3 * Noteworthy changes in release ?.? (????-??-??) [?]
6 * Noteworthy changes in release 2.7.91 (2013-06-24) [beta]
8 ** Java skeleton improvements
10 The Java skeleton now supports push parsing.
11 Contributed by Dennis Heimbigner.
13 * Noteworthy changes in release 2.7.90 (2013-05-30) [beta]
15 ** WARNING: Future backward-incompatibilities!
17 Like other GNU packages, Bison will start using some of the C99 features
18 for its own code, especially the definition of variables after statements.
19 The generated C parsers still aim at C90.
21 ** Backward incompatible changes
25 Support for YYFAIL is removed (deprecated in Bison 2.4.2): use YYERROR.
27 Support for yystype and yyltype is removed (deprecated in Bison 1.875):
28 use YYSTYPE and YYLTYPE.
30 Support for YYLEX_PARAM and YYPARSE_PARAM is removed (deprecated in Bison
31 1.875): use %lex-param, %parse-param, or %param.
33 Missing semicolons at the end of actions are no longer added (as announced
36 *** Use of YACC='bison -y'
38 TL;DR: With Autoconf <= 2.69, pass -Wno-yacc to (AM_)YFLAGS if you use
41 Traditional Yacc generates 'y.tab.c' whatever the name of the input file.
42 Therefore Makefiles written for Yacc expect 'y.tab.c' (and possibly
43 'y.tab.h' and 'y.outout') to be generated from 'foo.y'.
45 To this end, for ages, AC_PROG_YACC, Autoconf's macro to look for an
46 implementation of Yacc, was using Bison as 'bison -y'. While it does
47 ensure compatible output file names, it also enables warnings for
48 incompatibilities with POSIX Yacc. In other words, 'bison -y' triggers
49 warnings for Bison extensions.
51 Autoconf 2.70+ fixes this incompatibility by using YACC='bison -o y.tab.c'
52 (which also generates 'y.tab.h' and 'y.output' when needed).
53 Alternatively, disable Yacc warnings by passing '-Wno-yacc' to your Yacc
54 flags (YFLAGS, or AM_YFLAGS with Automake).
58 *** The epilogue is no longer affected by internal #defines (glr.c)
60 The glr.c skeleton uses defines such as #define yylval (yystackp->yyval) in
61 generated code. These weren't properly undefined before the inclusion of
62 the user epilogue, so functions such as the following were butchered by the
63 preprocessor expansion:
65 int yylex (YYSTYPE *yylval);
67 This is fixed: yylval, yynerrs, yychar, and yylloc are now valid
68 identifiers for user-provided variables.
70 *** stdio.h is no longer needed when locations are enabled (yacc.c)
72 Changes in Bison 2.7 introduced a dependency on FILE and fprintf when
73 locations are enabled. This is fixed.
75 *** Warnings about useless %pure-parser/%define api.pure are restored
77 ** Diagnostics reported by Bison
79 Most of these features were contributed by Théophile Ranquet and Victor
84 Version 2.7 introduced caret errors, for a prettier output. These are now
85 activated by default. The old format can still be used by invoking Bison
86 with -fno-caret (or -fnone).
88 Some error messages that reproduced excerpts of the grammar are now using
89 the caret information only. For instance on:
96 in.y: warning: 1 reduce/reduce conflict [-Wconflicts-rr]
97 in.y:2.12-14: warning: rule useless in parser due to conflicts: exp: 'a' [-Wother]
101 in.y: warning: 1 reduce/reduce conflict [-Wconflicts-rr]
102 in.y:2.12-14: warning: rule useless in parser due to conflicts [-Wother]
106 and "bison -fno-caret" reports:
108 in.y: warning: 1 reduce/reduce conflict [-Wconflicts-rr]
109 in.y:2.12-14: warning: rule useless in parser due to conflicts [-Wother]
111 *** Enhancements of the -Werror option
113 The -Werror=CATEGORY option is now recognized, and will treat specified
114 warnings as errors. The warnings need not have been explicitly activated
115 using the -W option, this is similar to what GCC 4.7 does.
117 For example, given the following command line, Bison will treat both
118 warnings related to POSIX Yacc incompatibilities and S/R conflicts as
119 errors (and only those):
121 $ bison -Werror=yacc,error=conflicts-sr input.y
123 If no categories are specified, -Werror will make all active warnings into
124 errors. For example, the following line does the same the previous example:
126 $ bison -Werror -Wnone -Wyacc -Wconflicts-sr input.y
128 (By default -Wconflicts-sr,conflicts-rr,deprecated,other is enabled.)
130 Note that the categories in this -Werror option may not be prefixed with
131 "no-". However, -Wno-error[=CATEGORY] is valid.
133 Note that -y enables -Werror=yacc. Therefore it is now possible to require
134 Yacc-like behavior (e.g., always generate y.tab.c), but to report
135 incompatibilities as warnings: "-y -Wno-error=yacc".
137 *** The display of warnings is now richer
139 The option that controls a given warning is now displayed:
141 foo.y:4.6: warning: type clash on default action: <foo> != <bar> [-Wother]
143 In the case of warnings treated as errors, the prefix is changed from
144 "warning: " to "error: ", and the suffix is displayed, in a manner similar
145 to GCC, as [-Werror=CATEGORY].
147 For instance, where the previous version of Bison would report (and exit
150 bison: warnings being treated as errors
151 input.y:1.1: warning: stray ',' treated as white space
155 input.y:1.1: error: stray ',' treated as white space [-Werror=other]
157 *** Deprecated constructs
159 The new 'deprecated' warning category flags obsolete constructs whose
160 support will be discontinued. It is enabled by default. These warnings
161 used to be reported as 'other' warnings.
163 *** Useless semantic types
165 Bison now warns about useless (uninhabited) semantic types. Since
166 semantic types are not declared to Bison (they are defined in the opaque
167 %union structure), it is %printer/%destructor directives about useless
168 types that trigger the warning:
172 %printer {} <type1> <type3>
173 %destructor {} <type2> <type4>
175 nterm: term { $$ = $1; };
177 3.28-34: warning: type <type3> is used, but is not associated to any symbol
178 4.28-34: warning: type <type4> is used, but is not associated to any symbol
180 *** Undefined but unused symbols
182 Bison used to raise an error for undefined symbols that are not used in
183 the grammar. This is now only a warning.
186 %destructor {} symbol2
191 *** Useless destructors or printers
193 Bison now warns about useless destructors or printers. In the following
194 example, the printer for <type1>, and the destructor for <type2> are
195 useless: all symbols of <type1> (token1) already have a printer, and all
196 symbols of type <type2> (token2) already have a destructor.
198 %token <type1> token1
202 %printer {} token1 <type1> <type3>
203 %destructor {} token2 <type2> <type4>
207 The warnings and error messages about shift/reduce and reduce/reduce
208 conflicts have been normalized. For instance on the following foo.y file:
212 exp: exp '+' exp | '0' | '0';
214 compare the previous version of bison:
217 foo.y: conflicts: 1 shift/reduce, 2 reduce/reduce
218 $ bison -Werror foo.y
219 bison: warnings being treated as errors
220 foo.y: conflicts: 1 shift/reduce, 2 reduce/reduce
222 with the new behavior:
225 foo.y: warning: 1 shift/reduce conflict [-Wconflicts-sr]
226 foo.y: warning: 2 reduce/reduce conflicts [-Wconflicts-rr]
227 $ bison -Werror foo.y
228 foo.y: error: 1 shift/reduce conflict [-Werror=conflicts-sr]
229 foo.y: error: 2 reduce/reduce conflicts [-Werror=conflicts-rr]
231 When %expect or %expect-rr is used, such as with bar.y:
236 exp: exp '+' exp | '0' | '0';
241 bar.y: conflicts: 1 shift/reduce, 2 reduce/reduce
242 bar.y: expected 0 shift/reduce conflicts
243 bar.y: expected 0 reduce/reduce conflicts
248 bar.y: error: shift/reduce conflicts: 1 found, 0 expected
249 bar.y: error: reduce/reduce conflicts: 2 found, 0 expected
251 ** Incompatibilities with POSIX Yacc
253 The 'yacc' category is no longer part of '-Wall', enable it explicitly
256 ** Additional yylex/yyparse arguments
258 The new directive %param declares additional arguments to both yylex and
259 yyparse. The %lex-param, %parse-param, and %param directives support one
260 or more arguments. Instead of
262 %lex-param {arg1_type *arg1}
263 %lex-param {arg2_type *arg2}
264 %parse-param {arg1_type *arg1}
265 %parse-param {arg2_type *arg2}
269 %param {arg1_type *arg1} {arg2_type *arg2}
271 ** Types of values for %define variables
273 Bison used to make no difference between '%define foo bar' and '%define
274 foo "bar"'. The former is now called a 'keyword value', and the latter a
275 'string value'. A third kind was added: 'code values', such as '%define
278 Keyword variables are used for fixed value sets, e.g.,
282 Code variables are used for value in the target language, e.g.,
284 %define api.value.type {struct semantic_type}
286 String variables are used remaining cases, e.g. file names.
288 ** Variable api.token.prefix
290 The variable api.token.prefix changes the way tokens are identified in
291 the generated files. This is especially useful to avoid collisions
292 with identifiers in the target language. For instance
294 %token FILE for ERROR
295 %define api.token.prefix {TOK_}
297 start: FILE for ERROR;
299 will generate the definition of the symbols TOK_FILE, TOK_for, and
300 TOK_ERROR in the generated sources. In particular, the scanner must
301 use these prefixed token names, although the grammar itself still
302 uses the short names (as in the sample rule given above).
304 ** Variable api.value.type
306 This new %define variable supersedes the #define macro YYSTYPE. The use
307 of YYSTYPE is discouraged. In particular, #defining YYSTYPE *and* either
308 using %union or %defining api.value.type results in undefined behavior.
310 Either define api.value.type, or use "%union":
317 %token <ival> INT "integer"
318 %token <sval> STRING "string"
319 %printer { fprintf (yyo, "%d", $$); } <ival>
320 %destructor { free ($$); } <sval>
323 yylval.ival = 42; return INT;
324 yylval.sval = "42"; return STRING;
326 The %define variable api.value.type supports both keyword and code values.
328 The keyword value 'union' means that the user provides genuine types, not
329 union member names such as "ival" and "sval" above (WARNING: will fail if
330 -y/--yacc/%yacc is enabled).
332 %define api.value.type union
333 %token <int> INT "integer"
334 %token <char *> STRING "string"
335 %printer { fprintf (yyo, "%d", $$); } <int>
336 %destructor { free ($$); } <char *>
339 yylval.INT = 42; return INT;
340 yylval.STRING = "42"; return STRING;
342 The keyword value variant is somewhat equivalent, but for C++ special
343 provision is made to allow classes to be used (more about this below).
