax
1197 error so that you don't have to. However, there are several other
1198 subtle differences between YYERROR and YYFAIL, and YYFAIL suffers from
1199 inherent flaws when %error-verbose or "#define YYERROR_VERBOSE" is
1200 used. For a more detailed discussion, see:
1201
1202 http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/bison-patches/2009-12/msg00024.html
1203
1204 The upcoming Bison 2.5 will remove YYFAIL from Java parsers, but
1205 deterministic parsers in C will continue to implement it. However,
1206 because YYFAIL is already flawed, it seems futile to try to make new
1207 Bison features compatible with it. Thus, during parser generation,
1208 Bison 2.5 will produce a warning whenever it discovers YYFAIL in a
1209 rule action. In a later release, YYFAIL will be disabled for
1210 %error-verbose and "#define YYERROR_VERBOSE". Eventually, YYFAIL will
1211 be removed altogether.
1212
1213 There exists at least one case where Bison 2.5's YYFAIL warning will
1214 be a false positive. Some projects add phony uses of YYFAIL and other
1215 Bison-defined macros for the sole purpose of suppressing C
1216 preprocessor warnings (from GCC cpp's -Wunused-macros, for example).
1217 To avoid Bison's future warning, such YYFAIL uses can be moved to the
1218 epilogue (that is, after the second "%%") in the Bison input file. In
1219 this release (2.4.2), Bison already generates its own code to suppress
1220 C preprocessor warnings for YYFAIL, so projects can remove their own
1221 phony uses of YYFAIL if compatibility with Bison releases prior to
1222 2.4.2 is not necessary.
1223
1224 ** Internationalization.
1225
1226 Fix a regression introduced in Bison 2.4: Under some circumstances,
1227 message translations were not installed although supported by the
1228 host system.
1229
1230 * Changes in version 2.4.1 (2008-12-11):
1231
1232 ** In the GLR defines file, unexpanded M4 macros in the yylval and yylloc
1233 declarations have been fixed.
1234
1235 ** Temporary hack for adding a semicolon to the user action.
1236
1237 Bison used to prepend a trailing semicolon at the end of the user
1238 action for reductions. This allowed actions such as
1239
1240 exp: exp "+" exp { $$ = $1 + $3 };
1241
1242 instead of
1243
1244 exp: exp "+" exp { $$ = $1 + $3; };
1245
1246 Some grammars still depend on this "feature". Bison 2.4.1 restores
1247 the previous behavior in the case of C output (specifically, when
1248 neither %language or %skeleton or equivalent command-line options
1249 are used) to leave more time for grammars depending on the old
1250 behavior to be adjusted. Future releases of Bison will disable this
1251 feature.
1252
1253 ** A few minor improvements to the Bison manual.
1254
1255 * Changes in version 2.4 (2008-11-02):
1256
1257 ** %language is an experimental feature.
1258
1259 We first introduced this feature in test release 2.3b as a cleaner
1260 alternative to %skeleton. Since then, we have discussed the possibility of
1261 modifying its effect on Bison's output file names. Thus, in this release,
1262 we consider %language to be an experimental feature that will likely evolve
1263 in future releases.
1264
1265 ** Forward compatibility with GNU M4 has been improved.
1266
1267 ** Several bugs in the C++ skeleton and the experimental Java skeleton have been
1268 fixed.
1269
1270 * Changes in version 2.3b (2008-05-27):
1271
1272 ** The quotes around NAME that used to be required in the following directive
1273 are now deprecated:
1274
1275 %define NAME "VALUE"
1276
1277 ** The directive "%pure-parser" is now deprecated in favor of:
1278
1279 %define api.pure
1280
1281 which has the same effect except that Bison is more careful to warn about
1282 unreasonable usage in the latter case.
1283
1284 ** Push Parsing
1285
1286 Bison can now generate an LALR(1) parser in C with a push interface. That
1287 is, instead of invoking "yyparse", which pulls tokens from "yylex", you can
1288 push one token at a time to the parser using "yypush_parse", which will
1289 return to the caller after processing each token. By default, the push
1290 interface is disabled. Either of the following directives will enable it:
1291
1292 %define api.push_pull "push" // Just push; does not require yylex.
1293 %define api.push_pull "both" // Push and pull; requires yylex.
1294
1295 See the new section "A Push Parser" in the Bison manual for details.
1296
1297 The current push parsing interface is experimental and may evolve. More user
1298 feedback will help to stabilize it.
1299
1300 ** The -g and --graph options now output graphs in Graphviz DOT format,
1301 not VCG format. Like --graph, -g now also takes an optional FILE argument
1302 and thus cannot be bundled with other short options.
1303
1304 ** Java
1305
1306 Bison can now generate an LALR(1) parser in Java. The skeleton is
1307 "data/lalr1.java". Consider using the new %language directive instead of
1308 %skeleton to select it.
1309
1310 See the new section "Java Parsers" in the Bison manual for details.
1311
1312 The current Java interface is experimental and may evolve. More user
1313 feedback will help to stabilize it.
1314 Contributed by Paolo Bonzini.
1315
1316 ** %language
1317
1318 This new directive specifies the programming language of the generated
1319 parser, which can be C (the default), C++, or Java. Besides the skeleton
1320 that Bison uses, the directive affects the names of the generated files if
1321 the grammar file's name ends in ".y".
1322
1323 ** XML Automaton Report
1324
1325 Bison can now generate an XML report of the LALR(1) automaton using the new
1326 "--xml" option. The current XML schema is experimental and may evolve. More
1327 user feedback will help to stabilize it.
1328 Contributed by Wojciech Polak.
1329
1330 ** The grammar file may now specify the name of the parser header file using
1331 %defines. For example:
1332
1333 %defines "parser.h"
1334
1335 ** When reporting useless rules, useless nonterminals, and unused terminals,
1336 Bison now employs the terms "useless in grammar" instead of "useless",
1337 "useless in parser" instead of "never reduced", and "unused in grammar"
1338 instead of "unused".
