3 * Noteworthy changes in release ?.? (????-??-??) [?]
5 ** Incompatible changes
9 Support for YYFAIL is removed (deprecated in Bison 2.4.2).
10 Support for yystype and yyltype (instead of YYSTYPE and YYLTYPE)
11 is removed (deprecated in Bison 1.875).
12 Support for YYPARSE_PARAM is removed (deprecated in Bison 1.875).
16 *** Warning categories are now displayed
20 foo.y:4.6: warning: type clash on default action: <foo> != <bar> [-Wother]
22 *** Useless semantic types
24 Bison now warns about useless (uninhabited) semantic types. Since
25 semantic types are not declared to Bison (they are defined in the opaque
26 %union structure), it is %printer/%destructor directives about useless
27 types that trigger the warning:
31 %printer {} <type1> <type3>
32 %destructor {} <type2> <type4>
34 nterm: term { $$ = $1; };
36 3.28-34: warning: type <type3> is used, but is not associated to any symbol
37 4.28-34: warning: type <type4> is used, but is not associated to any symbol
39 *** Undeclared symbols
41 Bison used to raise an error for %printer and %destructor directives for
45 %destructor {} symbol2
49 This is now only a warning.
51 *** Useless destructors or printers
53 Bison now warns about useless destructors or printers. In the following
54 example, the printer for <type1>, and the destructor for <type2> are
55 useless: all symbols of <type1> (token1) already have a printer, and all
56 symbols of type <type2> (token2) already have a destructor.
62 %printer {} token1 <type1> <type3>
63 %destructor {} token2 <type2> <type4>
65 ** Additional yylex/yyparse arguments
67 The new directive %param declares additional arguments to both yylex and
68 yyparse. The %lex-param, %parse-param, and %param directives support one
69 or more arguments. Instead of
71 %lex-param {arg1_type *arg1}
72 %lex-param {arg2_type *arg2}
73 %parse-param {arg1_type *arg1}
74 %parse-param {arg2_type *arg2}
78 %param {arg1_type *arg1} {arg2_type *arg2}
80 ** Java skeleton improvements
82 The constants for token names were moved to the Lexer interface.
83 Also, it is possible to add code to the parser's constructors using
84 "%code init" and "%define init_throws".
86 ** C++ skeletons improvements
88 *** parser header (%defines) is no longer mandatory (lalr1.cc)
90 In which case, if needed, the support classes are defined in the generated
91 parser, instead of additional files (location.hh, position.hh and
94 *** locations are no longer mandatory (lalr1.cc, glr.cc)
96 Both lalr1.cc and glr.cc no longer require %location.
98 *** syntax_error exception (lalr1.cc)
100 The C++ parser features a syntax_error exception, which can be
101 thrown from the scanner or from user rules to raise syntax errors.
102 This facilitates reporting errors caught in sub-functions (e.g.,
103 rejecting too large integral literals from a conversion function
104 used by the scanner, or rejecting invalid combinations from a
105 factory invoked by the user actions).
107 ** Variable api.tokens.prefix
109 The variable api.tokens.prefix changes the way tokens are identified in
110 the generated files. This is especially useful to avoid collisions
111 with identifiers in the target language. For instance
113 %token FILE for ERROR
114 %define api.tokens.prefix "TOK_"
116 start: FILE for ERROR;
118 will generate the definition of the symbols TOK_FILE, TOK_for, and
119 TOK_ERROR in the generated sources. In particular, the scanner must
120 use these prefixed token names, although the grammar itself still
121 uses the short names (as in the sample rule given above).
123 ** Variable api.namespace
125 The "namespace" variable is renamed "api.namespace". Backward
126 compatibility is ensured, but upgrading is recommended.
128 ** Variable parse.error
130 The variable error controls the verbosity of error messages. The
131 use of the %error-verbose directive is deprecated in favor of
132 %define parse.error "verbose".
134 ** Semantic predicates
136 The new, experimental, semantic-predicate feature allows actions of
137 the form %?{ BOOLEAN-EXPRESSION }, which cause syntax errors (as for
138 YYERROR) if the expression evaluates to 0, and are evaluated immediately
139 in GLR parsers, rather than being deferred. The result is that they
140 allow the programmer to prune possible parses based on the values of
141 run-time expressions.
143 * Noteworthy changes in release ?.? (????-??-??) [?]
146 * Noteworthy changes in release 2.6.1 (2012-07-30) [stable]
148 Bison no longer executes user-specified M4 code when processing a grammar.
152 In addition to the removal of the features announced in Bison 2.6, the
153 next major release will remove the "Temporary hack for adding a semicolon
154 to the user action", as announced in the release 2.5. Instead of:
156 exp: exp "+" exp { $$ = $1 + $3 };
160 exp: exp "+" exp { $$ = $1 + $3; };
164 *** Type names are now properly escaped.
166 *** glr.cc: set_debug_level and debug_level work as expected.
168 *** Stray @ or $ in actions
170 While Bison used to warn about stray $ or @ in action rules, it did not
171 for other actions such as printers, destructors, or initial actions. It
174 ** Type names in actions
176 For consistency with rule actions, it is now possible to qualify $$ by a
177 type-name in destructors, printers, and initial actions. For instance:
179 %printer { fprintf (yyo, "(%d, %f)", $<ival>$, $<fval>$); } <*> <>;
181 will display two values for each typed and untyped symbol (provided
182 that YYSTYPE has both "ival" and "fval" fields).
184 * Noteworthy changes in release 2.6 (2012-07-19) [stable]
188 The next major release of Bison will drop support for the following
189 deprecated features. Please report disagreements to bug-bison@gnu.org.
193 Support for generating parsers in K&R C will be removed. Parsers
194 generated for C support ISO C90, and are tested with ISO C99 and ISO C11
197 *** Features deprecated since Bison 1.875
199 The definitions of yystype and yyltype will be removed; use YYSTYPE and
202 YYPARSE_PARAM and YYLEX_PARAM, deprecated in favor of %parse-param and
203 %lex-param, will no longer be supported.
205 Support for the preprocessor symbol YYERROR_VERBOSE will be removed, use
208 *** The generated header will be included (yacc.c)
210 Instead of duplicating the content of the generated header (definition of
211 YYSTYPE, yyparse declaration etc.), the generated parser will include it,
212 as is already the case for GLR or C++ parsers. This change is deferred
213 because existing versions of ylwrap (e.g., Automake 1.12.1) do not support
216 ** Generated Parser Headers
218 *** Guards (yacc.c, glr.c, glr.cc)
220 The generated headers are now guarded, as is already the case for C++
221 parsers (lalr1.cc). For instance, with --defines=foo.h:
226 #endif /* !YY_FOO_H */
228 *** New declarations (yacc.c, glr.c)
230 The generated header now declares yydebug and yyparse. Both honor
231 --name-prefix=bar_, and yield
233 int bar_parse (void);
237 #define yyparse bar_parse
240 in order to facilitate the inclusion of several parser headers inside a
241 single compilation unit.
243 *** Exported symbols in C++
245 The symbols YYTOKEN_TABLE and YYERROR_VERBOSE, which were defined in the
246 header, are removed, as they prevent the possibility of including several
247 generated headers from a single compilation unit.
251 For the same reasons, the undocumented and unused macro YYLSP_NEEDED is no
254 ** New %define variable: api.prefix
256 Now that the generated headers are more complete and properly protected
257 against multiple inclusions, constant names, such as YYSTYPE are a
258 problem. While yyparse and others are properly renamed by %name-prefix,
259 YYSTYPE, YYDEBUG and others have never been affected by it. Because it
260 would introduce backward compatibility issues in projects not expecting
261 YYSTYPE to be renamed, instead of changing the behavior of %name-prefix,
262 it is deprecated in favor of a new %define variable: api.prefix.