345 %define api.value.type variant
346 %token <int> INT "integer"
347 %token <std::string> STRING "string"
349 Code values (in braces) denote user defined types. This is where YYSTYPE
367 %define api.value.type {struct my_value}
368 %token <u.ival> INT "integer"
369 %token <u.sval> STRING "string"
370 %printer { fprintf (yyo, "%d", $$); } <u.ival>
371 %destructor { free ($$); } <u.sval>
374 yylval.u.ival = 42; return INT;
375 yylval.u.sval = "42"; return STRING;
377 ** Variable parse.error
379 This variable controls the verbosity of error messages. The use of the
380 %error-verbose directive is deprecated in favor of "%define parse.error
383 ** Renamed %define variables
385 The following variables have been renamed for consistency. Backward
386 compatibility is ensured, but upgrading is recommended.
388 lr.default-reductions -> lr.default-reduction
389 lr.keep-unreachable-states -> lr.keep-unreachable-state
390 namespace -> api.namespace
391 stype -> api.value.type
393 ** Semantic predicates
395 Contributed by Paul Hilfinger.
397 The new, experimental, semantic-predicate feature allows actions of the
398 form "%?{ BOOLEAN-EXPRESSION }", which cause syntax errors (as for
399 YYERROR) if the expression evaluates to 0, and are evaluated immediately
400 in GLR parsers, rather than being deferred. The result is that they allow
401 the programmer to prune possible parses based on the values of run-time
404 ** The directive %expect-rr is now an error in non GLR mode
406 It used to be an error only if used in non GLR mode, _and_ if there are
407 reduce/reduce conflicts.
409 ** Tokens are numbered in their order of appearance
411 Contributed by Valentin Tolmer.
413 With '%token A B', A had a number less than the one of B. However,
414 precedence declarations used to generate a reversed order. This is now
415 fixed, and introducing tokens with any of %token, %left, %right,
416 %precedence, or %nonassoc yields the same result.
418 When mixing declarations of tokens with a litteral character (e.g., 'a')
419 or with an identifier (e.g., B) in a precedence declaration, Bison
420 numbered the litteral characters first. For example
424 would lead to the tokens declared in this order: 'c' 'd' A B. Again, the
425 input order is now preserved.
427 These changes were made so that one can remove useless precedence and
428 associativity declarations (i.e., map %nonassoc, %left or %right to
429 %precedence, or to %token) and get exactly the same output.
431 ** Useless precedence and associativity
433 Contributed by Valentin Tolmer.
435 When developing and maintaining a grammar, useless associativity and
436 precedence directives are common. They can be a nuisance: new ambiguities
437 arising are sometimes masked because their conflicts are resolved due to
438 the extra precedence or associativity information. Furthermore, it can
439 hinder the comprehension of a new grammar: one will wonder about the role
440 of a precedence, where in fact it is useless. The following changes aim
441 at detecting and reporting these extra directives.
443 *** Precedence warning category
445 A new category of warning, -Wprecedence, was introduced. It flags the
446 useless precedence and associativity directives.
448 *** Useless associativity
450 Bison now warns about symbols with a declared associativity that is never
451 used to resolve conflicts. In that case, using %precedence is sufficient;
452 the parsing tables will remain unchanged. Solving these warnings may raise
453 useless precedence warnings, as the symbols no longer have associativity.
467 warning: useless associativity for '+', use %precedence [-Wprecedence]
471 *** Useless precedence
473 Bison now warns about symbols with a declared precedence and no declared
474 associativity (i.e., declared with %precedence), and whose precedence is
475 never used. In that case, the symbol can be safely declared with %token
476 instead, without modifying the parsing tables. For example:
480 exp: "var" '=' "number";
484 warning: useless precedence for '=' [-Wprecedence]
488 *** Useless precedence and associativity
490 In case of both useless precedence and associativity, the issue is flagged
495 exp: "var" '=' "number";
499 warning: useless precedence and associativity for '=' [-Wprecedence]
505 With help from Joel E. Denny and Gabriel Rassoul.
507 Empty rules (i.e., with an empty right-hand side) can now be explicitly
508 marked by the new %empty directive. Using %empty on a non-empty rule is
509 an error. The new -Wempty-rule warning reports empty rules without
510 %empty. On the following grammar:
520 3.4-5: warning: empty rule without %empty [-Wempty-rule]
523 5.8-13: error: %empty on non-empty rule
527 ** Java skeleton improvements
529 The constants for token names were moved to the Lexer interface. Also, it
530 is possible to add code to the parser's constructors using "%code init"
531 and "%define init_throws".
532 Contributed by Paolo Bonzini.
534 ** C++ skeletons improvements
536 *** The parser header is no longer mandatory (lalr1.cc, glr.cc)
538 Using %defines is now optional. Without it, the needed support classes
539 are defined in the generated parser, instead of additional files (such as
540 location.hh, position.hh and stack.hh).
542 *** Locations are no longer mandatory (lalr1.cc, glr.cc)
544 Both lalr1.cc and glr.cc no longer require %location.
546 *** syntax_error exception (lalr1.cc)
548 The C++ parser features a syntax_error exception, which can be
549 thrown from the scanner or from user rules to raise syntax errors.
550 This facilitates reporting errors caught in sub-functions (e.g.,
551 rejecting too large integral literals from a conversion function
552 used by the scanner, or rejecting invalid combinations from a
553 factory invoked by the user actions).
555 *** %define api.value.type variant
557 This is based on a submission from Michiel De Wilde. With help
558 from Théophile Ranquet.
560 In this mode, complex C++ objects can be used as semantic values. For
563 %token <::std::string> TEXT;
566 %type <::std::string> item;
567 %type <::std::list<std::string>> list;
570 list { std::cout << $1 << std::endl; }
574 %empty { /* Generates an empty string list. */ }
575 | list item ";" { std::swap ($$, $1); $$.push_back ($2); }
579 TEXT { std::swap ($$, $1); }
580 | NUMBER { $$ = string_cast ($1); }
583 *** %define api.token.constructor
585 When variants are enabled, Bison can generate functions to build the
586 tokens. This guarantees that the token type (e.g., NUMBER) is consistent
587 with the semantic value (e.g., int):
589 parser::symbol_type yylex ()
591 parser::location_type loc = ...;
593 return parser::make_TEXT ("Hello, world!", loc);
595 return parser::make_NUMBER (42, loc);
597 return parser::make_SEMICOLON (loc);
603 There are operator- and operator-= for 'location'. Negative line/column
604 increments can no longer underflow the resulting value.
606 * Noteworthy changes in release 2.7.1 (2013-04-15) [stable]
610 *** Fix compiler attribute portability (yacc.c)
612 With locations enabled, __attribute__ was used unprotected.
614 *** Fix some compiler warnings (lalr1.cc)
616 * Noteworthy changes in release 2.7 (2012-12-12) [stable]
620 Warnings about uninitialized yylloc in yyparse have been fixed.
622 Restored C90 compliance (yet no report was ever made).
624 ** Diagnostics are improved
626 Contributed by Théophile Ranquet.
628 *** Changes in the format of error messages
630 This used to be the format of many error reports:
632 input.y:2.7-12: %type redeclaration for exp
633 input.y:1.7-12: previous declaration
637 input.y:2.7-12: error: %type redeclaration for exp
638 input.y:1.7-12: previous declaration
640 *** New format for error reports: carets
642 Caret errors have been added to Bison:
644 input.y:2.7-12: error: %type redeclaration for exp
647 input.y:1.7-12: previous declaration
653 input.y:3.20-23: error: ambiguous reference: '$exp'
654 exp: exp '+' exp { $exp = $1 + $3; };
656 input.y:3.1-3: refers to: $exp at $$
657 exp: exp '+' exp { $exp = $1 + $3; };
659 input.y:3.6-8: refers to: $exp at $1
660 exp: exp '+' exp { $exp = $1 + $3; };
662 input.y:3.14-16: refers to: $exp at $3
663 exp: exp '+' exp { $exp = $1 + $3; };
666 The default behavior for now is still not to display these unless
667 explicitly asked with -fcaret (or -fall). However, in a later release, it
668 will be made the default behavior (but may still be deactivated with
671 ** New value for %define variable: api.pure full
673 The %define variable api.pure requests a pure (reentrant) parser. However,
674 for historical reasons, using it in a location-tracking Yacc parser
675 resulted in a yyerror function that did not take a location as a
676 parameter. With this new value, the user may request a better pure parser,
677 where yyerror does take a location as a parameter (in location-tracking
680 The use of "%define api.pure true" is deprecated in favor of this new
681 "%define api.pure full".
683 ** New %define variable: api.location.type (glr.cc, lalr1.cc, lalr1.java)
685 The %define variable api.location.type defines the name of the type to use
686 for locations. When defined, Bison no longer generates the position.hh
687 and location.hh files, nor does the parser will include them: the user is
688 then responsible to define her type.
690 This can be used in programs with several parsers to factor their location
691 and position files: let one of them generate them, and the others just use
694 This feature was actually introduced, but not documented, in Bison 2.5,
695 under the name "location_type" (which is maintained for backward
698 For consistency, lalr1.java's %define variables location_type and
699 position_type are deprecated in favor of api.location.type and
702 ** Exception safety (lalr1.cc)
704 The parse function now catches exceptions, uses the %destructors to
705 release memory (the lookahead symbol and the symbols pushed on the stack)
706 before re-throwing the exception.
708 This feature is somewhat experimental. User feedback would be
711 ** Graph improvements in DOT and XSLT
713 Contributed by Théophile Ranquet.
715 The graphical presentation of the states is more readable: their shape is
716 now rectangular, the state number is clearly displayed, and the items are
717 numbered and left-justified.
719 The reductions are now explicitly represented as transitions to other
720 diamond shaped nodes.
722 These changes are present in both --graph output and xml2dot.xsl XSLT
723 processing, with minor (documented) differences.
725 ** %language is no longer an experimental feature.
727 The introduction of this feature, in 2.4, was four years ago. The
728 --language option and the %language directive are no longer experimental.
732 The sections about shift/reduce and reduce/reduce conflicts resolution
733 have been fixed and extended.
735 Although introduced more than four years ago, XML and Graphviz reports
736 were not properly documented.
738 The translation of mid-rule actions is now described.
740 * Noteworthy changes in release 2.6.5 (2012-11-07) [stable]
742 We consider compiler warnings about Bison generated parsers to be bugs.
743 Rather than working around them in your own project, please consider
744 reporting them to us.
748 Warnings about uninitialized yylval and/or yylloc for push parsers with a
749 pure interface have been fixed for GCC 4.0 up to 4.8, and Clang 2.9 to
752 Other issues in the test suite have been addressed.
754 Null characters are correctly displayed in error messages.
756 When possible, yylloc is correctly initialized before calling yylex. It
757 is no longer necessary to initialize it in the %initial-action.
759 * Noteworthy changes in release 2.6.4 (2012-10-23) [stable]
761 Bison 2.6.3's --version was incorrect. This release fixes this issue.
763 * Noteworthy changes in release 2.6.3 (2012-10-22) [stable]
767 Bugs and portability issues in the test suite have been fixed.
769 Some errors in translations have been addressed, and --help now directs
770 users to the appropriate place to report them.
772 Stray Info files shipped by accident are removed.
774 Incorrect definitions of YY_, issued by yacc.c when no parser header is
775 generated, are removed.