1339
1340 ** Unreachable State Removal
1341
1342 Previously, Bison sometimes generated parser tables containing unreachable
1343 states. A state can become unreachable during conflict resolution if Bison
1344 disables a shift action leading to it from a predecessor state. Bison now:
1345
1346 1. Removes unreachable states.
1347
1348 2. Does not report any conflicts that appeared in unreachable states.
1349 WARNING: As a result, you may need to update %expect and %expect-rr
1350 directives in existing grammar files.
1351
1352 3. For any rule used only in such states, Bison now reports the rule as
1353 "useless in parser due to conflicts".
1354
1355 This feature can be disabled with the following directive:
1356
1357 %define lr.keep_unreachable_states
1358
1359 See the %define entry in the "Bison Declaration Summary" in the Bison manual
1360 for further discussion.
1361
1362 ** Lookahead Set Correction in the ".output" Report
1363
1364 When instructed to generate a ".output" file including lookahead sets
1365 (using "--report=lookahead", for example), Bison now prints each reduction's
1366 lookahead set only next to the associated state's one item that (1) is
1367 associated with the same rule as the reduction and (2) has its dot at the end
1368 of its RHS. Previously, Bison also erroneously printed the lookahead set
1369 next to all of the state's other items associated with the same rule. This
1370 bug affected only the ".output" file and not the generated parser source
1371 code.
1372
1373 ** --report-file=FILE is a new option to override the default ".output" file
1374 name.
1375
1376 ** The "=" that used to be required in the following directives is now
1377 deprecated:
1378
1379 %file-prefix "parser"
1380 %name-prefix "c_"
1381 %output "parser.c"
1382
1383 ** An Alternative to "%{...%}" -- "%code QUALIFIER {CODE}"
1384
1385 Bison 2.3a provided a new set of directives as a more flexible alternative to
1386 the traditional Yacc prologue blocks. Those have now been consolidated into
1387 a single %code directive with an optional qualifier field, which identifies
1388 the purpose of the code and thus the location(s) where Bison should generate
1389 it:
1390
1391 1. "%code {CODE}" replaces "%after-header {CODE}"
1392 2. "%code requires {CODE}" replaces "%start-header {CODE}"
1393 3. "%code provides {CODE}" replaces "%end-header {CODE}"
1394 4. "%code top {CODE}" replaces "%before-header {CODE}"
1395
1396 See the %code entries in section "Bison Declaration Summary" in the Bison
1397 manual for a summary of the new functionality. See the new section "Prologue
1398 Alternatives" for a detailed discussion including the advantages of %code
1399 over the traditional Yacc prologues.
1400
1401 The prologue alternatives are experimental. More user feedback will help to
1402 determine whether they should become permanent features.
1403
1404 ** Revised warning: unset or unused mid-rule values
1405
1406 Since Bison 2.2, Bison has warned about mid-rule values that are set but not
1407 used within any of the actions of the parent rule. For example, Bison warns
1408 about unused $2 in:
1409
1410 exp: '1' { $$ = 1; } '+' exp { $$ = $1 + $4; };
1411
1412 Now, Bison also warns about mid-rule values that are used but not set. For
1413 example, Bison warns about unset $$ in the mid-rule action in:
1414
1415 exp: '1' { $1 = 1; } '+' exp { $$ = $2 + $4; };
1416
1417 However, Bison now disables both of these warnings by default since they
1418 sometimes prove to be false alarms in existing grammars employing the Yacc
1419 constructs $0 or $-N (where N is some positive integer).
1420
1421 To enable these warnings, specify the option "--warnings=midrule-values" or
1422 "-W", which is a synonym for "--warnings=all".
1423
1424 ** Default %destructor or %printer with "<*>" or "<>"
1425
1426 Bison now recognizes two separate kinds of default %destructor's and
1427 %printer's:
1428
1429 1. Place "<*>" in a %destructor/%printer symbol list to define a default
1430 %destructor/%printer for all grammar symbols for which you have formally
1431 declared semantic type tags.
1432
1433 2. Place "<>" in a %destructor/%printer symbol list to define a default
1434 %destructor/%printer for all grammar symbols without declared semantic
1435 type tags.
1436
1437 Bison no longer supports the "%symbol-default" notation from Bison 2.3a.
1438 "<*>" and "<>" combined achieve the same effect with one exception: Bison no
1439 longer applies any %destructor to a mid-rule value if that mid-rule value is
1440 not actually ever referenced using either $$ or $n in a semantic action.
1441
1442 The default %destructor's and %printer's are experimental. More user
1443 feedback will help to determine whether they should become permanent
1444 features.
1445
1446 See the section "Freeing Discarded Symbols" in the Bison manual for further
1447 details.
1448
1449 ** %left, %right, and %nonassoc can now declare token numbers. This is required
1450 by POSIX. However, see the end of section "Operator Precedence" in the Bison
1451 manual for a caveat concerning the treatment of literal strings.
1452
1453 ** The nonfunctional --no-parser, -n, and %no-parser options have been
1454 completely removed from Bison.
1455
1456 * Changes in version 2.3a, 2006-09-13:
1457
1458 ** Instead of %union, you can define and use your own union type
1459 YYSTYPE if your grammar contains at least one <type> tag.
1460 Your YYSTYPE need not be a macro; it can be a typedef.
1461 This change is for compatibility with other Yacc implementations,
1462 and is required by POSIX.
1463
1464 ** Locations columns and lines start at 1.