264 The following examples compares both:
266 %name-prefix "bar_" | %define api.prefix "bar_"
267 %token <ival> FOO %token <ival> FOO
268 %union { int ival; } %union { int ival; }
274 #ifndef BAR_FOO_H #ifndef BAR_FOO_H
275 # define BAR_FOO_H # define BAR_FOO_H
277 /* Enabling traces. */ /* Enabling traces. */
278 # ifndef YYDEBUG | # ifndef BAR_DEBUG
279 > # if defined YYDEBUG
281 > # define BAR_DEBUG 1
283 > # define BAR_DEBUG 0
286 # define YYDEBUG 0 | # define BAR_DEBUG 0
290 # if YYDEBUG | # if BAR_DEBUG
291 extern int bar_debug; extern int bar_debug;
294 /* Tokens. */ /* Tokens. */
295 # ifndef YYTOKENTYPE | # ifndef BAR_TOKENTYPE
296 # define YYTOKENTYPE | # define BAR_TOKENTYPE
297 enum yytokentype { | enum bar_tokentype {
302 #if ! defined YYSTYPE \ | #if ! defined BAR_STYPE \
303 && ! defined YYSTYPE_IS_DECLARED | && ! defined BAR_STYPE_IS_DECLARED
304 typedef union YYSTYPE | typedef union BAR_STYPE
307 } YYSTYPE; | } BAR_STYPE;
308 # define YYSTYPE_IS_DECLARED 1 | # define BAR_STYPE_IS_DECLARED 1
311 extern YYSTYPE bar_lval; | extern BAR_STYPE bar_lval;
313 int bar_parse (void); int bar_parse (void);
315 #endif /* !BAR_FOO_H */ #endif /* !BAR_FOO_H */
317 * Noteworthy changes in release 2.5.1 (2012-06-05) [stable]
321 The next major release will drop support for generating parsers in K&R C.
323 ** yacc.c: YYBACKUP works as expected.
325 ** glr.c improvements:
327 *** Location support is eliminated when not requested:
329 GLR parsers used to include location-related code even when locations were
330 not requested, and therefore not even usable.
332 *** __attribute__ is preserved:
334 __attribute__ is no longer disabled when __STRICT_ANSI__ is defined (i.e.,
335 when -std is passed to GCC).
337 ** lalr1.java: several fixes:
339 The Java parser no longer throws ArrayIndexOutOfBoundsException if the
340 first token leads to a syntax error. Some minor clean ups.
344 *** C++11 compatibility:
346 C and C++ parsers use "nullptr" instead of "0" when __cplusplus is 201103L
351 The header files such as "parser.hh", "location.hh", etc. used a constant
352 name for preprocessor guards, for instance:
354 #ifndef BISON_LOCATION_HH
355 # define BISON_LOCATION_HH
357 #endif // !BISON_LOCATION_HH
359 The inclusion guard is now computed from "PREFIX/FILE-NAME", where lower
360 case characters are converted to upper case, and series of
361 non-alphanumerical characters are converted to an underscore.
363 With "bison -o lang++/parser.cc", "location.hh" would now include:
365 #ifndef YY_LANG_LOCATION_HH
366 # define YY_LANG_LOCATION_HH
368 #endif // !YY_LANG_LOCATION_HH
372 The position and location constructors (and their initialize methods)
373 accept new arguments for line and column. Several issues in the
374 documentation were fixed.
376 ** liby is no longer asking for "rpl_fprintf" on some platforms.
378 ** Changes in the manual:
380 *** %printer is documented
382 The "%printer" directive, supported since at least Bison 1.50, is finally
383 documented. The "mfcalc" example is extended to demonstrate it.
385 For consistency with the C skeletons, the C++ parsers now also support
386 "yyoutput" (as an alias to "debug_stream ()").
388 *** Several improvements have been made:
390 The layout for grammar excerpts was changed to a more compact scheme.
391 Named references are motivated. The description of the automaton
392 description file (*.output) is updated to the current format. Incorrect
393 index entries were fixed. Some other errors were fixed.
397 *** Conflicting prototypes with recent/modified Flex.
399 Fixed build problems with the current, unreleased, version of Flex, and
400 some modified versions of 2.5.35, which have modified function prototypes.
402 *** Warnings during the build procedure have been eliminated.
404 *** Several portability problems in the test suite have been fixed:
406 This includes warnings with some compilers, unexpected behavior of tools
407 such as diff, warning messages from the test suite itself, etc.
409 *** The install-pdf target works properly:
411 Running "make install-pdf" (or -dvi, -html, -info, and -ps) no longer
412 halts in the middle of its course.
414 * Changes in version 2.5 (2011-05-14):
416 ** Grammar symbol names can now contain non-initial dashes:
418 Consistently with directives (such as %error-verbose) and with
419 %define variables (e.g. push-pull), grammar symbol names may contain
420 dashes in any position except the beginning. This is a GNU
421 extension over POSIX Yacc. Thus, use of this extension is reported
422 by -Wyacc and rejected in Yacc mode (--yacc).
426 Historically, Yacc and Bison have supported positional references
427 ($n, $$) to allow access to symbol values from inside of semantic
430 Starting from this version, Bison can also accept named references.
431 When no ambiguity is possible, original symbol names may be used
434 if_stmt : "if" cond_expr "then" then_stmt ';'
435 { $if_stmt = mk_if_stmt($cond_expr, $then_stmt); }
437 In the more common case, explicit names may be declared:
439 stmt[res] : "if" expr[cond] "then" stmt[then] "else" stmt[else] ';'
440 { $res = mk_if_stmt($cond, $then, $else); }
442 Location information is also accessible using @name syntax. When
443 accessing symbol names containing dots or dashes, explicit bracketing
444 ($[sym.1]) must be used.
446 These features are experimental in this version. More user feedback
447 will help to stabilize them.
449 ** IELR(1) and canonical LR(1):
451 IELR(1) is a minimal LR(1) parser table generation algorithm. That
452 is, given any context-free grammar, IELR(1) generates parser tables
453 with the full language-recognition power of canonical LR(1) but with
454 nearly the same number of parser states as LALR(1). This reduction
455 in parser states is often an order of magnitude. More importantly,
456 because canonical LR(1)'s extra parser states may contain duplicate
457 conflicts in the case of non-LR(1) grammars, the number of conflicts
458 for IELR(1) is often an order of magnitude less as well. This can
459 significantly reduce the complexity of developing of a grammar.
461 Bison can now generate IELR(1) and canonical LR(1) parser tables in
462 place of its traditional LALR(1) parser tables, which remain the
463 default. You can specify the type of parser tables in the grammar
464 file with these directives:
468 %define lr.type canonical-lr
470 The default-reduction optimization in the parser tables can also be
471 adjusted using "%define lr.default-reductions". For details on both
472 of these features, see the new section "Tuning LR" in the Bison
475 These features are experimental. More user feedback will help to
478 ** LAC (Lookahead Correction) for syntax error handling:
480 Canonical LR, IELR, and LALR can suffer from a couple of problems
481 upon encountering a syntax error. First, the parser might perform
482 additional parser stack reductions before discovering the syntax
483 error. Such reductions can perform user semantic actions that are
484 unexpected because they are based on an invalid token, and they
485 cause error recovery to begin in a different syntactic context than
486 the one in which the invalid token was encountered. Second, when
487 verbose error messages are enabled (with %error-verbose or the
488 obsolete "#define YYERROR_VERBOSE"), the expected token list in the
489 syntax error message can both contain invalid tokens and omit valid
492 The culprits for the above problems are %nonassoc, default
493 reductions in inconsistent states, and parser state merging. Thus,
494 IELR and LALR suffer the most. Canonical LR can suffer only if
495 %nonassoc is used or if default reductions are enabled for
498 LAC is a new mechanism within the parsing algorithm that solves
499 these problems for canonical LR, IELR, and LALR without sacrificing
500 %nonassoc, default reductions, or state merging. When LAC is in
501 use, canonical LR and IELR behave almost exactly the same for both
502 syntactically acceptable and syntactically unacceptable input.
503 While LALR still does not support the full language-recognition
504 power of canonical LR and IELR, LAC at least enables LALR's syntax
505 error handling to correctly reflect LALR's language-recognition
508 Currently, LAC is only supported for deterministic parsers in C.
509 You can enable LAC with the following directive:
511 %define parse.lac full
513 See the new section "LAC" in the Bison manual for additional
514 details including a few caveats.
516 LAC is an experimental feature. More user feedback will help to
519 ** %define improvements:
521 *** Can now be invoked via the command line:
523 Each of these command-line options
526 --define=NAME[=VALUE]
529 --force-define=NAME[=VALUE]
531 is equivalent to this grammar file declaration
533 %define NAME ["VALUE"]
535 except that the manner in which Bison processes multiple definitions
536 for the same NAME differs. Most importantly, -F and --force-define
537 quietly override %define, but -D and --define do not. For further
538 details, see the section "Bison Options" in the Bison manual.
540 *** Variables renamed:
542 The following %define variables
545 lr.keep_unreachable_states
550 lr.keep-unreachable-states
552 The old names are now deprecated but will be maintained indefinitely
553 for backward compatibility.