777 All the generated headers are self-contained.
779 ** Header guards (yacc.c, glr.c, glr.cc)
781 In order to avoid collisions, the header guards are now
782 YY_<PREFIX>_<FILE>_INCLUDED, instead of merely <PREFIX>_<FILE>.
783 For instance the header generated from
785 %define api.prefix "calc"
786 %defines "lib/parse.h"
788 will use YY_CALC_LIB_PARSE_H_INCLUDED as guard.
790 ** Fix compiler warnings in the generated parser (yacc.c, glr.c)
792 The compilation of pure parsers (%define api.pure) can trigger GCC
795 input.c: In function 'yyparse':
796 input.c:1503:12: warning: 'yylval' may be used uninitialized in this
797 function [-Wmaybe-uninitialized]
801 This is now fixed; pragmas to avoid these warnings are no longer needed.
803 Warnings from clang ("equality comparison with extraneous parentheses" and
804 "function declared 'noreturn' should not return") have also been
807 * Noteworthy changes in release 2.6.2 (2012-08-03) [stable]
811 Buffer overruns, complaints from Flex, and portability issues in the test
812 suite have been fixed.
814 ** Spaces in %lex- and %parse-param (lalr1.cc, glr.cc)
816 Trailing end-of-lines in %parse-param or %lex-param would result in
817 invalid C++. This is fixed.
819 ** Spurious spaces and end-of-lines
821 The generated files no longer end (nor start) with empty lines.
823 * Noteworthy changes in release 2.6.1 (2012-07-30) [stable]
825 Bison no longer executes user-specified M4 code when processing a grammar.
829 In addition to the removal of the features announced in Bison 2.6, the
830 next major release will remove the "Temporary hack for adding a semicolon
831 to the user action", as announced in the release 2.5. Instead of:
833 exp: exp "+" exp { $$ = $1 + $3 };
837 exp: exp "+" exp { $$ = $1 + $3; };
841 *** Type names are now properly escaped.
843 *** glr.cc: set_debug_level and debug_level work as expected.
845 *** Stray @ or $ in actions
847 While Bison used to warn about stray $ or @ in action rules, it did not
848 for other actions such as printers, destructors, or initial actions. It
851 ** Type names in actions
853 For consistency with rule actions, it is now possible to qualify $$ by a
854 type-name in destructors, printers, and initial actions. For instance:
856 %printer { fprintf (yyo, "(%d, %f)", $<ival>$, $<fval>$); } <*> <>;
858 will display two values for each typed and untyped symbol (provided
859 that YYSTYPE has both "ival" and "fval" fields).
861 * Noteworthy changes in release 2.6 (2012-07-19) [stable]
865 The next major release of Bison will drop support for the following
866 deprecated features. Please report disagreements to bug-bison@gnu.org.
870 Support for generating parsers in K&R C will be removed. Parsers
871 generated for C support ISO C90, and are tested with ISO C99 and ISO C11
874 *** Features deprecated since Bison 1.875
876 The definitions of yystype and yyltype will be removed; use YYSTYPE and
879 YYPARSE_PARAM and YYLEX_PARAM, deprecated in favor of %parse-param and
880 %lex-param, will no longer be supported.
882 Support for the preprocessor symbol YYERROR_VERBOSE will be removed, use
885 *** The generated header will be included (yacc.c)
887 Instead of duplicating the content of the generated header (definition of
888 YYSTYPE, yyparse declaration etc.), the generated parser will include it,
889 as is already the case for GLR or C++ parsers. This change is deferred
890 because existing versions of ylwrap (e.g., Automake 1.12.1) do not support
893 ** Generated Parser Headers
895 *** Guards (yacc.c, glr.c, glr.cc)
897 The generated headers are now guarded, as is already the case for C++
898 parsers (lalr1.cc). For instance, with --defines=foo.h:
903 #endif /* !YY_FOO_H */
905 *** New declarations (yacc.c, glr.c)
907 The generated header now declares yydebug and yyparse. Both honor
908 --name-prefix=bar_, and yield
910 int bar_parse (void);
914 #define yyparse bar_parse
917 in order to facilitate the inclusion of several parser headers inside a
918 single compilation unit.
920 *** Exported symbols in C++
922 The symbols YYTOKEN_TABLE and YYERROR_VERBOSE, which were defined in the
923 header, are removed, as they prevent the possibility of including several
924 generated headers from a single compilation unit.
928 For the same reasons, the undocumented and unused macro YYLSP_NEEDED is no
931 ** New %define variable: api.prefix
933 Now that the generated headers are more complete and properly protected
934 against multiple inclusions, constant names, such as YYSTYPE are a
935 problem. While yyparse and others are properly renamed by %name-prefix,
936 YYSTYPE, YYDEBUG and others have never been affected by it. Because it
937 would introduce backward compatibility issues in projects not expecting
938 YYSTYPE to be renamed, instead of changing the behavior of %name-prefix,
939 it is deprecated in favor of a new %define variable: api.prefix.
941 The following examples compares both:
943 %name-prefix "bar_" | %define api.prefix "bar_"
944 %token <ival> FOO %token <ival> FOO
945 %union { int ival; } %union { int ival; }
951 #ifndef BAR_FOO_H #ifndef BAR_FOO_H
952 # define BAR_FOO_H # define BAR_FOO_H
954 /* Enabling traces. */ /* Enabling traces. */
955 # ifndef YYDEBUG | # ifndef BAR_DEBUG
956 > # if defined YYDEBUG
958 > # define BAR_DEBUG 1
960 > # define BAR_DEBUG 0
963 # define YYDEBUG 0 | # define BAR_DEBUG 0
967 # if YYDEBUG | # if BAR_DEBUG
968 extern int bar_debug; extern int bar_debug;
971 /* Tokens. */ /* Tokens. */
972 # ifndef YYTOKENTYPE | # ifndef BAR_TOKENTYPE
973 # define YYTOKENTYPE | # define BAR_TOKENTYPE
974 enum yytokentype { | enum bar_tokentype {
979 #if ! defined YYSTYPE \ | #if ! defined BAR_STYPE \
980 && ! defined YYSTYPE_IS_DECLARED | && ! defined BAR_STYPE_IS_DECLARED
981 typedef union YYSTYPE | typedef union BAR_STYPE
984 } YYSTYPE; | } BAR_STYPE;
985 # define YYSTYPE_IS_DECLARED 1 | # define BAR_STYPE_IS_DECLARED 1
988 extern YYSTYPE bar_lval; | extern BAR_STYPE bar_lval;
990 int bar_parse (void); int bar_parse (void);
992 #endif /* !BAR_FOO_H */ #endif /* !BAR_FOO_H */
994 * Noteworthy changes in release 2.5.1 (2012-06-05) [stable]
998 The next major release will drop support for generating parsers in K&R C.
1000 ** yacc.c: YYBACKUP works as expected.
1002 ** glr.c improvements:
1004 *** Location support is eliminated when not requested:
1006 GLR parsers used to include location-related code even when locations were
1007 not requested, and therefore not even usable.
1009 *** __attribute__ is preserved:
1011 __attribute__ is no longer disabled when __STRICT_ANSI__ is defined (i.e.,
1012 when -std is passed to GCC).
1014 ** lalr1.java: several fixes:
1016 The Java parser no longer throws ArrayIndexOutOfBoundsException if the
1017 first token leads to a syntax error. Some minor clean ups.
1021 *** C++11 compatibility:
1023 C and C++ parsers use "nullptr" instead of "0" when __cplusplus is 201103L
1028 The header files such as "parser.hh", "location.hh", etc. used a constant
1029 name for preprocessor guards, for instance:
1031 #ifndef BISON_LOCATION_HH
1032 # define BISON_LOCATION_HH
1034 #endif // !BISON_LOCATION_HH
1036 The inclusion guard is now computed from "PREFIX/FILE-NAME", where lower
1037 case characters are converted to upper case, and series of
1038 non-alphanumerical characters are converted to an underscore.
1040 With "bison -o lang++/parser.cc", "location.hh" would now include:
1042 #ifndef YY_LANG_LOCATION_HH
1043 # define YY_LANG_LOCATION_HH
1045 #endif // !YY_LANG_LOCATION_HH
1049 The position and location constructors (and their initialize methods)
1050 accept new arguments for line and column. Several issues in the
1051 documentation were fixed.
1053 ** liby is no longer asking for "rpl_fprintf" on some platforms.
1055 ** Changes in the manual:
1057 *** %printer is documented
1059 The "%printer" directive, supported since at least Bison 1.50, is finally
1060 documented. The "mfcalc" example is extended to demonstrate it.
1062 For consistency with the C skeletons, the C++ parsers now also support
1063 "yyoutput" (as an alias to "debug_stream ()").
1065 *** Several improvements have been made:
1067 The layout for grammar excerpts was changed to a more compact scheme.
1068 Named references are motivated. The description of the automaton
1069 description file (*.output) is updated to the current format. Incorrect
1070 index entries were fixed. Some other errors were fixed.
1074 *** Conflicting prototypes with recent/modified Flex.
1076 Fixed build problems with the current, unreleased, version of Flex, and
1077 some modified versions of 2.5.35, which have modified function prototypes.
1079 *** Warnings during the build procedure have been eliminated.
1081 *** Several portability problems in the test suite have been fixed:
1083 This includes warnings with some compilers, unexpected behavior of tools
1084 such as diff, warning messages from the test suite itself, etc.
1086 *** The install-pdf target works properly:
1088 Running "make install-pdf" (or -dvi, -html, -info, and -ps) no longer
1089 halts in the middle of its course.
1091 * Changes in version 2.5 (2011-05-14):
1093 ** Grammar symbol names can now contain non-initial dashes:
1095 Consistently with directives (such as %error-verbose) and with
1096 %define variables (e.g. push-pull), grammar symbol names may contain
1097 dashes in any position except the beginning. This is a GNU
1098 extension over POSIX Yacc. Thus, use of this extension is reported
1099 by -Wyacc and rejected in Yacc mode (--yacc).
1101 ** Named references:
1103 Historically, Yacc and Bison have supported positional references
1104 ($n, $$) to allow access to symbol values from inside of semantic
1107 Starting from this version, Bison can also accept named references.
1108 When no ambiguity is possible, original symbol names may be used
1109 as named references:
1111 if_stmt : "if" cond_expr "then" then_stmt ';'
1112 { $if_stmt = mk_if_stmt($cond_expr, $then_stmt); }
1114 In the more common case, explicit names may be declared:
1116 stmt[res] : "if" expr[cond] "then" stmt[then] "else" stmt[else] ';'
1117 { $res = mk_if_stmt($cond, $then, $else); }
1119 Location information is also accessible using @name syntax. When
1120 accessing symbol names containing dots or dashes, explicit bracketing
1121 ($[sym.1]) must be used.
1123 These features are experimental in this version. More user feedback
1124 will help to stabilize them.
1125 Contributed by Alex Rozenman.
1127 ** IELR(1) and canonical LR(1):
1129 IELR(1) is a minimal LR(1) parser table generation algorithm. That
1130 is, given any context-free grammar, IELR(1) generates parser tables
1131 with the full language-recognition power of canonical LR(1) but with
1132 nearly the same number of parser states as LALR(1). This reduction
1133 in parser states is often an order of magnitude. More importantly,
1134 because canonical LR(1)'s extra parser states may contain duplicate
1135 conflicts in the case of non-LR(1) grammars, the number of conflicts
1136 for IELR(1) is often an order of magnitude less as well. This can
1137 significantly reduce the complexity of developing of a grammar.