1465 In accordance with the GNU Coding Standards and Emacs.
1466
1467 ** You may now declare per-type and default %destructor's and %printer's:
1468
1469 For example:
1470
1471 %union { char *string; }
1472 %token <string> STRING1
1473 %token <string> STRING2
1474 %type <string> string1
1475 %type <string> string2
1476 %union { char character; }
1477 %token <character> CHR
1478 %type <character> chr
1479 %destructor { free ($$); } %symbol-default
1480 %destructor { free ($$); printf ("%d", @$.first_line); } STRING1 string1
1481 %destructor { } <character>
1482
1483 guarantees that, when the parser discards any user-defined symbol that has a
1484 semantic type tag other than "<character>", it passes its semantic value to
1485 "free". However, when the parser discards a "STRING1" or a "string1", it
1486 also prints its line number to "stdout". It performs only the second
1487 "%destructor" in this case, so it invokes "free" only once.
1488
1489 [Although we failed to mention this here in the 2.3a release, the default
1490 %destructor's and %printer's were experimental, and they were rewritten in
1491 future versions.]
1492
1493 ** Except for LALR(1) parsers in C with POSIX Yacc emulation enabled (with "-y",
1494 "--yacc", or "%yacc"), Bison no longer generates #define statements for
1495 associating token numbers with token names. Removing the #define statements
1496 helps to sanitize the global namespace during preprocessing, but POSIX Yacc
1497 requires them. Bison still generates an enum for token names in all cases.
1498
1499 ** Handling of traditional Yacc prologue blocks is now more consistent but
1500 potentially incompatible with previous releases of Bison.
1501
1502 As before, you declare prologue blocks in your grammar file with the
1503 "%{ ... %}" syntax. To generate the pre-prologue, Bison concatenates all
1504 prologue blocks that you've declared before the first %union. To generate
1505 the post-prologue, Bison concatenates all prologue blocks that you've
1506 declared after the first %union.
1507
1508 Previous releases of Bison inserted the pre-prologue into both the header
1509 file and the code file in all cases except for LALR(1) parsers in C. In the
1510 latter case, Bison inserted it only into the code file. For parsers in C++,
1511 the point of insertion was before any token definitions (which associate
1512 token numbers with names). For parsers in C, the point of insertion was
1513 after the token definitions.
1514
1515 Now, Bison never inserts the pre-prologue into the header file. In the code
1516 file, it always inserts it before the token definitions.
1517
1518 ** Bison now provides a more flexible alternative to the traditional Yacc
1519 prologue blocks: %before-header, %start-header, %end-header, and
1520 %after-header.
1521
1522 For example, the following declaration order in the grammar file reflects the
1523 order in which Bison will output these code blocks. However, you are free to
1524 declare these code blocks in your grammar file in whatever order is most
1525 convenient for you:
1526
1527 %before-header {
1528 /* Bison treats this block like a pre-prologue block: it inserts it into
1529 * the code file before the contents of the header file. It does *not*
1530 * insert it into the header file. This is a good place to put
1531 * #include's that you want at the top of your code file. A common
1532 * example is '#include "system.h"'. */
1533 }
1534 %start-header {
1535 /* Bison inserts this block into both the header file and the code file.
1536 * In both files, the point of insertion is before any Bison-generated
1537 * token, semantic type, location type, and class definitions. This is a
1538 * good place to define %union dependencies, for example. */
1539 }
1540 %union {
1541 /* Unlike the traditional Yacc prologue blocks, the output order for the
1542 * new %*-header blocks is not affected by their declaration position
1543 * relative to any %union in the grammar file. */
1544 }
1545 %end-header {
1546 /* Bison inserts this block into both the header file and the code file.
1547 * In both files, the point of insertion is after the Bison-generated
1548 * definitions. This is a good place to declare or define public
1549 * functions or data structures that depend on the Bison-generated
1550 * definitions. */
1551 }
1552 %after-header {
1553 /* Bison treats this block like a post-prologue block: it inserts it into
1554 * the code file after the contents of the header file. It does *not*
1555 * insert it into the header file. This is a good place to declare or
1556 * define internal functions or data structures that depend on the
1557 * Bison-generated definitions. */
1558 }
1559
1560 If you have multiple occurrences of any one of the above declarations, Bison
1561 will concatenate the contents in declaration order.
1562
1563 [Although we failed to mention this here in the 2.3a release, the prologue
1564 alternatives were experimental, and they were rewritten in future versions.]
1565
1566 ** The option "--report=look-ahead" has been changed to "--report=lookahead".
1567 The old spelling still works, but is not documented and may be removed
1568 in a future release.
1569
1570 * Changes in version 2.3, 2006-06-05:
1571
1572 ** GLR grammars should now use "YYRECOVERING ()" instead of "YYRECOVERING",
1573 for compatibility with LALR(1) grammars.
1574
1575 ** It is now documented that any definition of YYSTYPE or YYLTYPE should
1576 be to a type name that does not contain parentheses or brackets.
1577
1578 * Changes in version 2.2, 2006-05-19:
1579
1580 ** The distribution terms for all Bison-generated parsers now permit
1581 using the parsers in nonfree programs. Previously, this permission
1582 was granted only for Bison-generated LALR(1) parsers in C.
1583
1584 ** %name-prefix changes the namespace name in C++ outputs.
1585
1586 ** The C++ parsers export their token_type.
1587
1588 ** Bison now allows multiple %union declarations, and concatenates
1589 their contents together.
1590
1591 ** New warning: unused values
1592 Right-hand side symbols whose values are not used are reported,
1593 if the symbols have destructors. For instance:
1594
1595 exp: exp "?" exp ":" exp { $1 ? $1 : $3; }
1596 | exp "+" exp
1597 ;
1598
1599 will trigger a warning about $$ and $5 in the first rule, and $3 in
1600 the second ($1 is copied to $$ by the default rule). This example
1601 most likely contains three errors, and could be rewritten as:
1602
1603 exp: exp "?" exp ":" exp
1604 { $$ = $1 ? $3 : $5; free ($1 ? $5 : $3); free ($1); }
1605 | exp "+" exp
1606 { $$ = $1 ? $1 : $3; if ($1) free ($3); }
1607 ;
1608
1609 However, if the original actions were really intended, memory leaks
1610 and all, the warnings can be suppressed by letting Bison believe the
1611 values are used, e.g.:
1612
1613 exp: exp "?" exp ":" exp { $1 ? $1 : $3; (void) ($$, $5); }
1614 | exp "+" exp { $$ = $1; (void) $3; }
1615 ;
1616
1617 If there are mid-rule actions, the warning is issued if no action
1618 uses it. The following triggers no warning: $1 and $3 are used.