555 *** Values no longer need to be quoted in the grammar file:
557 If a %define value is an identifier, it no longer needs to be placed
558 within quotations marks. For example,
560 %define api.push-pull "push"
564 %define api.push-pull push
566 *** Unrecognized variables are now errors not warnings.
568 *** Multiple invocations for any variable is now an error not a warning.
570 ** Unrecognized %code qualifiers are now errors not warnings.
572 ** Character literals not of length one:
574 Previously, Bison quietly converted all character literals to length
575 one. For example, without warning, Bison interpreted the operators in
576 the following grammar to be the same token:
582 Bison now warns when a character literal is not of length one. In
583 some future release, Bison will start reporting an error instead.
585 ** Destructor calls fixed for lookaheads altered in semantic actions:
587 Previously for deterministic parsers in C, if a user semantic action
588 altered yychar, the parser in some cases used the old yychar value to
589 determine which destructor to call for the lookahead upon a syntax
590 error or upon parser return. This bug has been fixed.
592 ** C++ parsers use YYRHSLOC:
594 Similarly to the C parsers, the C++ parsers now define the YYRHSLOC
595 macro and use it in the default YYLLOC_DEFAULT. You are encouraged
596 to use it. If, for instance, your location structure has "first"
597 and "last" members, instead of
599 # define YYLLOC_DEFAULT(Current, Rhs, N) \
603 (Current).first = (Rhs)[1].location.first; \
604 (Current).last = (Rhs)[N].location.last; \
608 (Current).first = (Current).last = (Rhs)[0].location.last; \
614 # define YYLLOC_DEFAULT(Current, Rhs, N) \
618 (Current).first = YYRHSLOC (Rhs, 1).first; \
619 (Current).last = YYRHSLOC (Rhs, N).last; \
623 (Current).first = (Current).last = YYRHSLOC (Rhs, 0).last; \
627 ** YYLLOC_DEFAULT in C++:
629 The default implementation of YYLLOC_DEFAULT used to be issued in
630 the header file. It is now output in the implementation file, after
631 the user %code sections so that its #ifndef guard does not try to
632 override the user's YYLLOC_DEFAULT if provided.
634 ** YYFAIL now produces warnings and Java parsers no longer implement it:
636 YYFAIL has existed for many years as an undocumented feature of
637 deterministic parsers in C generated by Bison. More recently, it was
638 a documented feature of Bison's experimental Java parsers. As
639 promised in Bison 2.4.2's NEWS entry, any appearance of YYFAIL in a
640 semantic action now produces a deprecation warning, and Java parsers
641 no longer implement YYFAIL at all. For further details, including a
642 discussion of how to suppress C preprocessor warnings about YYFAIL
643 being unused, see the Bison 2.4.2 NEWS entry.
645 ** Temporary hack for adding a semicolon to the user action:
647 Previously, Bison appended a semicolon to every user action for
648 reductions when the output language defaulted to C (specifically, when
649 neither %yacc, %language, %skeleton, or equivalent command-line
650 options were specified). This allowed actions such as
652 exp: exp "+" exp { $$ = $1 + $3 };
656 exp: exp "+" exp { $$ = $1 + $3; };
658 As a first step in removing this misfeature, Bison now issues a
659 warning when it appends a semicolon. Moreover, in cases where Bison
660 cannot easily determine whether a semicolon is needed (for example, an
661 action ending with a cpp directive or a braced compound initializer),
662 it no longer appends one. Thus, the C compiler might now complain
663 about a missing semicolon where it did not before. Future releases of
664 Bison will cease to append semicolons entirely.
666 ** Verbose syntax error message fixes:
668 When %error-verbose or the obsolete "#define YYERROR_VERBOSE" is
669 specified, syntax error messages produced by the generated parser
670 include the unexpected token as well as a list of expected tokens.
671 The effect of %nonassoc on these verbose messages has been corrected
672 in two ways, but a more complete fix requires LAC, described above:
674 *** When %nonassoc is used, there can exist parser states that accept no
675 tokens, and so the parser does not always require a lookahead token
676 in order to detect a syntax error. Because no unexpected token or
677 expected tokens can then be reported, the verbose syntax error
678 message described above is suppressed, and the parser instead
679 reports the simpler message, "syntax error". Previously, this
680 suppression was sometimes erroneously triggered by %nonassoc when a
681 lookahead was actually required. Now verbose messages are
682 suppressed only when all previous lookaheads have already been
683 shifted or discarded.
685 *** Previously, the list of expected tokens erroneously included tokens
686 that would actually induce a syntax error because conflicts for them
687 were resolved with %nonassoc in the current parser state. Such
688 tokens are now properly omitted from the list.
690 *** Expected token lists are still often wrong due to state merging
691 (from LALR or IELR) and default reductions, which can both add
692 invalid tokens and subtract valid tokens. Canonical LR almost
693 completely fixes this problem by eliminating state merging and
694 default reductions. However, there is one minor problem left even
695 when using canonical LR and even after the fixes above. That is,
696 if the resolution of a conflict with %nonassoc appears in a later
697 parser state than the one at which some syntax error is
698 discovered, the conflicted token is still erroneously included in
699 the expected token list. Bison's new LAC implementation,
700 described above, eliminates this problem and the need for
701 canonical LR. However, LAC is still experimental and is disabled
704 ** Java skeleton fixes:
706 *** A location handling bug has been fixed.
708 *** The top element of each of the value stack and location stack is now
709 cleared when popped so that it can be garbage collected.
711 *** Parser traces now print the top element of the stack.
713 ** -W/--warnings fixes:
715 *** Bison now properly recognizes the "no-" versions of categories:
717 For example, given the following command line, Bison now enables all
718 warnings except warnings for incompatibilities with POSIX Yacc:
720 bison -Wall,no-yacc gram.y
722 *** Bison now treats S/R and R/R conflicts like other warnings:
724 Previously, conflict reports were independent of Bison's normal
725 warning system. Now, Bison recognizes the warning categories
726 "conflicts-sr" and "conflicts-rr". This change has important
727 consequences for the -W and --warnings command-line options. For
730 bison -Wno-conflicts-sr gram.y # S/R conflicts not reported
731 bison -Wno-conflicts-rr gram.y # R/R conflicts not reported
732 bison -Wnone gram.y # no conflicts are reported
733 bison -Werror gram.y # any conflict is an error
735 However, as before, if the %expect or %expect-rr directive is
736 specified, an unexpected number of conflicts is an error, and an
737 expected number of conflicts is not reported, so -W and --warning
738 then have no effect on the conflict report.
740 *** The "none" category no longer disables a preceding "error":
742 For example, for the following command line, Bison now reports
743 errors instead of warnings for incompatibilities with POSIX Yacc:
745 bison -Werror,none,yacc gram.y
747 *** The "none" category now disables all Bison warnings:
749 Previously, the "none" category disabled only Bison warnings for
750 which there existed a specific -W/--warning category. However,
751 given the following command line, Bison is now guaranteed to
752 suppress all warnings:
756 ** Precedence directives can now assign token number 0:
758 Since Bison 2.3b, which restored the ability of precedence
759 directives to assign token numbers, doing so for token number 0 has
760 produced an assertion failure. For example:
764 This bug has been fixed.
766 * Changes in version 2.4.3 (2010-08-05):
768 ** Bison now obeys -Werror and --warnings=error for warnings about
769 grammar rules that are useless in the parser due to conflicts.
771 ** Problems with spawning M4 on at least FreeBSD 8 and FreeBSD 9 have
774 ** Failures in the test suite for GCC 4.5 have been fixed.
776 ** Failures in the test suite for some versions of Sun Studio C++ have
779 ** Contrary to Bison 2.4.2's NEWS entry, it has been decided that
780 warnings about undefined %prec identifiers will not be converted to
781 errors in Bison 2.5. They will remain warnings, which should be
782 sufficient for POSIX while avoiding backward compatibility issues.
784 ** Minor documentation fixes.
786 * Changes in version 2.4.2 (2010-03-20):
788 ** Some portability problems that resulted in failures and livelocks
789 in the test suite on some versions of at least Solaris, AIX, HP-UX,
790 RHEL4, and Tru64 have been addressed. As a result, fatal Bison
791 errors should no longer cause M4 to report a broken pipe on the
794 ** "%prec IDENTIFIER" requires IDENTIFIER to be defined separately.
796 POSIX specifies that an error be reported for any identifier that does
797 not appear on the LHS of a grammar rule and that is not defined by
798 %token, %left, %right, or %nonassoc. Bison 2.3b and later lost this
799 error report for the case when an identifier appears only after a
800 %prec directive. It is now restored. However, for backward
801 compatibility with recent Bison releases, it is only a warning for
802 now. In Bison 2.5 and later, it will return to being an error.