1139 Bison can now generate IELR(1) and canonical LR(1) parser tables in
1140 place of its traditional LALR(1) parser tables, which remain the
1141 default. You can specify the type of parser tables in the grammar
1142 file with these directives:
1144 %define lr.type lalr
1145 %define lr.type ielr
1146 %define lr.type canonical-lr
1148 The default-reduction optimization in the parser tables can also be
1149 adjusted using "%define lr.default-reductions". For details on both
1150 of these features, see the new section "Tuning LR" in the Bison
1153 These features are experimental. More user feedback will help to
1156 ** LAC (Lookahead Correction) for syntax error handling
1158 Contributed by Joel E. Denny.
1160 Canonical LR, IELR, and LALR can suffer from a couple of problems
1161 upon encountering a syntax error. First, the parser might perform
1162 additional parser stack reductions before discovering the syntax
1163 error. Such reductions can perform user semantic actions that are
1164 unexpected because they are based on an invalid token, and they
1165 cause error recovery to begin in a different syntactic context than
1166 the one in which the invalid token was encountered. Second, when
1167 verbose error messages are enabled (with %error-verbose or the
1168 obsolete "#define YYERROR_VERBOSE"), the expected token list in the
1169 syntax error message can both contain invalid tokens and omit valid
1172 The culprits for the above problems are %nonassoc, default
1173 reductions in inconsistent states, and parser state merging. Thus,
1174 IELR and LALR suffer the most. Canonical LR can suffer only if
1175 %nonassoc is used or if default reductions are enabled for
1176 inconsistent states.
1178 LAC is a new mechanism within the parsing algorithm that solves
1179 these problems for canonical LR, IELR, and LALR without sacrificing
1180 %nonassoc, default reductions, or state merging. When LAC is in
1181 use, canonical LR and IELR behave almost exactly the same for both
1182 syntactically acceptable and syntactically unacceptable input.
1183 While LALR still does not support the full language-recognition
1184 power of canonical LR and IELR, LAC at least enables LALR's syntax
1185 error handling to correctly reflect LALR's language-recognition
1188 Currently, LAC is only supported for deterministic parsers in C.
1189 You can enable LAC with the following directive:
1191 %define parse.lac full
1193 See the new section "LAC" in the Bison manual for additional
1194 details including a few caveats.
1196 LAC is an experimental feature. More user feedback will help to
1199 ** %define improvements:
1201 *** Can now be invoked via the command line:
1203 Each of these command-line options
1206 --define=NAME[=VALUE]
1209 --force-define=NAME[=VALUE]
1211 is equivalent to this grammar file declaration
1213 %define NAME ["VALUE"]
1215 except that the manner in which Bison processes multiple definitions
1216 for the same NAME differs. Most importantly, -F and --force-define
1217 quietly override %define, but -D and --define do not. For further
1218 details, see the section "Bison Options" in the Bison manual.
1220 *** Variables renamed:
1222 The following %define variables
1225 lr.keep_unreachable_states
1227 have been renamed to
1230 lr.keep-unreachable-states
1232 The old names are now deprecated but will be maintained indefinitely
1233 for backward compatibility.
1235 *** Values no longer need to be quoted in the grammar file:
1237 If a %define value is an identifier, it no longer needs to be placed
1238 within quotations marks. For example,
1240 %define api.push-pull "push"
1244 %define api.push-pull push
1246 *** Unrecognized variables are now errors not warnings.
1248 *** Multiple invocations for any variable is now an error not a warning.
1250 ** Unrecognized %code qualifiers are now errors not warnings.
1252 ** Character literals not of length one:
1254 Previously, Bison quietly converted all character literals to length
1255 one. For example, without warning, Bison interpreted the operators in
1256 the following grammar to be the same token:
1262 Bison now warns when a character literal is not of length one. In
1263 some future release, Bison will start reporting an error instead.
1265 ** Destructor calls fixed for lookaheads altered in semantic actions:
1267 Previously for deterministic parsers in C, if a user semantic action
1268 altered yychar, the parser in some cases used the old yychar value to
1269 determine which destructor to call for the lookahead upon a syntax
1270 error or upon parser return. This bug has been fixed.
1272 ** C++ parsers use YYRHSLOC:
1274 Similarly to the C parsers, the C++ parsers now define the YYRHSLOC
1275 macro and use it in the default YYLLOC_DEFAULT. You are encouraged
1276 to use it. If, for instance, your location structure has "first"
1277 and "last" members, instead of
1279 # define YYLLOC_DEFAULT(Current, Rhs, N) \
1283 (Current).first = (Rhs)[1].location.first; \
1284 (Current).last = (Rhs)[N].location.last; \
1288 (Current).first = (Current).last = (Rhs)[0].location.last; \
1294 # define YYLLOC_DEFAULT(Current, Rhs, N) \
1298 (Current).first = YYRHSLOC (Rhs, 1).first; \
1299 (Current).last = YYRHSLOC (Rhs, N).last; \
1303 (Current).first = (Current).last = YYRHSLOC (Rhs, 0).last; \
1307 ** YYLLOC_DEFAULT in C++:
1309 The default implementation of YYLLOC_DEFAULT used to be issued in
1310 the header file. It is now output in the implementation file, after
1311 the user %code sections so that its #ifndef guard does not try to
1312 override the user's YYLLOC_DEFAULT if provided.
1314 ** YYFAIL now produces warnings and Java parsers no longer implement it:
1316 YYFAIL has existed for many years as an undocumented feature of
1317 deterministic parsers in C generated by Bison. More recently, it was
1318 a documented feature of Bison's experimental Java parsers. As
1319 promised in Bison 2.4.2's NEWS entry, any appearance of YYFAIL in a
1320 semantic action now produces a deprecation warning, and Java parsers
1321 no longer implement YYFAIL at all. For further details, including a
1322 discussion of how to suppress C preprocessor warnings about YYFAIL
1323 being unused, see the Bison 2.4.2 NEWS entry.
1325 ** Temporary hack for adding a semicolon to the user action:
1327 Previously, Bison appended a semicolon to every user action for
1328 reductions when the output language defaulted to C (specifically, when
1329 neither %yacc, %language, %skeleton, or equivalent command-line
1330 options were specified). This allowed actions such as
1332 exp: exp "+" exp { $$ = $1 + $3 };
1336 exp: exp "+" exp { $$ = $1 + $3; };
1338 As a first step in removing this misfeature, Bison now issues a
1339 warning when it appends a semicolon. Moreover, in cases where Bison
1340 cannot easily determine whether a semicolon is needed (for example, an
1341 action ending with a cpp directive or a braced compound initializer),
1342 it no longer appends one. Thus, the C compiler might now complain
1343 about a missing semicolon where it did not before. Future releases of
1344 Bison will cease to append semicolons entirely.
1346 ** Verbose syntax error message fixes:
1348 When %error-verbose or the obsolete "#define YYERROR_VERBOSE" is
1349 specified, syntax error messages produced by the generated parser
1350 include the unexpected token as well as a list of expected tokens.
1351 The effect of %nonassoc on these verbose messages has been corrected
1352 in two ways, but a more complete fix requires LAC, described above:
1354 *** When %nonassoc is used, there can exist parser states that accept no
1355 tokens, and so the parser does not always require a lookahead token
1356 in order to detect a syntax error. Because no unexpected token or
1357 expected tokens can then be reported, the verbose syntax error
1358 message described above is suppressed, and the parser instead
1359 reports the simpler message, "syntax error". Previously, this
1360 suppression was sometimes erroneously triggered by %nonassoc when a
1361 lookahead was actually required. Now verbose messages are
1362 suppressed only when all previous lookaheads have already been
1363 shifted or discarded.
1365 *** Previously, the list of expected tokens erroneously included tokens
1366 that would actually induce a syntax error because conflicts for them
1367 were resolved with %nonassoc in the current parser state. Such
1368 tokens are now properly omitted from the list.
1370 *** Expected token lists are still often wrong due to state merging
1371 (from LALR or IELR) and default reductions, which can both add
1372 invalid tokens and subtract valid tokens. Canonical LR almost
1373 completely fixes this problem by eliminating state merging and
1374 default reductions. However, there is one minor problem left even
1375 when using canonical LR and even after the fixes above. That is,
1376 if the resolution of a conflict with %nonassoc appears in a later
1377 parser state than the one at which some syntax error is
1378 discovered, the conflicted token is still erroneously included in
1379 the expected token list. Bison's new LAC implementation,
1380 described above, eliminates this problem and the need for
1381 canonical LR. However, LAC is still experimental and is disabled
1384 ** Java skeleton fixes:
1386 *** A location handling bug has been fixed.
1388 *** The top element of each of the value stack and location stack is now
1389 cleared when popped so that it can be garbage collected.
1391 *** Parser traces now print the top element of the stack.
1393 ** -W/--warnings fixes:
1395 *** Bison now properly recognizes the "no-" versions of categories:
1397 For example, given the following command line, Bison now enables all
1398 warnings except warnings for incompatibilities with POSIX Yacc:
1400 bison -Wall,no-yacc gram.y
1402 *** Bison now treats S/R and R/R conflicts like other warnings:
1404 Previously, conflict reports were independent of Bison's normal
1405 warning system. Now, Bison recognizes the warning categories
1406 "conflicts-sr" and "conflicts-rr". This change has important
1407 consequences for the -W and --warnings command-line options. For
1410 bison -Wno-conflicts-sr gram.y # S/R conflicts not reported
1411 bison -Wno-conflicts-rr gram.y # R/R conflicts not reported
1412 bison -Wnone gram.y # no conflicts are reported
1413 bison -Werror gram.y # any conflict is an error
1415 However, as before, if the %expect or %expect-rr directive is
1416 specified, an unexpected number of conflicts is an error, and an
1417 expected number of conflicts is not reported, so -W and --warning
1418 then have no effect on the conflict report.
1420 *** The "none" category no longer disables a preceding "error":
1422 For example, for the following command line, Bison now reports
1423 errors instead of warnings for incompatibilities with POSIX Yacc:
1425 bison -Werror,none,yacc gram.y
1427 *** The "none" category now disables all Bison warnings:
1429 Previously, the "none" category disabled only Bison warnings for
1430 which there existed a specific -W/--warning category. However,
1431 given the following command line, Bison is now guaranteed to
1432 suppress all warnings:
1436 ** Precedence directives can now assign token number 0:
1438 Since Bison 2.3b, which restored the ability of precedence
1439 directives to assign token numbers, doing so for token number 0 has
1440 produced an assertion failure. For example:
1444 This bug has been fixed.
1446 * Changes in version 2.4.3 (2010-08-05):
1448 ** Bison now obeys -Werror and --warnings=error for warnings about
1449 grammar rules that are useless in the parser due to conflicts.
1451 ** Problems with spawning M4 on at least FreeBSD 8 and FreeBSD 9 have
1454 ** Failures in the test suite for GCC 4.5 have been fixed.