1619
1620 exp: exp { push ($1); } '+' exp { push ($3); sum (); };
1621
1622 The warning is intended to help catching lost values and memory leaks.
1623 If a value is ignored, its associated memory typically is not reclaimed.
1624
1625 ** %destructor vs. YYABORT, YYACCEPT, and YYERROR.
1626 Destructors are now called when user code invokes YYABORT, YYACCEPT,
1627 and YYERROR, for all objects on the stack, other than objects
1628 corresponding to the right-hand side of the current rule.
1629
1630 ** %expect, %expect-rr
1631 Incorrect numbers of expected conflicts are now actual errors,
1632 instead of warnings.
1633
1634 ** GLR, YACC parsers.
1635 The %parse-params are available in the destructors (and the
1636 experimental printers) as per the documentation.
1637
1638 ** Bison now warns if it finds a stray "$" or "@" in an action.
1639
1640 ** %require "VERSION"
1641 This specifies that the grammar file depends on features implemented
1642 in Bison version VERSION or higher.
1643
1644 ** lalr1.cc: The token and value types are now class members.
1645 The tokens were defined as free form enums and cpp macros. YYSTYPE
1646 was defined as a free form union. They are now class members:
1647 tokens are enumerations of the "yy::parser::token" struct, and the
1648 semantic values have the "yy::parser::semantic_type" type.
1649
1650 If you do not want or can update to this scheme, the directive
1651 '%define "global_tokens_and_yystype" "1"' triggers the global
1652 definition of tokens and YYSTYPE. This change is suitable both
1653 for previous releases of Bison, and this one.
1654
1655 If you wish to update, then make sure older version of Bison will
1656 fail using '%require "2.2"'.
1657
1658 ** DJGPP support added.
1659 \f
1660 * Changes in version 2.1, 2005-09-16:
1661
1662 ** The C++ lalr1.cc skeleton supports %lex-param.
1663
1664 ** Bison-generated parsers now support the translation of diagnostics like
1665 "syntax error" into languages other than English. The default
1666 language is still English. For details, please see the new
1667 Internationalization section of the Bison manual. Software
1668 distributors should also see the new PACKAGING file. Thanks to
1669 Bruno Haible for this new feature.
1670
1671 ** Wording in the Bison-generated parsers has been changed slightly to
1672 simplify translation. In particular, the message "memory exhausted"
1673 has replaced "parser stack overflow", as the old message was not
1674 always accurate for modern Bison-generated parsers.
1675
1676 ** Destructors are now called when the parser aborts, for all symbols left
1677 behind on the stack. Also, the start symbol is now destroyed after a
1678 successful parse. In both cases, the behavior was formerly inconsistent.
1679
1680 ** When generating verbose diagnostics, Bison-generated parsers no longer
1681 quote the literal strings associated with tokens. For example, for
1682 a syntax error associated with '%token NUM "number"' they might
1683 print 'syntax error, unexpected number' instead of 'syntax error,
1684 unexpected "number"'.
1685 \f
1686 * Changes in version 2.0, 2004-12-25:
1687
1688 ** Possibly-incompatible changes
1689
1690 - Bison-generated parsers no longer default to using the alloca function
1691 (when available) to extend the parser stack, due to widespread
1692 problems in unchecked stack-overflow detection. You can "#define
1693 YYSTACK_USE_ALLOCA 1" to require the use of alloca, but please read
1694 the manual to determine safe values for YYMAXDEPTH in that case.
1695
1696 - Error token location.
1697 During error recovery, the location of the syntax error is updated
1698 to cover the whole sequence covered by the error token: it includes
1699 the shifted symbols thrown away during the first part of the error
1700 recovery, and the lookahead rejected during the second part.
1701
1702 - Semicolon changes:
1703 . Stray semicolons are no longer allowed at the start of a grammar.
1704 . Semicolons are now required after in-grammar declarations.
1705
1706 - Unescaped newlines are no longer allowed in character constants or
1707 string literals. They were never portable, and GCC 3.4.0 has
1708 dropped support for them. Better diagnostics are now generated if
1709 forget a closing quote.
1710
1711 - NUL bytes are no longer allowed in Bison string literals, unfortunately.
1712
1713 ** New features
1714
1715 - GLR grammars now support locations.
1716
1717 - New directive: %initial-action.
1718 This directive allows the user to run arbitrary code (including
1719 initializing @$) from yyparse before parsing starts.
1720
1721 - A new directive "%expect-rr N" specifies the expected number of
1722 reduce/reduce conflicts in GLR parsers.
1723
1724 - %token numbers can now be hexadecimal integers, e.g., "%token FOO 0x12d".
1725 This is a GNU extension.
1726
1727 - The option "--report=lookahead" was changed to "--report=look-ahead".
1728 [However, this was changed back after 2.3.]
1729
1730 - Experimental %destructor support has been added to lalr1.cc.
1731
1732 - New configure option --disable-yacc, to disable installation of the
1733 yacc command and -ly library introduced in 1.875 for POSIX conformance.
1734
1735 ** Bug fixes
1736
1737 - For now, %expect-count violations are now just warnings, not errors.
1738 This is for compatibility with Bison 1.75 and earlier (when there are
1739 reduce/reduce conflicts) and with Bison 1.30 and earlier (when there
1740 are too many or too few shift/reduce conflicts). However, in future
1741 versions of Bison we plan to improve the %expect machinery so that
1742 these violations will become errors again.