803 [Between the 2.4.2 and 2.4.3 releases, it was decided that this
804 warning will not be converted to an error in Bison 2.5.]
806 ** Detection of GNU M4 1.4.6 or newer during configure is improved.
808 ** Warnings from gcc's -Wundef option about undefined YYENABLE_NLS,
809 YYLTYPE_IS_TRIVIAL, and __STRICT_ANSI__ in C/C++ parsers are now
812 ** %code is now a permanent feature.
814 A traditional Yacc prologue directive is written in the form:
818 To provide a more flexible alternative, Bison 2.3b introduced the
819 %code directive with the following forms for C/C++:
822 %code requires {CODE}
823 %code provides {CODE}
826 These forms are now considered permanent features of Bison. See the
827 %code entries in the section "Bison Declaration Summary" in the Bison
828 manual for a summary of their functionality. See the section
829 "Prologue Alternatives" for a detailed discussion including the
830 advantages of %code over the traditional Yacc prologue directive.
832 Bison's Java feature as a whole including its current usage of %code
833 is still considered experimental.
835 ** YYFAIL is deprecated and will eventually be removed.
837 YYFAIL has existed for many years as an undocumented feature of
838 deterministic parsers in C generated by Bison. Previously, it was
839 documented for Bison's experimental Java parsers. YYFAIL is no longer
840 documented for Java parsers and is formally deprecated in both cases.
841 Users are strongly encouraged to migrate to YYERROR, which is
844 Like YYERROR, you can invoke YYFAIL from a semantic action in order to
845 induce a syntax error. The most obvious difference from YYERROR is
846 that YYFAIL will automatically invoke yyerror to report the syntax
847 error so that you don't have to. However, there are several other
848 subtle differences between YYERROR and YYFAIL, and YYFAIL suffers from
849 inherent flaws when %error-verbose or "#define YYERROR_VERBOSE" is
850 used. For a more detailed discussion, see:
852 http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/bison-patches/2009-12/msg00024.html
854 The upcoming Bison 2.5 will remove YYFAIL from Java parsers, but
855 deterministic parsers in C will continue to implement it. However,
856 because YYFAIL is already flawed, it seems futile to try to make new
857 Bison features compatible with it. Thus, during parser generation,
858 Bison 2.5 will produce a warning whenever it discovers YYFAIL in a
859 rule action. In a later release, YYFAIL will be disabled for
860 %error-verbose and "#define YYERROR_VERBOSE". Eventually, YYFAIL will
861 be removed altogether.
863 There exists at least one case where Bison 2.5's YYFAIL warning will
864 be a false positive. Some projects add phony uses of YYFAIL and other
865 Bison-defined macros for the sole purpose of suppressing C
866 preprocessor warnings (from GCC cpp's -Wunused-macros, for example).
867 To avoid Bison's future warning, such YYFAIL uses can be moved to the
868 epilogue (that is, after the second "%%") in the Bison input file. In
869 this release (2.4.2), Bison already generates its own code to suppress
870 C preprocessor warnings for YYFAIL, so projects can remove their own
871 phony uses of YYFAIL if compatibility with Bison releases prior to
872 2.4.2 is not necessary.
874 ** Internationalization.
876 Fix a regression introduced in Bison 2.4: Under some circumstances,
877 message translations were not installed although supported by the
880 * Changes in version 2.4.1 (2008-12-11):
882 ** In the GLR defines file, unexpanded M4 macros in the yylval and yylloc
883 declarations have been fixed.
885 ** Temporary hack for adding a semicolon to the user action.
887 Bison used to prepend a trailing semicolon at the end of the user
888 action for reductions. This allowed actions such as
890 exp: exp "+" exp { $$ = $1 + $3 };
894 exp: exp "+" exp { $$ = $1 + $3; };
896 Some grammars still depend on this "feature". Bison 2.4.1 restores
897 the previous behavior in the case of C output (specifically, when
898 neither %language or %skeleton or equivalent command-line options
899 are used) to leave more time for grammars depending on the old
900 behavior to be adjusted. Future releases of Bison will disable this
903 ** A few minor improvements to the Bison manual.
905 * Changes in version 2.4 (2008-11-02):
907 ** %language is an experimental feature.
909 We first introduced this feature in test release 2.3b as a cleaner
910 alternative to %skeleton. Since then, we have discussed the possibility of
911 modifying its effect on Bison's output file names. Thus, in this release,
912 we consider %language to be an experimental feature that will likely evolve
915 ** Forward compatibility with GNU M4 has been improved.
917 ** Several bugs in the C++ skeleton and the experimental Java skeleton have been
920 * Changes in version 2.3b (2008-05-27):
922 ** The quotes around NAME that used to be required in the following directive
927 ** The directive "%pure-parser" is now deprecated in favor of:
931 which has the same effect except that Bison is more careful to warn about
932 unreasonable usage in the latter case.
936 Bison can now generate an LALR(1) parser in C with a push interface. That
937 is, instead of invoking "yyparse", which pulls tokens from "yylex", you can
938 push one token at a time to the parser using "yypush_parse", which will
939 return to the caller after processing each token. By default, the push
940 interface is disabled. Either of the following directives will enable it:
942 %define api.push_pull "push" // Just push; does not require yylex.
943 %define api.push_pull "both" // Push and pull; requires yylex.
945 See the new section "A Push Parser" in the Bison manual for details.
947 The current push parsing interface is experimental and may evolve. More user
948 feedback will help to stabilize it.
950 ** The -g and --graph options now output graphs in Graphviz DOT format,
951 not VCG format. Like --graph, -g now also takes an optional FILE argument
952 and thus cannot be bundled with other short options.
956 Bison can now generate an LALR(1) parser in Java. The skeleton is
957 "data/lalr1.java". Consider using the new %language directive instead of
958 %skeleton to select it.
960 See the new section "Java Parsers" in the Bison manual for details.
962 The current Java interface is experimental and may evolve. More user
963 feedback will help to stabilize it.
967 This new directive specifies the programming language of the generated
968 parser, which can be C (the default), C++, or Java. Besides the skeleton
969 that Bison uses, the directive affects the names of the generated files if
970 the grammar file's name ends in ".y".
972 ** XML Automaton Report
974 Bison can now generate an XML report of the LALR(1) automaton using the new
975 "--xml" option. The current XML schema is experimental and may evolve. More
976 user feedback will help to stabilize it.
978 ** The grammar file may now specify the name of the parser header file using
979 %defines. For example:
983 ** When reporting useless rules, useless nonterminals, and unused terminals,
984 Bison now employs the terms "useless in grammar" instead of "useless",
985 "useless in parser" instead of "never reduced", and "unused in grammar"
988 ** Unreachable State Removal
990 Previously, Bison sometimes generated parser tables containing unreachable
991 states. A state can become unreachable during conflict resolution if Bison
992 disables a shift action leading to it from a predecessor state. Bison now:
994 1. Removes unreachable states.
996 2. Does not report any conflicts that appeared in unreachable states.
997 WARNING: As a result, you may need to update %expect and %expect-rr
998 directives in existing grammar files.
1000 3. For any rule used only in such states, Bison now reports the rule as
1001 "useless in parser due to conflicts".
1003 This feature can be disabled with the following directive:
1005 %define lr.keep_unreachable_states
1007 See the %define entry in the "Bison Declaration Summary" in the Bison manual
1008 for further discussion.
1010 ** Lookahead Set Correction in the ".output" Report
1012 When instructed to generate a ".output" file including lookahead sets
1013 (using "--report=lookahead", for example), Bison now prints each reduction's
1014 lookahead set only next to the associated state's one item that (1) is
1015 associated with the same rule as the reduction and (2) has its dot at the end
1016 of its RHS. Previously, Bison also erroneously printed the lookahead set
1017 next to all of the state's other items associated with the same rule. This
1018 bug affected only the ".output" file and not the generated parser source
1021 ** --report-file=FILE is a new option to override the default ".output" file
1024 ** The "=" that used to be required in the following directives is now
1027 %file-prefix "parser"
1031 ** An Alternative to "%{...%}" -- "%code QUALIFIER {CODE}"
1033 Bison 2.3a provided a new set of directives as a more flexible alternative to
1034 the traditional Yacc prologue blocks. Those have now been consolidated into
1035 a single %code directive with an optional qualifier field, which identifies
1036 the purpose of the code and thus the location(s) where Bison should generate
1039 1. "%code {CODE}" replaces "%after-header {CODE}"
1040 2. "%code requires {CODE}" replaces "%start-header {CODE}"
1041 3. "%code provides {CODE}" replaces "%end-header {CODE}"
1042 4. "%code top {CODE}" replaces "%before-header {CODE}"
1044 See the %code entries in section "Bison Declaration Summary" in the Bison
1045 manual for a summary of the new functionality. See the new section "Prologue
1046 Alternatives" for a detailed discussion including the advantages of %code
1047 over the traditional Yacc prologues.