1456 ** Failures in the test suite for some versions of Sun Studio C++ have
1459 ** Contrary to Bison 2.4.2's NEWS entry, it has been decided that
1460 warnings about undefined %prec identifiers will not be converted to
1461 errors in Bison 2.5. They will remain warnings, which should be
1462 sufficient for POSIX while avoiding backward compatibility issues.
1464 ** Minor documentation fixes.
1466 * Changes in version 2.4.2 (2010-03-20):
1468 ** Some portability problems that resulted in failures and livelocks
1469 in the test suite on some versions of at least Solaris, AIX, HP-UX,
1470 RHEL4, and Tru64 have been addressed. As a result, fatal Bison
1471 errors should no longer cause M4 to report a broken pipe on the
1474 ** "%prec IDENTIFIER" requires IDENTIFIER to be defined separately.
1476 POSIX specifies that an error be reported for any identifier that does
1477 not appear on the LHS of a grammar rule and that is not defined by
1478 %token, %left, %right, or %nonassoc. Bison 2.3b and later lost this
1479 error report for the case when an identifier appears only after a
1480 %prec directive. It is now restored. However, for backward
1481 compatibility with recent Bison releases, it is only a warning for
1482 now. In Bison 2.5 and later, it will return to being an error.
1483 [Between the 2.4.2 and 2.4.3 releases, it was decided that this
1484 warning will not be converted to an error in Bison 2.5.]
1486 ** Detection of GNU M4 1.4.6 or newer during configure is improved.
1488 ** Warnings from gcc's -Wundef option about undefined YYENABLE_NLS,
1489 YYLTYPE_IS_TRIVIAL, and __STRICT_ANSI__ in C/C++ parsers are now
1492 ** %code is now a permanent feature.
1494 A traditional Yacc prologue directive is written in the form:
1498 To provide a more flexible alternative, Bison 2.3b introduced the
1499 %code directive with the following forms for C/C++:
1502 %code requires {CODE}
1503 %code provides {CODE}
1506 These forms are now considered permanent features of Bison. See the
1507 %code entries in the section "Bison Declaration Summary" in the Bison
1508 manual for a summary of their functionality. See the section
1509 "Prologue Alternatives" for a detailed discussion including the
1510 advantages of %code over the traditional Yacc prologue directive.
1512 Bison's Java feature as a whole including its current usage of %code
1513 is still considered experimental.
1515 ** YYFAIL is deprecated and will eventually be removed.
1517 YYFAIL has existed for many years as an undocumented feature of
1518 deterministic parsers in C generated by Bison. Previously, it was
1519 documented for Bison's experimental Java parsers. YYFAIL is no longer
1520 documented for Java parsers and is formally deprecated in both cases.
1521 Users are strongly encouraged to migrate to YYERROR, which is
1524 Like YYERROR, you can invoke YYFAIL from a semantic action in order to
1525 induce a syntax error. The most obvious difference from YYERROR is
1526 that YYFAIL will automatically invoke yyerror to report the syntax
1527 error so that you don't have to. However, there are several other
1528 subtle differences between YYERROR and YYFAIL, and YYFAIL suffers from
1529 inherent flaws when %error-verbose or "#define YYERROR_VERBOSE" is
1530 used. For a more detailed discussion, see:
1532 http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/bison-patches/2009-12/msg00024.html
1534 The upcoming Bison 2.5 will remove YYFAIL from Java parsers, but
1535 deterministic parsers in C will continue to implement it. However,
1536 because YYFAIL is already flawed, it seems futile to try to make new
1537 Bison features compatible with it. Thus, during parser generation,
1538 Bison 2.5 will produce a warning whenever it discovers YYFAIL in a
1539 rule action. In a later release, YYFAIL will be disabled for
1540 %error-verbose and "#define YYERROR_VERBOSE". Eventually, YYFAIL will
1541 be removed altogether.
1543 There exists at least one case where Bison 2.5's YYFAIL warning will
1544 be a false positive. Some projects add phony uses of YYFAIL and other
1545 Bison-defined macros for the sole purpose of suppressing C
1546 preprocessor warnings (from GCC cpp's -Wunused-macros, for example).
1547 To avoid Bison's future warning, such YYFAIL uses can be moved to the
1548 epilogue (that is, after the second "%%") in the Bison input file. In
1549 this release (2.4.2), Bison already generates its own code to suppress
1550 C preprocessor warnings for YYFAIL, so projects can remove their own
1551 phony uses of YYFAIL if compatibility with Bison releases prior to
1552 2.4.2 is not necessary.
1554 ** Internationalization.
1556 Fix a regression introduced in Bison 2.4: Under some circumstances,
1557 message translations were not installed although supported by the
1560 * Changes in version 2.4.1 (2008-12-11):
1562 ** In the GLR defines file, unexpanded M4 macros in the yylval and yylloc
1563 declarations have been fixed.
1565 ** Temporary hack for adding a semicolon to the user action.
1567 Bison used to prepend a trailing semicolon at the end of the user
1568 action for reductions. This allowed actions such as
1570 exp: exp "+" exp { $$ = $1 + $3 };
1574 exp: exp "+" exp { $$ = $1 + $3; };
1576 Some grammars still depend on this "feature". Bison 2.4.1 restores
1577 the previous behavior in the case of C output (specifically, when
1578 neither %language or %skeleton or equivalent command-line options
1579 are used) to leave more time for grammars depending on the old
1580 behavior to be adjusted. Future releases of Bison will disable this
1583 ** A few minor improvements to the Bison manual.
1585 * Changes in version 2.4 (2008-11-02):
1587 ** %language is an experimental feature.
1589 We first introduced this feature in test release 2.3b as a cleaner
1590 alternative to %skeleton. Since then, we have discussed the possibility of
1591 modifying its effect on Bison's output file names. Thus, in this release,
1592 we consider %language to be an experimental feature that will likely evolve
1595 ** Forward compatibility with GNU M4 has been improved.
1597 ** Several bugs in the C++ skeleton and the experimental Java skeleton have been
1600 * Changes in version 2.3b (2008-05-27):
1602 ** The quotes around NAME that used to be required in the following directive
1605 %define NAME "VALUE"
1607 ** The directive "%pure-parser" is now deprecated in favor of:
1611 which has the same effect except that Bison is more careful to warn about
1612 unreasonable usage in the latter case.
1616 Bison can now generate an LALR(1) parser in C with a push interface. That
1617 is, instead of invoking "yyparse", which pulls tokens from "yylex", you can
1618 push one token at a time to the parser using "yypush_parse", which will
1619 return to the caller after processing each token. By default, the push
1620 interface is disabled. Either of the following directives will enable it:
1622 %define api.push_pull "push" // Just push; does not require yylex.
1623 %define api.push_pull "both" // Push and pull; requires yylex.
1625 See the new section "A Push Parser" in the Bison manual for details.
1627 The current push parsing interface is experimental and may evolve. More user
1628 feedback will help to stabilize it.
1630 ** The -g and --graph options now output graphs in Graphviz DOT format,
1631 not VCG format. Like --graph, -g now also takes an optional FILE argument
1632 and thus cannot be bundled with other short options.
1636 Bison can now generate an LALR(1) parser in Java. The skeleton is
1637 "data/lalr1.java". Consider using the new %language directive instead of
1638 %skeleton to select it.
1640 See the new section "Java Parsers" in the Bison manual for details.
1642 The current Java interface is experimental and may evolve. More user
1643 feedback will help to stabilize it.
1644 Contributed by Paolo Bonzini.
1648 This new directive specifies the programming language of the generated
1649 parser, which can be C (the default), C++, or Java. Besides the skeleton
1650 that Bison uses, the directive affects the names of the generated files if
1651 the grammar file's name ends in ".y".
1653 ** XML Automaton Report
1655 Bison can now generate an XML report of the LALR(1) automaton using the new
1656 "--xml" option. The current XML schema is experimental and may evolve. More
1657 user feedback will help to stabilize it.
1658 Contributed by Wojciech Polak.
1660 ** The grammar file may now specify the name of the parser header file using
1661 %defines. For example:
1665 ** When reporting useless rules, useless nonterminals, and unused terminals,
1666 Bison now employs the terms "useless in grammar" instead of "useless",
1667 "useless in parser" instead of "never reduced", and "unused in grammar"
1668 instead of "unused".
1670 ** Unreachable State Removal
1672 Previously, Bison sometimes generated parser tables containing unreachable
1673 states. A state can become unreachable during conflict resolution if Bison
1674 disables a shift action leading to it from a predecessor state. Bison now:
1676 1. Removes unreachable states.
1678 2. Does not report any conflicts that appeared in unreachable states.
1679 WARNING: As a result, you may need to update %expect and %expect-rr
1680 directives in existing grammar files.
1682 3. For any rule used only in such states, Bison now reports the rule as
1683 "useless in parser due to conflicts".
1685 This feature can be disabled with the following directive:
1687 %define lr.keep_unreachable_states
1689 See the %define entry in the "Bison Declaration Summary" in the Bison manual
1690 for further discussion.
1692 ** Lookahead Set Correction in the ".output" Report
1694 When instructed to generate a ".output" file including lookahead sets
1695 (using "--report=lookahead", for example), Bison now prints each reduction's
1696 lookahead set only next to the associated state's one item that (1) is
1697 associated with the same rule as the reduction and (2) has its dot at the end
1698 of its RHS. Previously, Bison also erroneously printed the lookahead set
1699 next to all of the state's other items associated with the same rule. This
1700 bug affected only the ".output" file and not the generated parser source
1703 ** --report-file=FILE is a new option to override the default ".output" file
1706 ** The "=" that used to be required in the following directives is now
1709 %file-prefix "parser"
1713 ** An Alternative to "%{...%}" -- "%code QUALIFIER {CODE}"
1715 Bison 2.3a provided a new set of directives as a more flexible alternative to
1716 the traditional Yacc prologue blocks. Those have now been consolidated into
1717 a single %code directive with an optional qualifier field, which identifies
1718 the purpose of the code and thus the location(s) where Bison should generate
1721 1. "%code {CODE}" replaces "%after-header {CODE}"
1722 2. "%code requires {CODE}" replaces "%start-header {CODE}"
1723 3. "%code provides {CODE}" replaces "%end-header {CODE}"
1724 4. "%code top {CODE}" replaces "%before-header {CODE}"
1726 See the %code entries in section "Bison Declaration Summary" in the Bison
1727 manual for a summary of the new functionality. See the new section "Prologue
1728 Alternatives" for a detailed discussion including the advantages of %code
1729 over the traditional Yacc prologues.
1731 The prologue alternatives are experimental. More user feedback will help to
1732 determine whether they should become permanent features.
1734 ** Revised warning: unset or unused mid-rule values
1736 Since Bison 2.2, Bison has warned about mid-rule values that are set but not
1737 used within any of the actions of the parent rule. For example, Bison warns
1740 exp: '1' { $$ = 1; } '+' exp { $$ = $1 + $4; };
1742 Now, Bison also warns about mid-rule values that are used but not set. For
1743 example, Bison warns about unset $$ in the mid-rule action in:
1745 exp: '1' { $1 = 1; } '+' exp { $$ = $2 + $4; };
1747 However, Bison now disables both of these warnings by default since they
1748 sometimes prove to be false alarms in existing grammars employing the Yacc
1749 constructs $0 or $-N (where N is some positive integer).