1743
1744 - Within Bison itself, numbers (e.g., goto numbers) are no longer
1745 arbitrarily limited to 16-bit counts.
1746
1747 - Semicolons are now allowed before "|" in grammar rules, as POSIX requires.
1748 \f
1749 * Changes in version 1.875, 2003-01-01:
1750
1751 ** The documentation license has been upgraded to version 1.2
1752 of the GNU Free Documentation License.
1753
1754 ** syntax error processing
1755
1756 - In Yacc-style parsers YYLLOC_DEFAULT is now used to compute error
1757 locations too. This fixes bugs in error-location computation.
1758
1759 - %destructor
1760 It is now possible to reclaim the memory associated to symbols
1761 discarded during error recovery. This feature is still experimental.
1762
1763 - %error-verbose
1764 This new directive is preferred over YYERROR_VERBOSE.
1765
1766 - #defining yyerror to steal internal variables is discouraged.
1767 It is not guaranteed to work forever.
1768
1769 ** POSIX conformance
1770
1771 - Semicolons are once again optional at the end of grammar rules.
1772 This reverts to the behavior of Bison 1.33 and earlier, and improves
1773 compatibility with Yacc.
1774
1775 - "parse error" -> "syntax error"
1776 Bison now uniformly uses the term "syntax error"; formerly, the code
1777 and manual sometimes used the term "parse error" instead. POSIX
1778 requires "syntax error" in diagnostics, and it was thought better to
1779 be consistent.
1780
1781 - The documentation now emphasizes that yylex and yyerror must be
1782 declared before use. C99 requires this.
1783
1784 - Bison now parses C99 lexical constructs like UCNs and
1785 backslash-newline within C escape sequences, as POSIX 1003.1-2001 requires.
1786
1787 - File names are properly escaped in C output. E.g., foo\bar.y is
1788 output as "foo\\bar.y".
1789
1790 - Yacc command and library now available
1791 The Bison distribution now installs a "yacc" command, as POSIX requires.
1792 Also, Bison now installs a small library liby.a containing
1793 implementations of Yacc-compatible yyerror and main functions.
1794 This library is normally not useful, but POSIX requires it.
1795
1796 - Type clashes now generate warnings, not errors.
1797
1798 - If the user does not define YYSTYPE as a macro, Bison now declares it
1799 using typedef instead of defining it as a macro.
1800 For consistency, YYLTYPE is also declared instead of defined.
1801
1802 ** Other compatibility issues
1803
1804 - %union directives can now have a tag before the "{", e.g., the
1805 directive "%union foo {...}" now generates the C code
1806 "typedef union foo { ... } YYSTYPE;"; this is for Yacc compatibility.
1807 The default union tag is "YYSTYPE", for compatibility with Solaris 9 Yacc.
1808 For consistency, YYLTYPE's struct tag is now "YYLTYPE" not "yyltype".
1809 This is for compatibility with both Yacc and Bison 1.35.
1810
1811 - ";" is output before the terminating "}" of an action, for
1812 compatibility with Bison 1.35.
1813
1814 - Bison now uses a Yacc-style format for conflict reports, e.g.,
1815 "conflicts: 2 shift/reduce, 1 reduce/reduce".
1816
1817 - "yystype" and "yyltype" are now obsolescent macros instead of being
1818 typedefs or tags; they are no longer documented and are planned to be
1819 withdrawn in a future release.
1820
1821 ** GLR parser notes
1822
1823 - GLR and inline
1824 Users of Bison have to decide how they handle the portability of the
1825 C keyword "inline".
1826
1827 - "parsing stack overflow..." -> "parser stack overflow"
1828 GLR parsers now report "parser stack overflow" as per the Bison manual.
1829
1830 ** %parse-param and %lex-param
1831 The macros YYPARSE_PARAM and YYLEX_PARAM provide a means to pass
1832 additional context to yyparse and yylex. They suffer from several
1833 shortcomings:
1834
1835 - a single argument only can be added,
1836 - their types are weak (void *),
1837 - this context is not passed to ancillary functions such as yyerror,
1838 - only yacc.c parsers support them.
1839
1840 The new %parse-param/%lex-param directives provide a more precise control.
1841 For instance:
1842
1843 %parse-param {int *nastiness}
1844 %lex-param {int *nastiness}
1845 %parse-param {int *randomness}
1846
1847 results in the following signatures:
1848
1849 int yylex (int *nastiness);
1850 int yyparse (int *nastiness, int *randomness);
1851
1852 or, if both %pure-parser and %locations are used:
1853
1854 int yylex (YYSTYPE *lvalp, YYLTYPE *llocp, int *nastiness);
1855 int yyparse (int *nastiness, int *randomness);
1856
1857 ** Bison now warns if it detects conflicting outputs to the same file,
1858 e.g., it generates a warning for "bison -d -o foo.h foo.y" since
1859 that command outputs both code and header to foo.h.
1860
1861 ** #line in output files
1862 - --no-line works properly.
1863
1864 ** Bison can no longer be built by a K&R C compiler; it requires C89 or
1865 later to be built. This change originally took place a few versions
1866 ago, but nobody noticed until we recently asked someone to try
1867 building Bison with a K&R C compiler.
1868 \f
1869 * Changes in version 1.75, 2002-10-14:
1870
1871 ** Bison should now work on 64-bit hosts.
1872
1873 ** Indonesian translation thanks to Tedi Heriyanto.
1874
1875 ** GLR parsers
1876 Fix spurious parse errors.
1877
1878 ** Pure parsers
1879 Some people redefine yyerror to steal yyparse' private variables.
1880 Reenable this trick until an official feature replaces it.
1881
1882 ** Type Clashes
1883 In agreement with POSIX and with other Yaccs, leaving a default
1884 action is valid when $$ is untyped, and $1 typed:
1885
1886 untyped: ... typed;
1887
1888 but the converse remains an error:
1889
1890 typed: ... untyped;
1891
1892 ** Values of mid-rule actions
1893 The following code:
1894
1895 foo: { ... } { $$ = $1; } ...