1049 The prologue alternatives are experimental. More user feedback will help to
1050 determine whether they should become permanent features.
1052 ** Revised warning: unset or unused mid-rule values
1054 Since Bison 2.2, Bison has warned about mid-rule values that are set but not
1055 used within any of the actions of the parent rule. For example, Bison warns
1058 exp: '1' { $$ = 1; } '+' exp { $$ = $1 + $4; };
1060 Now, Bison also warns about mid-rule values that are used but not set. For
1061 example, Bison warns about unset $$ in the mid-rule action in:
1063 exp: '1' { $1 = 1; } '+' exp { $$ = $2 + $4; };
1065 However, Bison now disables both of these warnings by default since they
1066 sometimes prove to be false alarms in existing grammars employing the Yacc
1067 constructs $0 or $-N (where N is some positive integer).
1069 To enable these warnings, specify the option "--warnings=midrule-values" or
1070 "-W", which is a synonym for "--warnings=all".
1072 ** Default %destructor or %printer with "<*>" or "<>"
1074 Bison now recognizes two separate kinds of default %destructor's and
1077 1. Place "<*>" in a %destructor/%printer symbol list to define a default
1078 %destructor/%printer for all grammar symbols for which you have formally
1079 declared semantic type tags.
1081 2. Place "<>" in a %destructor/%printer symbol list to define a default
1082 %destructor/%printer for all grammar symbols without declared semantic
1085 Bison no longer supports the "%symbol-default" notation from Bison 2.3a.
1086 "<*>" and "<>" combined achieve the same effect with one exception: Bison no
1087 longer applies any %destructor to a mid-rule value if that mid-rule value is
1088 not actually ever referenced using either $$ or $n in a semantic action.
1090 The default %destructor's and %printer's are experimental. More user
1091 feedback will help to determine whether they should become permanent
1094 See the section "Freeing Discarded Symbols" in the Bison manual for further
1097 ** %left, %right, and %nonassoc can now declare token numbers. This is required
1098 by POSIX. However, see the end of section "Operator Precedence" in the Bison
1099 manual for a caveat concerning the treatment of literal strings.
1101 ** The nonfunctional --no-parser, -n, and %no-parser options have been
1102 completely removed from Bison.
1104 * Changes in version 2.3a, 2006-09-13:
1106 ** Instead of %union, you can define and use your own union type
1107 YYSTYPE if your grammar contains at least one <type> tag.
1108 Your YYSTYPE need not be a macro; it can be a typedef.
1109 This change is for compatibility with other Yacc implementations,
1110 and is required by POSIX.
1112 ** Locations columns and lines start at 1.
1113 In accordance with the GNU Coding Standards and Emacs.
1115 ** You may now declare per-type and default %destructor's and %printer's:
1119 %union { char *string; }
1120 %token <string> STRING1
1121 %token <string> STRING2
1122 %type <string> string1
1123 %type <string> string2
1124 %union { char character; }
1125 %token <character> CHR
1126 %type <character> chr
1127 %destructor { free ($$); } %symbol-default
1128 %destructor { free ($$); printf ("%d", @$.first_line); } STRING1 string1
1129 %destructor { } <character>
1131 guarantees that, when the parser discards any user-defined symbol that has a
1132 semantic type tag other than "<character>", it passes its semantic value to
1133 "free". However, when the parser discards a "STRING1" or a "string1", it
1134 also prints its line number to "stdout". It performs only the second
1135 "%destructor" in this case, so it invokes "free" only once.
1137 [Although we failed to mention this here in the 2.3a release, the default
1138 %destructor's and %printer's were experimental, and they were rewritten in
1141 ** Except for LALR(1) parsers in C with POSIX Yacc emulation enabled (with "-y",
1142 "--yacc", or "%yacc"), Bison no longer generates #define statements for
1143 associating token numbers with token names. Removing the #define statements
1144 helps to sanitize the global namespace during preprocessing, but POSIX Yacc
1145 requires them. Bison still generates an enum for token names in all cases.
1147 ** Handling of traditional Yacc prologue blocks is now more consistent but
1148 potentially incompatible with previous releases of Bison.
1150 As before, you declare prologue blocks in your grammar file with the
1151 "%{ ... %}" syntax. To generate the pre-prologue, Bison concatenates all
1152 prologue blocks that you've declared before the first %union. To generate
1153 the post-prologue, Bison concatenates all prologue blocks that you've
1154 declared after the first %union.
1156 Previous releases of Bison inserted the pre-prologue into both the header
1157 file and the code file in all cases except for LALR(1) parsers in C. In the
1158 latter case, Bison inserted it only into the code file. For parsers in C++,
1159 the point of insertion was before any token definitions (which associate
1160 token numbers with names). For parsers in C, the point of insertion was
1161 after the token definitions.
1163 Now, Bison never inserts the pre-prologue into the header file. In the code
1164 file, it always inserts it before the token definitions.
1166 ** Bison now provides a more flexible alternative to the traditional Yacc
1167 prologue blocks: %before-header, %start-header, %end-header, and
1170 For example, the following declaration order in the grammar file reflects the
1171 order in which Bison will output these code blocks. However, you are free to
1172 declare these code blocks in your grammar file in whatever order is most
1176 /* Bison treats this block like a pre-prologue block: it inserts it into
1177 * the code file before the contents of the header file. It does *not*
1178 * insert it into the header file. This is a good place to put
1179 * #include's that you want at the top of your code file. A common
1180 * example is '#include "system.h"'. */
1183 /* Bison inserts this block into both the header file and the code file.
1184 * In both files, the point of insertion is before any Bison-generated
1185 * token, semantic type, location type, and class definitions. This is a
1186 * good place to define %union dependencies, for example. */
1189 /* Unlike the traditional Yacc prologue blocks, the output order for the
1190 * new %*-header blocks is not affected by their declaration position
1191 * relative to any %union in the grammar file. */
1194 /* Bison inserts this block into both the header file and the code file.
1195 * In both files, the point of insertion is after the Bison-generated
1196 * definitions. This is a good place to declare or define public
1197 * functions or data structures that depend on the Bison-generated
1201 /* Bison treats this block like a post-prologue block: it inserts it into
1202 * the code file after the contents of the header file. It does *not*
1203 * insert it into the header file. This is a good place to declare or
1204 * define internal functions or data structures that depend on the
1205 * Bison-generated definitions. */
1208 If you have multiple occurrences of any one of the above declarations, Bison
1209 will concatenate the contents in declaration order.
1211 [Although we failed to mention this here in the 2.3a release, the prologue
1212 alternatives were experimental, and they were rewritten in future versions.]
1214 ** The option "--report=look-ahead" has been changed to "--report=lookahead".
1215 The old spelling still works, but is not documented and may be removed
1216 in a future release.
1218 * Changes in version 2.3, 2006-06-05:
1220 ** GLR grammars should now use "YYRECOVERING ()" instead of "YYRECOVERING",
1221 for compatibility with LALR(1) grammars.
1223 ** It is now documented that any definition of YYSTYPE or YYLTYPE should
1224 be to a type name that does not contain parentheses or brackets.
1226 * Changes in version 2.2, 2006-05-19:
1228 ** The distribution terms for all Bison-generated parsers now permit
1229 using the parsers in nonfree programs. Previously, this permission
1230 was granted only for Bison-generated LALR(1) parsers in C.
1232 ** %name-prefix changes the namespace name in C++ outputs.
1234 ** The C++ parsers export their token_type.
1236 ** Bison now allows multiple %union declarations, and concatenates
1237 their contents together.