1751 To enable these warnings, specify the option "--warnings=midrule-values" or
1752 "-W", which is a synonym for "--warnings=all".
1754 ** Default %destructor or %printer with "<*>" or "<>"
1756 Bison now recognizes two separate kinds of default %destructor's and
1759 1. Place "<*>" in a %destructor/%printer symbol list to define a default
1760 %destructor/%printer for all grammar symbols for which you have formally
1761 declared semantic type tags.
1763 2. Place "<>" in a %destructor/%printer symbol list to define a default
1764 %destructor/%printer for all grammar symbols without declared semantic
1767 Bison no longer supports the "%symbol-default" notation from Bison 2.3a.
1768 "<*>" and "<>" combined achieve the same effect with one exception: Bison no
1769 longer applies any %destructor to a mid-rule value if that mid-rule value is
1770 not actually ever referenced using either $$ or $n in a semantic action.
1772 The default %destructor's and %printer's are experimental. More user
1773 feedback will help to determine whether they should become permanent
1776 See the section "Freeing Discarded Symbols" in the Bison manual for further
1779 ** %left, %right, and %nonassoc can now declare token numbers. This is required
1780 by POSIX. However, see the end of section "Operator Precedence" in the Bison
1781 manual for a caveat concerning the treatment of literal strings.
1783 ** The nonfunctional --no-parser, -n, and %no-parser options have been
1784 completely removed from Bison.
1786 * Changes in version 2.3a, 2006-09-13:
1788 ** Instead of %union, you can define and use your own union type
1789 YYSTYPE if your grammar contains at least one <type> tag.
1790 Your YYSTYPE need not be a macro; it can be a typedef.
1791 This change is for compatibility with other Yacc implementations,
1792 and is required by POSIX.
1794 ** Locations columns and lines start at 1.
1795 In accordance with the GNU Coding Standards and Emacs.
1797 ** You may now declare per-type and default %destructor's and %printer's:
1801 %union { char *string; }
1802 %token <string> STRING1
1803 %token <string> STRING2
1804 %type <string> string1
1805 %type <string> string2
1806 %union { char character; }
1807 %token <character> CHR
1808 %type <character> chr
1809 %destructor { free ($$); } %symbol-default
1810 %destructor { free ($$); printf ("%d", @$.first_line); } STRING1 string1
1811 %destructor { } <character>
1813 guarantees that, when the parser discards any user-defined symbol that has a
1814 semantic type tag other than "<character>", it passes its semantic value to
1815 "free". However, when the parser discards a "STRING1" or a "string1", it
1816 also prints its line number to "stdout". It performs only the second
1817 "%destructor" in this case, so it invokes "free" only once.
1819 [Although we failed to mention this here in the 2.3a release, the default
1820 %destructor's and %printer's were experimental, and they were rewritten in
1823 ** Except for LALR(1) parsers in C with POSIX Yacc emulation enabled (with "-y",
1824 "--yacc", or "%yacc"), Bison no longer generates #define statements for
1825 associating token numbers with token names. Removing the #define statements
1826 helps to sanitize the global namespace during preprocessing, but POSIX Yacc
1827 requires them. Bison still generates an enum for token names in all cases.
1829 ** Handling of traditional Yacc prologue blocks is now more consistent but
1830 potentially incompatible with previous releases of Bison.
1832 As before, you declare prologue blocks in your grammar file with the
1833 "%{ ... %}" syntax. To generate the pre-prologue, Bison concatenates all
1834 prologue blocks that you've declared before the first %union. To generate
1835 the post-prologue, Bison concatenates all prologue blocks that you've
1836 declared after the first %union.
1838 Previous releases of Bison inserted the pre-prologue into both the header
1839 file and the code file in all cases except for LALR(1) parsers in C. In the
1840 latter case, Bison inserted it only into the code file. For parsers in C++,
1841 the point of insertion was before any token definitions (which associate
1842 token numbers with names). For parsers in C, the point of insertion was
1843 after the token definitions.
1845 Now, Bison never inserts the pre-prologue into the header file. In the code
1846 file, it always inserts it before the token definitions.
1848 ** Bison now provides a more flexible alternative to the traditional Yacc
1849 prologue blocks: %before-header, %start-header, %end-header, and
1852 For example, the following declaration order in the grammar file reflects the
1853 order in which Bison will output these code blocks. However, you are free to
1854 declare these code blocks in your grammar file in whatever order is most
1858 /* Bison treats this block like a pre-prologue block: it inserts it into
1859 * the code file before the contents of the header file. It does *not*
1860 * insert it into the header file. This is a good place to put
1861 * #include's that you want at the top of your code file. A common
1862 * example is '#include "system.h"'. */
1865 /* Bison inserts this block into both the header file and the code file.
1866 * In both files, the point of insertion is before any Bison-generated
1867 * token, semantic type, location type, and class definitions. This is a
1868 * good place to define %union dependencies, for example. */
1871 /* Unlike the traditional Yacc prologue blocks, the output order for the
1872 * new %*-header blocks is not affected by their declaration position
1873 * relative to any %union in the grammar file. */
1876 /* Bison inserts this block into both the header file and the code file.
1877 * In both files, the point of insertion is after the Bison-generated
1878 * definitions. This is a good place to declare or define public
1879 * functions or data structures that depend on the Bison-generated
1883 /* Bison treats this block like a post-prologue block: it inserts it into
1884 * the code file after the contents of the header file. It does *not*
1885 * insert it into the header file. This is a good place to declare or
1886 * define internal functions or data structures that depend on the
1887 * Bison-generated definitions. */
1890 If you have multiple occurrences of any one of the above declarations, Bison
1891 will concatenate the contents in declaration order.
1893 [Although we failed to mention this here in the 2.3a release, the prologue
1894 alternatives were experimental, and they were rewritten in future versions.]
1896 ** The option "--report=look-ahead" has been changed to "--report=lookahead".
1897 The old spelling still works, but is not documented and may be removed
1898 in a future release.
1900 * Changes in version 2.3, 2006-06-05:
1902 ** GLR grammars should now use "YYRECOVERING ()" instead of "YYRECOVERING",
1903 for compatibility with LALR(1) grammars.
1905 ** It is now documented that any definition of YYSTYPE or YYLTYPE should
1906 be to a type name that does not contain parentheses or brackets.
1908 * Changes in version 2.2, 2006-05-19:
1910 ** The distribution terms for all Bison-generated parsers now permit
1911 using the parsers in nonfree programs. Previously, this permission
1912 was granted only for Bison-generated LALR(1) parsers in C.
1914 ** %name-prefix changes the namespace name in C++ outputs.
1916 ** The C++ parsers export their token_type.
1918 ** Bison now allows multiple %union declarations, and concatenates
1919 their contents together.
1921 ** New warning: unused values
1922 Right-hand side symbols whose values are not used are reported,
1923 if the symbols have destructors. For instance:
1925 exp: exp "?" exp ":" exp { $1 ? $1 : $3; }
1929 will trigger a warning about $$ and $5 in the first rule, and $3 in
1930 the second ($1 is copied to $$ by the default rule). This example
1931 most likely contains three errors, and could be rewritten as:
1933 exp: exp "?" exp ":" exp
1934 { $$ = $1 ? $3 : $5; free ($1 ? $5 : $3); free ($1); }
1936 { $$ = $1 ? $1 : $3; if ($1) free ($3); }
1939 However, if the original actions were really intended, memory leaks
1940 and all, the warnings can be suppressed by letting Bison believe the
1941 values are used, e.g.:
1943 exp: exp "?" exp ":" exp { $1 ? $1 : $3; (void) ($$, $5); }
1944 | exp "+" exp { $$ = $1; (void) $3; }
1947 If there are mid-rule actions, the warning is issued if no action
1948 uses it. The following triggers no warning: $1 and $3 are used.
1950 exp: exp { push ($1); } '+' exp { push ($3); sum (); };
1952 The warning is intended to help catching lost values and memory leaks.
1953 If a value is ignored, its associated memory typically is not reclaimed.
1955 ** %destructor vs. YYABORT, YYACCEPT, and YYERROR.
1956 Destructors are now called when user code invokes YYABORT, YYACCEPT,
1957 and YYERROR, for all objects on the stack, other than objects
1958 corresponding to the right-hand side of the current rule.
1960 ** %expect, %expect-rr
1961 Incorrect numbers of expected conflicts are now actual errors,
1962 instead of warnings.
1964 ** GLR, YACC parsers.
1965 The %parse-params are available in the destructors (and the
1966 experimental printers) as per the documentation.
1968 ** Bison now warns if it finds a stray "$" or "@" in an action.
1970 ** %require "VERSION"
1971 This specifies that the grammar file depends on features implemented
1972 in Bison version VERSION or higher.
1974 ** lalr1.cc: The token and value types are now class members.
1975 The tokens were defined as free form enums and cpp macros. YYSTYPE
1976 was defined as a free form union. They are now class members:
1977 tokens are enumerations of the "yy::parser::token" struct, and the
1978 semantic values have the "yy::parser::semantic_type" type.
1980 If you do not want or can update to this scheme, the directive
1981 '%define "global_tokens_and_yystype" "1"' triggers the global
1982 definition of tokens and YYSTYPE. This change is suitable both
1983 for previous releases of Bison, and this one.
1985 If you wish to update, then make sure older version of Bison will
1986 fail using '%require "2.2"'.
1988 ** DJGPP support added.
1990 * Changes in version 2.1, 2005-09-16:
1992 ** The C++ lalr1.cc skeleton supports %lex-param.
1994 ** Bison-generated parsers now support the translation of diagnostics like
1995 "syntax error" into languages other than English. The default
1996 language is still English. For details, please see the new
1997 Internationalization section of the Bison manual. Software
1998 distributors should also see the new PACKAGING file. Thanks to
1999 Bruno Haible for this new feature.
2001 ** Wording in the Bison-generated parsers has been changed slightly to
2002 simplify translation. In particular, the message "memory exhausted"
2003 has replaced "parser stack overflow", as the old message was not
2004 always accurate for modern Bison-generated parsers.
2006 ** Destructors are now called when the parser aborts, for all symbols left
2007 behind on the stack. Also, the start symbol is now destroyed after a
2008 successful parse. In both cases, the behavior was formerly inconsistent.
2010 ** When generating verbose diagnostics, Bison-generated parsers no longer
2011 quote the literal strings associated with tokens. For example, for
2012 a syntax error associated with '%token NUM "number"' they might
2013 print 'syntax error, unexpected number' instead of 'syntax error,
2014 unexpected "number"'.
2016 * Changes in version 2.0, 2004-12-25:
2018 ** Possibly-incompatible changes
2020 - Bison-generated parsers no longer default to using the alloca function
2021 (when available) to extend the parser stack, due to widespread
2022 problems in unchecked stack-overflow detection. You can "#define
2023 YYSTACK_USE_ALLOCA 1" to require the use of alloca, but please read
2024 the manual to determine safe values for YYMAXDEPTH in that case.