1896
1897 was incorrectly rejected: $1 is defined in the second mid-rule
1898 action, and is equal to the $$ of the first mid-rule action.
1899 \f
1900 * Changes in version 1.50, 2002-10-04:
1901
1902 ** GLR parsing
1903 The declaration
1904 %glr-parser
1905 causes Bison to produce a Generalized LR (GLR) parser, capable of handling
1906 almost any context-free grammar, ambiguous or not. The new declarations
1907 %dprec and %merge on grammar rules allow parse-time resolution of
1908 ambiguities. Contributed by Paul Hilfinger.
1909
1910 Unfortunately Bison 1.50 does not work properly on 64-bit hosts
1911 like the Alpha, so please stick to 32-bit hosts for now.
1912
1913 ** Output Directory
1914 When not in Yacc compatibility mode, when the output file was not
1915 specified, running "bison foo/bar.y" created "foo/bar.c". It
1916 now creates "bar.c".
1917
1918 ** Undefined token
1919 The undefined token was systematically mapped to 2 which prevented
1920 the use of 2 by the user. This is no longer the case.
1921
1922 ** Unknown token numbers
1923 If yylex returned an out of range value, yyparse could die. This is
1924 no longer the case.
1925
1926 ** Error token
1927 According to POSIX, the error token must be 256.
1928 Bison extends this requirement by making it a preference: *if* the
1929 user specified that one of her tokens is numbered 256, then error
1930 will be mapped onto another number.
1931
1932 ** Verbose error messages
1933 They no longer report "..., expecting error or..." for states where
1934 error recovery is possible.
1935
1936 ** End token
1937 Defaults to "$end" instead of "$".
1938
1939 ** Error recovery now conforms to documentation and to POSIX
1940 When a Bison-generated parser encounters a syntax error, it now pops
1941 the stack until it finds a state that allows shifting the error
1942 token. Formerly, it popped the stack until it found a state that
1943 allowed some non-error action other than a default reduction on the
1944 error token. The new behavior has long been the documented behavior,
1945 and has long been required by POSIX. For more details, please see
1946 Paul Eggert, "Reductions during Bison error handling" (2002-05-20)
1947 <http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/bug-bison/2002-05/msg00038.html>.
1948
1949 ** Traces
1950 Popped tokens and nonterminals are now reported.
1951
1952 ** Larger grammars
1953 Larger grammars are now supported (larger token numbers, larger grammar
1954 size (= sum of the LHS and RHS lengths), larger LALR tables).
1955 Formerly, many of these numbers ran afoul of 16-bit limits;
1956 now these limits are 32 bits on most hosts.
1957
1958 ** Explicit initial rule
1959 Bison used to play hacks with the initial rule, which the user does
1960 not write. It is now explicit, and visible in the reports and
1961 graphs as rule 0.
1962
1963 ** Useless rules
1964 Before, Bison reported the useless rules, but, although not used,
1965 included them in the parsers. They are now actually removed.
1966
1967 ** Useless rules, useless nonterminals
1968 They are now reported, as a warning, with their locations.
1969
1970 ** Rules never reduced
1971 Rules that can never be reduced because of conflicts are now
1972 reported.
1973
1974 ** Incorrect "Token not used"
1975 On a grammar such as
1976
1977 %token useless useful
1978 %%
1979 exp: '0' %prec useful;
1980
1981 where a token was used to set the precedence of the last rule,
1982 bison reported both "useful" and "useless" as useless tokens.
1983
1984 ** Revert the C++ namespace changes introduced in 1.31
1985 as they caused too many portability hassles.
1986
1987 ** Default locations
1988 By an accident of design, the default computation of @$ was
1989 performed after another default computation was performed: @$ = @1.
1990 The latter is now removed: YYLLOC_DEFAULT is fully responsible of
1991 the computation of @$.
1992
1993 ** Token end-of-file
1994 The token end of file may be specified by the user, in which case,
1995 the user symbol is used in the reports, the graphs, and the verbose
1996 error messages instead of "$end", which remains being the default.
1997 For instance
1998 %token MYEOF 0
1999 or
2000 %token MYEOF 0 "end of file"
2001
2002 ** Semantic parser
2003 This old option, which has been broken for ages, is removed.
2004
2005 ** New translations
2006 Brazilian Portuguese, thanks to Alexandre Folle de Menezes.
2007 Croatian, thanks to Denis Lackovic.
2008
2009 ** Incorrect token definitions
2010 When given
2011 %token 'a' "A"
2012 bison used to output
2013 #define 'a' 65
2014
2015 ** Token definitions as enums
2016 Tokens are output both as the traditional #define's, and, provided
2017 the compiler supports ANSI C or is a C++ compiler, as enums.
2018 This lets debuggers display names instead of integers.
2019
2020 ** Reports
2021 In addition to --verbose, bison supports --report=THINGS, which
2022 produces additional information:
2023 - itemset
2024 complete the core item sets with their closure
2025 - lookahead [changed to "look-ahead" in 1.875e through 2.3, but changed back]
2026 explicitly associate lookahead tokens to items
2027 - solved
2028 describe shift/reduce conflicts solving.
2029 Bison used to systematically output this information on top of
2030 the report. Solved conflicts are now attached to their states.
2031
2032 ** Type clashes
2033 Previous versions don't complain when there is a type clash on
2034 the default action if the rule has a mid-rule action, such as in:
2035
2036 %type <foo> bar
2037 %%
2038 bar: '0' {} '0';
2039
2040 This is fixed.
2041
2042 ** GNU M4 is now required when using Bison.
2043 \f
2044 * Changes in version 1.35, 2002-03-25:
2045
2046 ** C Skeleton
2047 Some projects use Bison's C parser with C++ compilers, and define
2048 YYSTYPE as a class. The recent adjustment of C parsers for data
2049 alignment and 64 bit architectures made this impossible.