1239 ** New warning: unused values
1240 Right-hand side symbols whose values are not used are reported,
1241 if the symbols have destructors. For instance:
1243 exp: exp "?" exp ":" exp { $1 ? $1 : $3; }
1247 will trigger a warning about $$ and $5 in the first rule, and $3 in
1248 the second ($1 is copied to $$ by the default rule). This example
1249 most likely contains three errors, and could be rewritten as:
1251 exp: exp "?" exp ":" exp
1252 { $$ = $1 ? $3 : $5; free ($1 ? $5 : $3); free ($1); }
1254 { $$ = $1 ? $1 : $3; if ($1) free ($3); }
1257 However, if the original actions were really intended, memory leaks
1258 and all, the warnings can be suppressed by letting Bison believe the
1259 values are used, e.g.:
1261 exp: exp "?" exp ":" exp { $1 ? $1 : $3; (void) ($$, $5); }
1262 | exp "+" exp { $$ = $1; (void) $3; }
1265 If there are mid-rule actions, the warning is issued if no action
1266 uses it. The following triggers no warning: $1 and $3 are used.
1268 exp: exp { push ($1); } '+' exp { push ($3); sum (); };
1270 The warning is intended to help catching lost values and memory leaks.
1271 If a value is ignored, its associated memory typically is not reclaimed.
1273 ** %destructor vs. YYABORT, YYACCEPT, and YYERROR.
1274 Destructors are now called when user code invokes YYABORT, YYACCEPT,
1275 and YYERROR, for all objects on the stack, other than objects
1276 corresponding to the right-hand side of the current rule.
1278 ** %expect, %expect-rr
1279 Incorrect numbers of expected conflicts are now actual errors,
1280 instead of warnings.
1282 ** GLR, YACC parsers.
1283 The %parse-params are available in the destructors (and the
1284 experimental printers) as per the documentation.
1286 ** Bison now warns if it finds a stray "$" or "@" in an action.
1288 ** %require "VERSION"
1289 This specifies that the grammar file depends on features implemented
1290 in Bison version VERSION or higher.
1292 ** lalr1.cc: The token and value types are now class members.
1293 The tokens were defined as free form enums and cpp macros. YYSTYPE
1294 was defined as a free form union. They are now class members:
1295 tokens are enumerations of the "yy::parser::token" struct, and the
1296 semantic values have the "yy::parser::semantic_type" type.
1298 If you do not want or can update to this scheme, the directive
1299 '%define "global_tokens_and_yystype" "1"' triggers the global
1300 definition of tokens and YYSTYPE. This change is suitable both
1301 for previous releases of Bison, and this one.
1303 If you wish to update, then make sure older version of Bison will
1304 fail using '%require "2.2"'.
1306 ** DJGPP support added.
1308 * Changes in version 2.1, 2005-09-16:
1310 ** The C++ lalr1.cc skeleton supports %lex-param.
1312 ** Bison-generated parsers now support the translation of diagnostics like
1313 "syntax error" into languages other than English. The default
1314 language is still English. For details, please see the new
1315 Internationalization section of the Bison manual. Software
1316 distributors should also see the new PACKAGING file. Thanks to
1317 Bruno Haible for this new feature.
1319 ** Wording in the Bison-generated parsers has been changed slightly to
1320 simplify translation. In particular, the message "memory exhausted"
1321 has replaced "parser stack overflow", as the old message was not
1322 always accurate for modern Bison-generated parsers.
1324 ** Destructors are now called when the parser aborts, for all symbols left
1325 behind on the stack. Also, the start symbol is now destroyed after a
1326 successful parse. In both cases, the behavior was formerly inconsistent.
1328 ** When generating verbose diagnostics, Bison-generated parsers no longer
1329 quote the literal strings associated with tokens. For example, for
1330 a syntax error associated with '%token NUM "number"' they might
1331 print 'syntax error, unexpected number' instead of 'syntax error,
1332 unexpected "number"'.
1334 * Changes in version 2.0, 2004-12-25:
1336 ** Possibly-incompatible changes
1338 - Bison-generated parsers no longer default to using the alloca function
1339 (when available) to extend the parser stack, due to widespread
1340 problems in unchecked stack-overflow detection. You can "#define
1341 YYSTACK_USE_ALLOCA 1" to require the use of alloca, but please read
1342 the manual to determine safe values for YYMAXDEPTH in that case.
1344 - Error token location.
1345 During error recovery, the location of the syntax error is updated
1346 to cover the whole sequence covered by the error token: it includes
1347 the shifted symbols thrown away during the first part of the error
1348 recovery, and the lookahead rejected during the second part.
1350 - Semicolon changes:
1351 . Stray semicolons are no longer allowed at the start of a grammar.
1352 . Semicolons are now required after in-grammar declarations.
1354 - Unescaped newlines are no longer allowed in character constants or
1355 string literals. They were never portable, and GCC 3.4.0 has
1356 dropped support for them. Better diagnostics are now generated if
1357 forget a closing quote.
1359 - NUL bytes are no longer allowed in Bison string literals, unfortunately.
1363 - GLR grammars now support locations.
1365 - New directive: %initial-action.
1366 This directive allows the user to run arbitrary code (including
1367 initializing @$) from yyparse before parsing starts.
1369 - A new directive "%expect-rr N" specifies the expected number of
1370 reduce/reduce conflicts in GLR parsers.
1372 - %token numbers can now be hexadecimal integers, e.g., "%token FOO 0x12d".
1373 This is a GNU extension.
1375 - The option "--report=lookahead" was changed to "--report=look-ahead".
1376 [However, this was changed back after 2.3.]
1378 - Experimental %destructor support has been added to lalr1.cc.
1380 - New configure option --disable-yacc, to disable installation of the
1381 yacc command and -ly library introduced in 1.875 for POSIX conformance.
1385 - For now, %expect-count violations are now just warnings, not errors.
1386 This is for compatibility with Bison 1.75 and earlier (when there are
1387 reduce/reduce conflicts) and with Bison 1.30 and earlier (when there
1388 are too many or too few shift/reduce conflicts). However, in future
1389 versions of Bison we plan to improve the %expect machinery so that
1390 these violations will become errors again.
1392 - Within Bison itself, numbers (e.g., goto numbers) are no longer
1393 arbitrarily limited to 16-bit counts.
1395 - Semicolons are now allowed before "|" in grammar rules, as POSIX requires.
1397 * Changes in version 1.875, 2003-01-01:
1399 ** The documentation license has been upgraded to version 1.2
1400 of the GNU Free Documentation License.
1402 ** syntax error processing
1404 - In Yacc-style parsers YYLLOC_DEFAULT is now used to compute error
1405 locations too. This fixes bugs in error-location computation.
1408 It is now possible to reclaim the memory associated to symbols
1409 discarded during error recovery. This feature is still experimental.
1412 This new directive is preferred over YYERROR_VERBOSE.
1414 - #defining yyerror to steal internal variables is discouraged.
1415 It is not guaranteed to work forever.
1417 ** POSIX conformance
1419 - Semicolons are once again optional at the end of grammar rules.
1420 This reverts to the behavior of Bison 1.33 and earlier, and improves
1421 compatibility with Yacc.
1423 - "parse error" -> "syntax error"
1424 Bison now uniformly uses the term "syntax error"; formerly, the code
1425 and manual sometimes used the term "parse error" instead. POSIX
1426 requires "syntax error" in diagnostics, and it was thought better to
1429 - The documentation now emphasizes that yylex and yyerror must be
1430 declared before use. C99 requires this.
1432 - Bison now parses C99 lexical constructs like UCNs and
1433 backslash-newline within C escape sequences, as POSIX 1003.1-2001 requires.
1435 - File names are properly escaped in C output. E.g., foo\bar.y is
1436 output as "foo\\bar.y".
1438 - Yacc command and library now available
1439 The Bison distribution now installs a "yacc" command, as POSIX requires.
1440 Also, Bison now installs a small library liby.a containing
1441 implementations of Yacc-compatible yyerror and main functions.
1442 This library is normally not useful, but POSIX requires it.
1444 - Type clashes now generate warnings, not errors.
1446 - If the user does not define YYSTYPE as a macro, Bison now declares it
1447 using typedef instead of defining it as a macro.
1448 For consistency, YYLTYPE is also declared instead of defined.
1450 ** Other compatibility issues
1452 - %union directives can now have a tag before the "{", e.g., the
1453 directive "%union foo {...}" now generates the C code
1454 "typedef union foo { ... } YYSTYPE;"; this is for Yacc compatibility.
1455 The default union tag is "YYSTYPE", for compatibility with Solaris 9 Yacc.
1456 For consistency, YYLTYPE's struct tag is now "YYLTYPE" not "yyltype".
1457 This is for compatibility with both Yacc and Bison 1.35.
1459 - ";" is output before the terminating "}" of an action, for
1460 compatibility with Bison 1.35.
1462 - Bison now uses a Yacc-style format for conflict reports, e.g.,
1463 "conflicts: 2 shift/reduce, 1 reduce/reduce".