2026 - Error token location.
2027 During error recovery, the location of the syntax error is updated
2028 to cover the whole sequence covered by the error token: it includes
2029 the shifted symbols thrown away during the first part of the error
2030 recovery, and the lookahead rejected during the second part.
2032 - Semicolon changes:
2033 . Stray semicolons are no longer allowed at the start of a grammar.
2034 . Semicolons are now required after in-grammar declarations.
2036 - Unescaped newlines are no longer allowed in character constants or
2037 string literals. They were never portable, and GCC 3.4.0 has
2038 dropped support for them. Better diagnostics are now generated if
2039 forget a closing quote.
2041 - NUL bytes are no longer allowed in Bison string literals, unfortunately.
2045 - GLR grammars now support locations.
2047 - New directive: %initial-action.
2048 This directive allows the user to run arbitrary code (including
2049 initializing @$) from yyparse before parsing starts.
2051 - A new directive "%expect-rr N" specifies the expected number of
2052 reduce/reduce conflicts in GLR parsers.
2054 - %token numbers can now be hexadecimal integers, e.g., "%token FOO 0x12d".
2055 This is a GNU extension.
2057 - The option "--report=lookahead" was changed to "--report=look-ahead".
2058 [However, this was changed back after 2.3.]
2060 - Experimental %destructor support has been added to lalr1.cc.
2062 - New configure option --disable-yacc, to disable installation of the
2063 yacc command and -ly library introduced in 1.875 for POSIX conformance.
2067 - For now, %expect-count violations are now just warnings, not errors.
2068 This is for compatibility with Bison 1.75 and earlier (when there are
2069 reduce/reduce conflicts) and with Bison 1.30 and earlier (when there
2070 are too many or too few shift/reduce conflicts). However, in future
2071 versions of Bison we plan to improve the %expect machinery so that
2072 these violations will become errors again.
2074 - Within Bison itself, numbers (e.g., goto numbers) are no longer
2075 arbitrarily limited to 16-bit counts.
2077 - Semicolons are now allowed before "|" in grammar rules, as POSIX requires.
2079 * Changes in version 1.875, 2003-01-01:
2081 ** The documentation license has been upgraded to version 1.2
2082 of the GNU Free Documentation License.
2084 ** syntax error processing
2086 - In Yacc-style parsers YYLLOC_DEFAULT is now used to compute error
2087 locations too. This fixes bugs in error-location computation.
2090 It is now possible to reclaim the memory associated to symbols
2091 discarded during error recovery. This feature is still experimental.
2094 This new directive is preferred over YYERROR_VERBOSE.
2096 - #defining yyerror to steal internal variables is discouraged.
2097 It is not guaranteed to work forever.
2099 ** POSIX conformance
2101 - Semicolons are once again optional at the end of grammar rules.
2102 This reverts to the behavior of Bison 1.33 and earlier, and improves
2103 compatibility with Yacc.
2105 - "parse error" -> "syntax error"
2106 Bison now uniformly uses the term "syntax error"; formerly, the code
2107 and manual sometimes used the term "parse error" instead. POSIX
2108 requires "syntax error" in diagnostics, and it was thought better to
2111 - The documentation now emphasizes that yylex and yyerror must be
2112 declared before use. C99 requires this.
2114 - Bison now parses C99 lexical constructs like UCNs and
2115 backslash-newline within C escape sequences, as POSIX 1003.1-2001 requires.
2117 - File names are properly escaped in C output. E.g., foo\bar.y is
2118 output as "foo\\bar.y".
2120 - Yacc command and library now available
2121 The Bison distribution now installs a "yacc" command, as POSIX requires.
2122 Also, Bison now installs a small library liby.a containing
2123 implementations of Yacc-compatible yyerror and main functions.
2124 This library is normally not useful, but POSIX requires it.
2126 - Type clashes now generate warnings, not errors.
2128 - If the user does not define YYSTYPE as a macro, Bison now declares it
2129 using typedef instead of defining it as a macro.
2130 For consistency, YYLTYPE is also declared instead of defined.
2132 ** Other compatibility issues
2134 - %union directives can now have a tag before the "{", e.g., the
2135 directive "%union foo {...}" now generates the C code
2136 "typedef union foo { ... } YYSTYPE;"; this is for Yacc compatibility.
2137 The default union tag is "YYSTYPE", for compatibility with Solaris 9 Yacc.
2138 For consistency, YYLTYPE's struct tag is now "YYLTYPE" not "yyltype".
2139 This is for compatibility with both Yacc and Bison 1.35.
2141 - ";" is output before the terminating "}" of an action, for
2142 compatibility with Bison 1.35.
2144 - Bison now uses a Yacc-style format for conflict reports, e.g.,
2145 "conflicts: 2 shift/reduce, 1 reduce/reduce".
2147 - "yystype" and "yyltype" are now obsolescent macros instead of being
2148 typedefs or tags; they are no longer documented and are planned to be
2149 withdrawn in a future release.
2154 Users of Bison have to decide how they handle the portability of the
2157 - "parsing stack overflow..." -> "parser stack overflow"
2158 GLR parsers now report "parser stack overflow" as per the Bison manual.
2160 ** %parse-param and %lex-param
2161 The macros YYPARSE_PARAM and YYLEX_PARAM provide a means to pass
2162 additional context to yyparse and yylex. They suffer from several
2165 - a single argument only can be added,
2166 - their types are weak (void *),
2167 - this context is not passed to ancillary functions such as yyerror,
2168 - only yacc.c parsers support them.
2170 The new %parse-param/%lex-param directives provide a more precise control.
2173 %parse-param {int *nastiness}
2174 %lex-param {int *nastiness}
2175 %parse-param {int *randomness}
2177 results in the following signatures:
2179 int yylex (int *nastiness);
2180 int yyparse (int *nastiness, int *randomness);
2182 or, if both %pure-parser and %locations are used:
2184 int yylex (YYSTYPE *lvalp, YYLTYPE *llocp, int *nastiness);
2185 int yyparse (int *nastiness, int *randomness);
2187 ** Bison now warns if it detects conflicting outputs to the same file,
2188 e.g., it generates a warning for "bison -d -o foo.h foo.y" since
2189 that command outputs both code and header to foo.h.
2191 ** #line in output files
2192 - --no-line works properly.
2194 ** Bison can no longer be built by a K&R C compiler; it requires C89 or
2195 later to be built. This change originally took place a few versions
2196 ago, but nobody noticed until we recently asked someone to try
2197 building Bison with a K&R C compiler.
2199 * Changes in version 1.75, 2002-10-14:
2201 ** Bison should now work on 64-bit hosts.
2203 ** Indonesian translation thanks to Tedi Heriyanto.
2206 Fix spurious parse errors.
2209 Some people redefine yyerror to steal yyparse' private variables.
2210 Reenable this trick until an official feature replaces it.
2213 In agreement with POSIX and with other Yaccs, leaving a default
2214 action is valid when $$ is untyped, and $1 typed:
2218 but the converse remains an error:
2222 ** Values of mid-rule actions
2225 foo: { ... } { $$ = $1; } ...
2227 was incorrectly rejected: $1 is defined in the second mid-rule
2228 action, and is equal to the $$ of the first mid-rule action.
2230 * Changes in version 1.50, 2002-10-04:
2235 causes Bison to produce a Generalized LR (GLR) parser, capable of handling
2236 almost any context-free grammar, ambiguous or not. The new declarations
2237 %dprec and %merge on grammar rules allow parse-time resolution of
2238 ambiguities. Contributed by Paul Hilfinger.
2240 Unfortunately Bison 1.50 does not work properly on 64-bit hosts
2241 like the Alpha, so please stick to 32-bit hosts for now.
2244 When not in Yacc compatibility mode, when the output file was not
2245 specified, running "bison foo/bar.y" created "foo/bar.c". It
2246 now creates "bar.c".
2249 The undefined token was systematically mapped to 2 which prevented
2250 the use of 2 by the user. This is no longer the case.
2252 ** Unknown token numbers
2253 If yylex returned an out of range value, yyparse could die. This is
2257 According to POSIX, the error token must be 256.
2258 Bison extends this requirement by making it a preference: *if* the
2259 user specified that one of her tokens is numbered 256, then error
2260 will be mapped onto another number.
2262 ** Verbose error messages
2263 They no longer report "..., expecting error or..." for states where
2264 error recovery is possible.
2267 Defaults to "$end" instead of "$".
2269 ** Error recovery now conforms to documentation and to POSIX
2270 When a Bison-generated parser encounters a syntax error, it now pops
2271 the stack until it finds a state that allows shifting the error
2272 token. Formerly, it popped the stack until it found a state that
2273 allowed some non-error action other than a default reduction on the
2274 error token. The new behavior has long been the documented behavior,
2275 and has long been required by POSIX. For more details, please see
2276 Paul Eggert, "Reductions during Bison error handling" (2002-05-20)
2277 <http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/bug-bison/2002-05/msg00038.html>.
2280 Popped tokens and nonterminals are now reported.
2283 Larger grammars are now supported (larger token numbers, larger grammar
2284 size (= sum of the LHS and RHS lengths), larger LALR tables).
2285 Formerly, many of these numbers ran afoul of 16-bit limits;
2286 now these limits are 32 bits on most hosts.
2288 ** Explicit initial rule
2289 Bison used to play hacks with the initial rule, which the user does
2290 not write. It is now explicit, and visible in the reports and
2294 Before, Bison reported the useless rules, but, although not used,
2295 included them in the parsers. They are now actually removed.
2297 ** Useless rules, useless nonterminals
2298 They are now reported, as a warning, with their locations.
2300 ** Rules never reduced
2301 Rules that can never be reduced because of conflicts are now
2304 ** Incorrect "Token not used"
2305 On a grammar such as
2307 %token useless useful
2309 exp: '0' %prec useful;
2311 where a token was used to set the precedence of the last rule,
2312 bison reported both "useful" and "useless" as useless tokens.
2314 ** Revert the C++ namespace changes introduced in 1.31
2315 as they caused too many portability hassles.
2317 ** Default locations
2318 By an accident of design, the default computation of @$ was
2319 performed after another default computation was performed: @$ = @1.
2320 The latter is now removed: YYLLOC_DEFAULT is fully responsible of
2321 the computation of @$.
2323 ** Token end-of-file
2324 The token end of file may be specified by the user, in which case,
2325 the user symbol is used in the reports, the graphs, and the verbose
2326 error messages instead of "$end", which remains being the default.
2330 %token MYEOF 0 "end of file"
2333 This old option, which has been broken for ages, is removed.
2336 Brazilian Portuguese, thanks to Alexandre Folle de Menezes.
2337 Croatian, thanks to Denis Lackovic.
2339 ** Incorrect token definitions
2342 bison used to output
2345 ** Token definitions as enums
2346 Tokens are output both as the traditional #define's, and, provided
2347 the compiler supports ANSI C or is a C++ compiler, as enums.
2348 This lets debuggers display names instead of integers.
2351 In addition to --verbose, bison supports --report=THINGS, which
2352 produces additional information:
2354 complete the core item sets with their closure
2355 - lookahead [changed to "look-ahead" in 1.875e through 2.3, but changed back]
2356 explicitly associate lookahead tokens to items
2358 describe shift/reduce conflicts solving.