2050
2051 Because for the time being no real solution for C++ parser
2052 generation exists, kludges were implemented in the parser to
2053 maintain this use. In the future, when Bison has C++ parsers, this
2054 kludge will be disabled.
2055
2056 This kludge also addresses some C++ problems when the stack was
2057 extended.
2058 \f
2059 * Changes in version 1.34, 2002-03-12:
2060
2061 ** File name clashes are detected
2062 $ bison foo.y -d -o foo.x
2063 fatal error: header and parser would both be named "foo.x"
2064
2065 ** A missing ";" at the end of a rule triggers a warning
2066 In accordance with POSIX, and in agreement with other
2067 Yacc implementations, Bison will mandate this semicolon in the near
2068 future. This eases the implementation of a Bison parser of Bison
2069 grammars by making this grammar LALR(1) instead of LR(2). To
2070 facilitate the transition, this release introduces a warning.
2071
2072 ** Revert the C++ namespace changes introduced in 1.31, as they caused too
2073 many portability hassles.
2074
2075 ** DJGPP support added.
2076
2077 ** Fix test suite portability problems.
2078 \f
2079 * Changes in version 1.33, 2002-02-07:
2080
2081 ** Fix C++ issues
2082 Groff could not be compiled for the definition of size_t was lacking
2083 under some conditions.
2084
2085 ** Catch invalid @n
2086 As is done with $n.
2087 \f
2088 * Changes in version 1.32, 2002-01-23:
2089
2090 ** Fix Yacc output file names
2091
2092 ** Portability fixes
2093
2094 ** Italian, Dutch translations
2095 \f
2096 * Changes in version 1.31, 2002-01-14:
2097
2098 ** Many Bug Fixes
2099
2100 ** GNU Gettext and %expect
2101 GNU Gettext asserts 10 s/r conflicts, but there are 7. Now that
2102 Bison dies on incorrect %expectations, we fear there will be
2103 too many bug reports for Gettext, so _for the time being_, %expect
2104 does not trigger an error when the input file is named "plural.y".
2105
2106 ** Use of alloca in parsers
2107 If YYSTACK_USE_ALLOCA is defined to 0, then the parsers will use
2108 malloc exclusively. Since 1.29, but was not NEWS'ed.
2109
2110 alloca is used only when compiled with GCC, to avoid portability
2111 problems as on AIX.
2112
2113 ** yyparse now returns 2 if memory is exhausted; formerly it dumped core.
2114
2115 ** When the generated parser lacks debugging code, YYDEBUG is now 0
2116 (as POSIX requires) instead of being undefined.
2117
2118 ** User Actions
2119 Bison has always permitted actions such as { $$ = $1 }: it adds the
2120 ending semicolon. Now if in Yacc compatibility mode, the semicolon
2121 is no longer output: one has to write { $$ = $1; }.
2122
2123 ** Better C++ compliance
2124 The output parsers try to respect C++ namespaces.
2125 [This turned out to be a failed experiment, and it was reverted later.]
2126
2127 ** Reduced Grammars
2128 Fixed bugs when reporting useless nonterminals.
2129
2130 ** 64 bit hosts
2131 The parsers work properly on 64 bit hosts.
2132
2133 ** Error messages
2134 Some calls to strerror resulted in scrambled or missing error messages.
2135
2136 ** %expect
2137 When the number of shift/reduce conflicts is correct, don't issue
2138 any warning.
2139
2140 ** The verbose report includes the rule line numbers.
2141
2142 ** Rule line numbers are fixed in traces.
2143
2144 ** Swedish translation
2145
2146 ** Parse errors
2147 Verbose parse error messages from the parsers are better looking.
2148 Before: parse error: unexpected `'/'', expecting `"number"' or `'-'' or `'(''
2149 Now: parse error: unexpected '/', expecting "number" or '-' or '('
2150
2151 ** Fixed parser memory leaks.
2152 When the generated parser was using malloc to extend its stacks, the
2153 previous allocations were not freed.
2154
2155 ** Fixed verbose output file.
2156 Some newlines were missing.
2157 Some conflicts in state descriptions were missing.
2158
2159 ** Fixed conflict report.
2160 Option -v was needed to get the result.
2161
2162 ** %expect
2163 Was not used.
2164 Mismatches are errors, not warnings.
2165
2166 ** Fixed incorrect processing of some invalid input.
2167
2168 ** Fixed CPP guards: 9foo.h uses BISON_9FOO_H instead of 9FOO_H.
2169
2170 ** Fixed some typos in the documentation.
2171
2172 ** %token MY_EOF 0 is supported.
2173 Before, MY_EOF was silently renumbered as 257.
2174
2175 ** doc/refcard.tex is updated.
2176
2177 ** %output, %file-prefix, %name-prefix.
2178 New.
2179
2180 ** --output
2181 New, aliasing "--output-file".
2182 \f
2183 * Changes in version 1.30, 2001-10-26:
2184
2185 ** "--defines" and "--graph" have now an optional argument which is the
2186 output file name. "-d" and "-g" do not change; they do not take any
2187 argument.
2188
2189 ** "%source_extension" and "%header_extension" are removed, failed
2190 experiment.
2191
2192 ** Portability fixes.
2193 \f
2194 * Changes in version 1.29, 2001-09-07:
2195
2196 ** The output file does not define const, as this caused problems when used
2197 with common autoconfiguration schemes. If you still use ancient compilers
2198 that lack const, compile with the equivalent of the C compiler option
2199 "-Dconst=". Autoconf's AC_C_CONST macro provides one way to do this.
2200
2201 ** Added "-g" and "--graph".
2202
2203 ** The Bison manual is now distributed under the terms of the GNU FDL.
2204
2205 ** The input and the output files has automatically a similar extension.
2206
2207 ** Russian translation added.