1465 - "yystype" and "yyltype" are now obsolescent macros instead of being
1466 typedefs or tags; they are no longer documented and are planned to be
1467 withdrawn in a future release.
1472 Users of Bison have to decide how they handle the portability of the
1475 - "parsing stack overflow..." -> "parser stack overflow"
1476 GLR parsers now report "parser stack overflow" as per the Bison manual.
1478 ** %parse-param and %lex-param
1479 The macros YYPARSE_PARAM and YYLEX_PARAM provide a means to pass
1480 additional context to yyparse and yylex. They suffer from several
1483 - a single argument only can be added,
1484 - their types are weak (void *),
1485 - this context is not passed to ancillary functions such as yyerror,
1486 - only yacc.c parsers support them.
1488 The new %parse-param/%lex-param directives provide a more precise control.
1491 %parse-param {int *nastiness}
1492 %lex-param {int *nastiness}
1493 %parse-param {int *randomness}
1495 results in the following signatures:
1497 int yylex (int *nastiness);
1498 int yyparse (int *nastiness, int *randomness);
1500 or, if both %pure-parser and %locations are used:
1502 int yylex (YYSTYPE *lvalp, YYLTYPE *llocp, int *nastiness);
1503 int yyparse (int *nastiness, int *randomness);
1505 ** Bison now warns if it detects conflicting outputs to the same file,
1506 e.g., it generates a warning for "bison -d -o foo.h foo.y" since
1507 that command outputs both code and header to foo.h.
1509 ** #line in output files
1510 - --no-line works properly.
1512 ** Bison can no longer be built by a K&R C compiler; it requires C89 or
1513 later to be built. This change originally took place a few versions
1514 ago, but nobody noticed until we recently asked someone to try
1515 building Bison with a K&R C compiler.
1517 * Changes in version 1.75, 2002-10-14:
1519 ** Bison should now work on 64-bit hosts.
1521 ** Indonesian translation thanks to Tedi Heriyanto.
1524 Fix spurious parse errors.
1527 Some people redefine yyerror to steal yyparse' private variables.
1528 Reenable this trick until an official feature replaces it.
1531 In agreement with POSIX and with other Yaccs, leaving a default
1532 action is valid when $$ is untyped, and $1 typed:
1536 but the converse remains an error:
1540 ** Values of mid-rule actions
1543 foo: { ... } { $$ = $1; } ...
1545 was incorrectly rejected: $1 is defined in the second mid-rule
1546 action, and is equal to the $$ of the first mid-rule action.
1548 * Changes in version 1.50, 2002-10-04:
1553 causes Bison to produce a Generalized LR (GLR) parser, capable of handling
1554 almost any context-free grammar, ambiguous or not. The new declarations
1555 %dprec and %merge on grammar rules allow parse-time resolution of
1556 ambiguities. Contributed by Paul Hilfinger.
1558 Unfortunately Bison 1.50 does not work properly on 64-bit hosts
1559 like the Alpha, so please stick to 32-bit hosts for now.
1562 When not in Yacc compatibility mode, when the output file was not
1563 specified, running "bison foo/bar.y" created "foo/bar.c". It
1564 now creates "bar.c".
1567 The undefined token was systematically mapped to 2 which prevented
1568 the use of 2 by the user. This is no longer the case.
1570 ** Unknown token numbers
1571 If yylex returned an out of range value, yyparse could die. This is
1575 According to POSIX, the error token must be 256.
1576 Bison extends this requirement by making it a preference: *if* the
1577 user specified that one of her tokens is numbered 256, then error
1578 will be mapped onto another number.
1580 ** Verbose error messages
1581 They no longer report "..., expecting error or..." for states where
1582 error recovery is possible.
1585 Defaults to "$end" instead of "$".
1587 ** Error recovery now conforms to documentation and to POSIX
1588 When a Bison-generated parser encounters a syntax error, it now pops
1589 the stack until it finds a state that allows shifting the error
1590 token. Formerly, it popped the stack until it found a state that
1591 allowed some non-error action other than a default reduction on the
1592 error token. The new behavior has long been the documented behavior,
1593 and has long been required by POSIX. For more details, please see
1594 Paul Eggert, "Reductions during Bison error handling" (2002-05-20)
1595 <http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/bug-bison/2002-05/msg00038.html>.
1598 Popped tokens and nonterminals are now reported.
1601 Larger grammars are now supported (larger token numbers, larger grammar
1602 size (= sum of the LHS and RHS lengths), larger LALR tables).
1603 Formerly, many of these numbers ran afoul of 16-bit limits;
1604 now these limits are 32 bits on most hosts.
1606 ** Explicit initial rule
1607 Bison used to play hacks with the initial rule, which the user does
1608 not write. It is now explicit, and visible in the reports and
1612 Before, Bison reported the useless rules, but, although not used,
1613 included them in the parsers. They are now actually removed.
1615 ** Useless rules, useless nonterminals
1616 They are now reported, as a warning, with their locations.
1618 ** Rules never reduced
1619 Rules that can never be reduced because of conflicts are now
1622 ** Incorrect "Token not used"
1623 On a grammar such as
1625 %token useless useful
1627 exp: '0' %prec useful;
1629 where a token was used to set the precedence of the last rule,
1630 bison reported both "useful" and "useless" as useless tokens.
1632 ** Revert the C++ namespace changes introduced in 1.31
1633 as they caused too many portability hassles.
1635 ** Default locations
1636 By an accident of design, the default computation of @$ was
1637 performed after another default computation was performed: @$ = @1.
1638 The latter is now removed: YYLLOC_DEFAULT is fully responsible of
1639 the computation of @$.
1641 ** Token end-of-file
1642 The token end of file may be specified by the user, in which case,
1643 the user symbol is used in the reports, the graphs, and the verbose
1644 error messages instead of "$end", which remains being the default.
1648 %token MYEOF 0 "end of file"
1651 This old option, which has been broken for ages, is removed.
1654 Brazilian Portuguese, thanks to Alexandre Folle de Menezes.
1655 Croatian, thanks to Denis Lackovic.
1657 ** Incorrect token definitions
1660 bison used to output
1663 ** Token definitions as enums
1664 Tokens are output both as the traditional #define's, and, provided
1665 the compiler supports ANSI C or is a C++ compiler, as enums.
1666 This lets debuggers display names instead of integers.
1669 In addition to --verbose, bison supports --report=THINGS, which
1670 produces additional information:
1672 complete the core item sets with their closure
1673 - lookahead [changed to "look-ahead" in 1.875e through 2.3, but changed back]
1674 explicitly associate lookahead tokens to items
1676 describe shift/reduce conflicts solving.
1677 Bison used to systematically output this information on top of
1678 the report. Solved conflicts are now attached to their states.
1681 Previous versions don't complain when there is a type clash on
1682 the default action if the rule has a mid-rule action, such as in:
1690 ** GNU M4 is now required when using Bison.
1692 * Changes in version 1.35, 2002-03-25:
1695 Some projects use Bison's C parser with C++ compilers, and define
1696 YYSTYPE as a class. The recent adjustment of C parsers for data
1697 alignment and 64 bit architectures made this impossible.
1699 Because for the time being no real solution for C++ parser
1700 generation exists, kludges were implemented in the parser to
1701 maintain this use. In the future, when Bison has C++ parsers, this
1702 kludge will be disabled.
1704 This kludge also addresses some C++ problems when the stack was
1707 * Changes in version 1.34, 2002-03-12:
1709 ** File name clashes are detected
1710 $ bison foo.y -d -o foo.x
1711 fatal error: header and parser would both be named "foo.x"
1713 ** A missing ";" at the end of a rule triggers a warning
1714 In accordance with POSIX, and in agreement with other
1715 Yacc implementations, Bison will mandate this semicolon in the near
1716 future. This eases the implementation of a Bison parser of Bison
1717 grammars by making this grammar LALR(1) instead of LR(2). To
1718 facilitate the transition, this release introduces a warning.
1720 ** Revert the C++ namespace changes introduced in 1.31, as they caused too
1721 many portability hassles.
1723 ** DJGPP support added.
1725 ** Fix test suite portability problems.
1727 * Changes in version 1.33, 2002-02-07:
1730 Groff could not be compiled for the definition of size_t was lacking
1731 under some conditions.
1736 * Changes in version 1.32, 2002-01-23:
1738 ** Fix Yacc output file names
1740 ** Portability fixes
1742 ** Italian, Dutch translations
1744 * Changes in version 1.31, 2002-01-14:
1748 ** GNU Gettext and %expect
1749 GNU Gettext asserts 10 s/r conflicts, but there are 7. Now that
1750 Bison dies on incorrect %expectations, we fear there will be
1751 too many bug reports for Gettext, so _for the time being_, %expect
1752 does not trigger an error when the input file is named "plural.y".
1754 ** Use of alloca in parsers
1755 If YYSTACK_USE_ALLOCA is defined to 0, then the parsers will use
1756 malloc exclusively. Since 1.29, but was not NEWS'ed.
1758 alloca is used only when compiled with GCC, to avoid portability
1761 ** yyparse now returns 2 if memory is exhausted; formerly it dumped core.
1763 ** When the generated parser lacks debugging code, YYDEBUG is now 0
1764 (as POSIX requires) instead of being undefined.
1767 Bison has always permitted actions such as { $$ = $1 }: it adds the
1768 ending semicolon. Now if in Yacc compatibility mode, the semicolon
1769 is no longer output: one has to write { $$ = $1; }.
1771 ** Better C++ compliance
1772 The output parsers try to respect C++ namespaces.
1773 [This turned out to be a failed experiment, and it was reverted later.]
1776 Fixed bugs when reporting useless nonterminals.
1779 The parsers work properly on 64 bit hosts.
1782 Some calls to strerror resulted in scrambled or missing error messages.
1785 When the number of shift/reduce conflicts is correct, don't issue
1788 ** The verbose report includes the rule line numbers.
1790 ** Rule line numbers are fixed in traces.
1792 ** Swedish translation
1795 Verbose parse error messages from the parsers are better looking.
1796 Before: parse error: unexpected `'/'', expecting `"number"' or `'-'' or `'(''
1797 Now: parse error: unexpected '/', expecting "number" or '-' or '('
1799 ** Fixed parser memory leaks.
1800 When the generated parser was using malloc to extend its stacks, the
1801 previous allocations were not freed.
1803 ** Fixed verbose output file.
1804 Some newlines were missing.
1805 Some conflicts in state descriptions were missing.
1807 ** Fixed conflict report.
1808 Option -v was needed to get the result.
1812 Mismatches are errors, not warnings.
1814 ** Fixed incorrect processing of some invalid input.
1816 ** Fixed CPP guards: 9foo.h uses BISON_9FOO_H instead of 9FOO_H.
1818 ** Fixed some typos in the documentation.
1820 ** %token MY_EOF 0 is supported.
1821 Before, MY_EOF was silently renumbered as 257.
1823 ** doc/refcard.tex is updated.
1825 ** %output, %file-prefix, %name-prefix.
1829 New, aliasing "--output-file".
1831 * Changes in version 1.30, 2001-10-26:
1833 ** "--defines" and "--graph" have now an optional argument which is the
1834 output file name. "-d" and "-g" do not change; they do not take any
1837 ** "%source_extension" and "%header_extension" are removed, failed
1840 ** Portability fixes.
1842 * Changes in version 1.29, 2001-09-07:
1844 ** The output file does not define const, as this caused problems when used
1845 with common autoconfiguration schemes. If you still use ancient compilers
1846 that lack const, compile with the equivalent of the C compiler option
1847 "-Dconst=". Autoconf's AC_C_CONST macro provides one way to do this.
1849 ** Added "-g" and "--graph".
1851 ** The Bison manual is now distributed under the terms of the GNU FDL.
1853 ** The input and the output files has automatically a similar extension.
1855 ** Russian translation added.
1857 ** NLS support updated; should hopefully be less troublesome.
1859 ** Added the old Bison reference card.
1861 ** Added "--locations" and "%locations".
1863 ** Added "-S" and "--skeleton".
1865 ** "%raw", "-r", "--raw" is disabled.
1867 ** Special characters are escaped when output. This solves the problems
1868 of the #line lines with path names including backslashes.
1871 "%yacc", "%fixed_output_files", "%defines", "%no_parser", "%verbose",
1872 "%debug", "%source_extension" and "%header_extension".
1875 Automatic location tracking.
1877 * Changes in version 1.28, 1999-07-06:
1879 ** Should compile better now with K&R compilers.
1883 ** Fixed a problem with escaping the double quote character.
1885 ** There is now a FAQ.
1887 * Changes in version 1.27:
1889 ** The make rule which prevented bison.simple from being created on
1890 some systems has been fixed.
1892 * Changes in version 1.26:
1894 ** Bison now uses Automake.
1896 ** New mailing lists: <bug-bison@gnu.org> and <help-bison@gnu.org>.
1898 ** Token numbers now start at 257 as previously documented, not 258.
1900 ** Bison honors the TMPDIR environment variable.
1902 ** A couple of buffer overruns have been fixed.
1904 ** Problems when closing files should now be reported.
1906 ** Generated parsers should now work even on operating systems which do
1907 not provide alloca().
1909 * Changes in version 1.25, 1995-10-16:
1911 ** Errors in the input grammar are not fatal; Bison keeps reading
1912 the grammar file, and reports all the errors found in it.
1914 ** Tokens can now be specified as multiple-character strings: for
1915 example, you could use "<=" for a token which looks like <=, instead
1916 of choosing a name like LESSEQ.
1918 ** The %token_table declaration says to write a table of tokens (names
1919 and numbers) into the parser file. The yylex function can use this
1920 table to recognize multiple-character string tokens, or for other
1923 ** The %no_lines declaration says not to generate any #line preprocessor
1924 directives in the parser file.
1926 ** The %raw declaration says to use internal Bison token numbers, not
1927 Yacc-compatible token numbers, when token names are defined as macros.
1929 ** The --no-parser option produces the parser tables without including
1930 the parser engine; a project can now use its own parser engine.
1931 The actions go into a separate file called NAME.act, in the form of
1932 a switch statement body.
1934 * Changes in version 1.23:
1936 The user can define YYPARSE_PARAM as the name of an argument to be
1937 passed into yyparse. The argument should have type void *. It should
1938 actually point to an object. Grammar actions can access the variable
1939 by casting it to the proper pointer type.
1941 Line numbers in output file corrected.
1943 * Changes in version 1.22:
1945 --help option added.
1947 * Changes in version 1.20:
1949 Output file does not redefine const for C++.
1953 Copyright (C) 1995-2012 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
1955 This file is part of Bison, the GNU Parser Generator.
1957 This program is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify
1958 it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
1959 the Free Software Foundation, either version 3 of the License, or
1960 (at your option) any later version.
1962 This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
1963 but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
1964 MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the
1965 GNU General Public License for more details.
1967 You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
1968 along with this program. If not, see <http://www.gnu.org/licenses/>.
1970 LocalWords: yacc YYBACKUP glr GCC lalr ArrayIndexOutOfBoundsException nullptr
1971 LocalWords: cplusplus liby rpl fprintf mfcalc Wyacc stmt cond expr mk sym lr
1972 LocalWords: IELR ielr Lookahead YYERROR nonassoc LALR's api lookaheads yychar
1973 LocalWords: destructor lookahead YYRHSLOC YYLLOC Rhs ifndef YYFAIL cpp sr rr
1974 LocalWords: preprocessor initializer Wno Wnone Werror FreeBSD prec livelocks
1975 LocalWords: Solaris AIX UX RHEL Tru LHS gcc's Wundef YYENABLE NLS YYLTYPE VCG
1976 LocalWords: yyerror cpp's Wunused yylval yylloc prepend yyparse yylex yypush
1977 LocalWords: Graphviz xml nonterminals midrule destructor's YYSTYPE typedef ly
1978 LocalWords: CHR chr printf stdout namespace preprocessing enum pre include's
1979 LocalWords: YYRECOVERING nonfree destructors YYABORT YYACCEPT params enums de
1980 LocalWords: struct yystype DJGPP lex param Haible NUM alloca YYSTACK NUL goto
1981 LocalWords: YYMAXDEPTH Unescaped UCNs YYLTYPE's yyltype typedefs inline Yaccs
1982 LocalWords: Heriyanto Reenable dprec Hilfinger Eggert MYEOF Folle Menezes EOF
1983 LocalWords: Lackovic define's itemset Groff Gettext malloc NEWS'ed YYDEBUG YY
1984 LocalWords: namespaces strerror const autoconfiguration Dconst Autoconf's FDL
1985 LocalWords: Automake TMPDIR LESSEQ ylwrap endif yydebug YYTOKEN YYLSP ival hh
1986 LocalWords: extern YYTOKENTYPE TOKENTYPE yytokentype tokentype STYPE lval pdf
1987 LocalWords: lang yyoutput dvi html ps POSIX lvalp llocp Wother nterm arg init