2359 Bison used to systematically output this information on top of
2360 the report. Solved conflicts are now attached to their states.
2363 Previous versions don't complain when there is a type clash on
2364 the default action if the rule has a mid-rule action, such as in:
2372 ** GNU M4 is now required when using Bison.
2374 * Changes in version 1.35, 2002-03-25:
2377 Some projects use Bison's C parser with C++ compilers, and define
2378 YYSTYPE as a class. The recent adjustment of C parsers for data
2379 alignment and 64 bit architectures made this impossible.
2381 Because for the time being no real solution for C++ parser
2382 generation exists, kludges were implemented in the parser to
2383 maintain this use. In the future, when Bison has C++ parsers, this
2384 kludge will be disabled.
2386 This kludge also addresses some C++ problems when the stack was
2389 * Changes in version 1.34, 2002-03-12:
2391 ** File name clashes are detected
2392 $ bison foo.y -d -o foo.x
2393 fatal error: header and parser would both be named "foo.x"
2395 ** A missing ";" at the end of a rule triggers a warning
2396 In accordance with POSIX, and in agreement with other
2397 Yacc implementations, Bison will mandate this semicolon in the near
2398 future. This eases the implementation of a Bison parser of Bison
2399 grammars by making this grammar LALR(1) instead of LR(2). To
2400 facilitate the transition, this release introduces a warning.
2402 ** Revert the C++ namespace changes introduced in 1.31, as they caused too
2403 many portability hassles.
2405 ** DJGPP support added.
2407 ** Fix test suite portability problems.
2409 * Changes in version 1.33, 2002-02-07:
2412 Groff could not be compiled for the definition of size_t was lacking
2413 under some conditions.
2418 * Changes in version 1.32, 2002-01-23:
2420 ** Fix Yacc output file names
2422 ** Portability fixes
2424 ** Italian, Dutch translations
2426 * Changes in version 1.31, 2002-01-14:
2430 ** GNU Gettext and %expect
2431 GNU Gettext asserts 10 s/r conflicts, but there are 7. Now that
2432 Bison dies on incorrect %expectations, we fear there will be
2433 too many bug reports for Gettext, so _for the time being_, %expect
2434 does not trigger an error when the input file is named "plural.y".
2436 ** Use of alloca in parsers
2437 If YYSTACK_USE_ALLOCA is defined to 0, then the parsers will use
2438 malloc exclusively. Since 1.29, but was not NEWS'ed.
2440 alloca is used only when compiled with GCC, to avoid portability
2443 ** yyparse now returns 2 if memory is exhausted; formerly it dumped core.
2445 ** When the generated parser lacks debugging code, YYDEBUG is now 0
2446 (as POSIX requires) instead of being undefined.
2449 Bison has always permitted actions such as { $$ = $1 }: it adds the
2450 ending semicolon. Now if in Yacc compatibility mode, the semicolon
2451 is no longer output: one has to write { $$ = $1; }.
2453 ** Better C++ compliance
2454 The output parsers try to respect C++ namespaces.
2455 [This turned out to be a failed experiment, and it was reverted later.]
2458 Fixed bugs when reporting useless nonterminals.
2461 The parsers work properly on 64 bit hosts.
2464 Some calls to strerror resulted in scrambled or missing error messages.
2467 When the number of shift/reduce conflicts is correct, don't issue
2470 ** The verbose report includes the rule line numbers.
2472 ** Rule line numbers are fixed in traces.
2474 ** Swedish translation
2477 Verbose parse error messages from the parsers are better looking.
2478 Before: parse error: unexpected `'/'', expecting `"number"' or `'-'' or `'(''
2479 Now: parse error: unexpected '/', expecting "number" or '-' or '('
2481 ** Fixed parser memory leaks.
2482 When the generated parser was using malloc to extend its stacks, the
2483 previous allocations were not freed.
2485 ** Fixed verbose output file.
2486 Some newlines were missing.
2487 Some conflicts in state descriptions were missing.
2489 ** Fixed conflict report.
2490 Option -v was needed to get the result.
2494 Mismatches are errors, not warnings.
2496 ** Fixed incorrect processing of some invalid input.
2498 ** Fixed CPP guards: 9foo.h uses BISON_9FOO_H instead of 9FOO_H.
2500 ** Fixed some typos in the documentation.
2502 ** %token MY_EOF 0 is supported.
2503 Before, MY_EOF was silently renumbered as 257.
2505 ** doc/refcard.tex is updated.
2507 ** %output, %file-prefix, %name-prefix.
2511 New, aliasing "--output-file".
2513 * Changes in version 1.30, 2001-10-26:
2515 ** "--defines" and "--graph" have now an optional argument which is the
2516 output file name. "-d" and "-g" do not change; they do not take any
2519 ** "%source_extension" and "%header_extension" are removed, failed
2522 ** Portability fixes.
2524 * Changes in version 1.29, 2001-09-07:
2526 ** The output file does not define const, as this caused problems when used
2527 with common autoconfiguration schemes. If you still use ancient compilers
2528 that lack const, compile with the equivalent of the C compiler option
2529 "-Dconst=". Autoconf's AC_C_CONST macro provides one way to do this.
2531 ** Added "-g" and "--graph".
2533 ** The Bison manual is now distributed under the terms of the GNU FDL.
2535 ** The input and the output files has automatically a similar extension.
2537 ** Russian translation added.
2539 ** NLS support updated; should hopefully be less troublesome.
2541 ** Added the old Bison reference card.
2543 ** Added "--locations" and "%locations".
2545 ** Added "-S" and "--skeleton".
2547 ** "%raw", "-r", "--raw" is disabled.
2549 ** Special characters are escaped when output. This solves the problems
2550 of the #line lines with path names including backslashes.
2553 "%yacc", "%fixed_output_files", "%defines", "%no_parser", "%verbose",
2554 "%debug", "%source_extension" and "%header_extension".
2557 Automatic location tracking.
2559 * Changes in version 1.28, 1999-07-06:
2561 ** Should compile better now with K&R compilers.
2565 ** Fixed a problem with escaping the double quote character.
2567 ** There is now a FAQ.
2569 * Changes in version 1.27:
2571 ** The make rule which prevented bison.simple from being created on
2572 some systems has been fixed.
2574 * Changes in version 1.26:
2576 ** Bison now uses Automake.
2578 ** New mailing lists: <bug-bison@gnu.org> and <help-bison@gnu.org>.
2580 ** Token numbers now start at 257 as previously documented, not 258.
2582 ** Bison honors the TMPDIR environment variable.
2584 ** A couple of buffer overruns have been fixed.
2586 ** Problems when closing files should now be reported.
2588 ** Generated parsers should now work even on operating systems which do
2589 not provide alloca().
2591 * Changes in version 1.25, 1995-10-16:
2593 ** Errors in the input grammar are not fatal; Bison keeps reading
2594 the grammar file, and reports all the errors found in it.
2596 ** Tokens can now be specified as multiple-character strings: for
2597 example, you could use "<=" for a token which looks like <=, instead
2598 of choosing a name like LESSEQ.
2600 ** The %token_table declaration says to write a table of tokens (names
2601 and numbers) into the parser file. The yylex function can use this
2602 table to recognize multiple-character string tokens, or for other
2605 ** The %no_lines declaration says not to generate any #line preprocessor
2606 directives in the parser file.
2608 ** The %raw declaration says to use internal Bison token numbers, not
2609 Yacc-compatible token numbers, when token names are defined as macros.
2611 ** The --no-parser option produces the parser tables without including
2612 the parser engine; a project can now use its own parser engine.
2613 The actions go into a separate file called NAME.act, in the form of
2614 a switch statement body.
2616 * Changes in version 1.23:
2618 The user can define YYPARSE_PARAM as the name of an argument to be
2619 passed into yyparse. The argument should have type void *. It should
2620 actually point to an object. Grammar actions can access the variable
2621 by casting it to the proper pointer type.
2623 Line numbers in output file corrected.
2625 * Changes in version 1.22:
2627 --help option added.
2629 * Changes in version 1.20:
2631 Output file does not redefine const for C++.
2635 Copyright (C) 1995-2013 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
2637 This file is part of Bison, the GNU Parser Generator.
2639 This program is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify
2640 it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
2641 the Free Software Foundation, either version 3 of the License, or
2642 (at your option) any later version.
2644 This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
2645 but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
2646 MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the
2647 GNU General Public License for more details.
2649 You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
2650 along with this program. If not, see <http://www.gnu.org/licenses/>.
2652 LocalWords: yacc YYBACKUP glr GCC lalr ArrayIndexOutOfBoundsException nullptr
2653 LocalWords: cplusplus liby rpl fprintf mfcalc Wyacc stmt cond expr mk sym lr
2654 LocalWords: IELR ielr Lookahead YYERROR nonassoc LALR's api lookaheads yychar
2655 LocalWords: destructor lookahead YYRHSLOC YYLLOC Rhs ifndef YYFAIL cpp sr rr
2656 LocalWords: preprocessor initializer Wno Wnone Werror FreeBSD prec livelocks
2657 LocalWords: Solaris AIX UX RHEL Tru LHS gcc's Wundef YYENABLE NLS YYLTYPE VCG
2658 LocalWords: yyerror cpp's Wunused yylval yylloc prepend yyparse yylex yypush
2659 LocalWords: Graphviz xml nonterminals midrule destructor's YYSTYPE typedef ly
2660 LocalWords: CHR chr printf stdout namespace preprocessing enum pre include's
2661 LocalWords: YYRECOVERING nonfree destructors YYABORT YYACCEPT params enums de
2662 LocalWords: struct yystype DJGPP lex param Haible NUM alloca YYSTACK NUL goto
2663 LocalWords: YYMAXDEPTH Unescaped UCNs YYLTYPE's yyltype typedefs inline Yaccs
2664 LocalWords: Heriyanto Reenable dprec Hilfinger Eggert MYEOF Folle Menezes EOF
2665 LocalWords: Lackovic define's itemset Groff Gettext malloc NEWS'ed YYDEBUG YY
2666 LocalWords: namespaces strerror const autoconfiguration Dconst Autoconf's FDL
2667 LocalWords: Automake TMPDIR LESSEQ ylwrap endif yydebug YYTOKEN YYLSP ival hh
2668 LocalWords: extern YYTOKENTYPE TOKENTYPE yytokentype tokentype STYPE lval pdf
2669 LocalWords: lang yyoutput dvi html ps POSIX lvalp llocp Wother nterm arg init
2670 LocalWords: TOK calc yyo fval Wconflicts parsers yystackp yyval yynerrs
2671 LocalWords: Théophile Ranquet Santet fno fnone stype associativity Tolmer
2672 LocalWords: Wprecedence Rassoul Wempty Paolo Bonzini parser's Michiel loc
2673 LocalWords: redeclaration sval fcaret reentrant XSLT xsl Wmaybe yyvsp Tedi
2674 LocalWords: pragmas noreturn untyped Rozenman unexpanded Wojciech Polak
2675 LocalWords: Alexandre MERCHANTABILITY yytype