2208
2209 ** NLS support updated; should hopefully be less troublesome.
2210
2211 ** Added the old Bison reference card.
2212
2213 ** Added "--locations" and "%locations".
2214
2215 ** Added "-S" and "--skeleton".
2216
2217 ** "%raw", "-r", "--raw" is disabled.
2218
2219 ** Special characters are escaped when output. This solves the problems
2220 of the #line lines with path names including backslashes.
2221
2222 ** New directives.
2223 "%yacc", "%fixed_output_files", "%defines", "%no_parser", "%verbose",
2224 "%debug", "%source_extension" and "%header_extension".
2225
2226 ** @$
2227 Automatic location tracking.
2228 \f
2229 * Changes in version 1.28, 1999-07-06:
2230
2231 ** Should compile better now with K&R compilers.
2232
2233 ** Added NLS.
2234
2235 ** Fixed a problem with escaping the double quote character.
2236
2237 ** There is now a FAQ.
2238 \f
2239 * Changes in version 1.27:
2240
2241 ** The make rule which prevented bison.simple from being created on
2242 some systems has been fixed.
2243 \f
2244 * Changes in version 1.26:
2245
2246 ** Bison now uses Automake.
2247
2248 ** New mailing lists: <bug-bison@gnu.org> and <help-bison@gnu.org>.
2249
2250 ** Token numbers now start at 257 as previously documented, not 258.
2251
2252 ** Bison honors the TMPDIR environment variable.
2253
2254 ** A couple of buffer overruns have been fixed.
2255
2256 ** Problems when closing files should now be reported.
2257
2258 ** Generated parsers should now work even on operating systems which do
2259 not provide alloca().
2260 \f
2261 * Changes in version 1.25, 1995-10-16:
2262
2263 ** Errors in the input grammar are not fatal; Bison keeps reading
2264 the grammar file, and reports all the errors found in it.
2265
2266 ** Tokens can now be specified as multiple-character strings: for
2267 example, you could use "<=" for a token which looks like <=, instead
2268 of choosing a name like LESSEQ.
2269
2270 ** The %token_table declaration says to write a table of tokens (names
2271 and numbers) into the parser file. The yylex function can use this
2272 table to recognize multiple-character string tokens, or for other
2273 purposes.
2274
2275 ** The %no_lines declaration says not to generate any #line preprocessor
2276 directives in the parser file.
2277
2278 ** The %raw declaration says to use internal Bison token numbers, not
2279 Yacc-compatible token numbers, when token names are defined as macros.
2280
2281 ** The --no-parser option produces the parser tables without including
2282 the parser engine; a project can now use its own parser engine.
2283 The actions go into a separate file called NAME.act, in the form of
2284 a switch statement body.
2285 \f
2286 * Changes in version 1.23:
2287
2288 The user can define YYPARSE_PARAM as the name of an argument to be
2289 passed into yyparse. The argument should have type void *. It should
2290 actually point to an object. Grammar actions can access the variable
2291 by casting it to the proper pointer type.
2292
2293 Line numbers in output file corrected.
2294 \f
2295 * Changes in version 1.22:
2296
2297 --help option added.
2298 \f
2299 * Changes in version 1.20:
2300
2301 Output file does not redefine const for C++.
2302
2303 -----
2304
2305 Copyright (C) 1995-2013 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
2306
2307 This file is part of Bison, the GNU Parser Generator.
2308
2309 This program is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify
2310 it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
2311 the Free Software Foundation, either version 3 of the License, or
2312 (at your option) any later version.
2313
2314 This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
2315 but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
2316 MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the
2317 GNU General Public License for more details.
2318
2319 You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
2320 along with this program. If not, see <http://www.gnu.org/licenses/>.
2321
2322 LocalWords: yacc YYBACKUP glr GCC lalr ArrayIndexOutOfBoundsException nullptr
2323 LocalWords: cplusplus liby rpl fprintf mfcalc Wyacc stmt cond expr mk sym lr
2324 LocalWords: IELR ielr Lookahead YYERROR nonassoc LALR's api lookaheads yychar
2325 LocalWords: destructor lookahead YYRHSLOC YYLLOC Rhs ifndef YYFAIL cpp sr rr
2326 LocalWords: preprocessor initializer Wno Wnone Werror FreeBSD prec livelocks
2327 LocalWords: Solaris AIX UX RHEL Tru LHS gcc's Wundef YYENABLE NLS YYLTYPE VCG
2328 LocalWords: yyerror cpp's Wunused yylval yylloc prepend yyparse yylex yypush
2329 LocalWords: Graphviz xml nonterminals midrule destructor's YYSTYPE typedef ly
2330 LocalWords: CHR chr printf stdout namespace preprocessing enum pre include's
2331 LocalWords: YYRECOVERING nonfree destructors YYABORT YYACCEPT params enums de
2332 LocalWords: struct yystype DJGPP lex param Haible NUM alloca YYSTACK NUL goto
2333 LocalWords: YYMAXDEPTH Unescaped UCNs YYLTYPE's yyltype typedefs inline Yaccs
2334 LocalWords: Heriyanto Reenable dprec Hilfinger Eggert MYEOF Folle Menezes EOF
2335 LocalWords: Lackovic define's itemset Groff Gettext malloc NEWS'ed YYDEBUG YY
2336 LocalWords: namespaces strerror const autoconfiguration Dconst Autoconf's FDL
2337 LocalWords: Automake TMPDIR LESSEQ ylwrap endif yydebug YYTOKEN YYLSP ival hh
2338 LocalWords: extern YYTOKENTYPE TOKENTYPE yytokentype tokentype STYPE lval pdf
2339 LocalWords: lang yyoutput dvi html ps POSIX lvalp llocp Wother nterm arg init
2340 LocalWords: TOK calc yyo fval Wconflicts
2341
2342 Local Variables:
2343 mode: outline
2344 fill-column: 76
2345 End: