X-Git-Url: https://git.saurik.com/bison.git/blobdiff_plain/2bfcac9a2be3778d9ee6915f1e615f7daaf10880..8a4281b987577d911e418e8a37aef0c9c7121bf8:/NEWS diff --git a/NEWS b/NEWS index 1f0c42c0..593807c7 100644 --- a/NEWS +++ b/NEWS @@ -62,7 +62,7 @@ Bison News * Changes in version 2.5 (????-??-??): -** Named References Support +** Named references: Historically, Yacc and Bison have supported positional references ($n, $$) to allow access to symbol values from inside of semantic @@ -87,13 +87,13 @@ Bison News These features are experimental in this version. More user feedback will help to stabilize them. -** IELR(1) and Canonical LR(1) Support +** IELR(1) and canonical LR(1): IELR(1) is a minimal LR(1) parser table generation algorithm. That is, given any context-free grammar, IELR(1) generates parser tables with the full language recognition power of canonical LR(1) but with - nearly the same number of parser states as LALR(1). This reduction in - parser states is often an order of magnitude. More importantly, + nearly the same number of parser states as LALR(1). This reduction + in parser states is often an order of magnitude. More importantly, because canonical LR(1)'s extra parser states may contain duplicate conflicts in the case of non-LR(1) grammars, the number of conflicts for IELR(1) is often an order of magnitude less as well. This can @@ -117,15 +117,57 @@ Bison News These features are experimental. More user feedback will help to stabilize them. -** Unrecognized %code qualifiers are now an error not a warning. +** LAC (lookahead correction) for syntax error handling: -** %define improvements. + Canonical LR, IELR, and LALR can suffer from a couple of problems + upon encountering a syntax error. First, the parser might perform + additional parser stack reductions before discovering the syntax + error. Such reductions perform user semantic actions that are + unexpected because they are based on an invalid token, and they + cause error recovery to begin in a different syntactic context than + the one in which the invalid token was encountered. Second, when + verbose error messages are enabled (with %error-verbose or `#define + YYERROR_VERBOSE'), the expected token list in the syntax error + message can both contain invalid tokens and omit valid tokens. -*** Unrecognized variables are now an error not a warning. + The culprits for the above problems are %nonassoc, default + reductions in inconsistent states, and parser state merging. Thus, + IELR and LALR suffer the most. Canonical LR can suffer only if + %nonassoc is used or if default reductions are enabled for + inconsistent states. -*** Multiple invocations for any variable is now an error not a warning. + LAC is a new mechanism within the parsing algorithm that completely + solves these problems for canonical LR, IELR, and LALR without + sacrificing %nonassoc, default reductions, or state mering. When + LAC is in use, canonical LR and IELR behave exactly the same for + both syntactically acceptable and syntactically unacceptable input. + While LALR still does not support the full language-recognition + power of canonical LR and IELR, LAC at least enables LALR's syntax + error handling to correctly reflect LALR's language-recognition + power. + + Currently, LAC is only supported for deterministic parsers in C. + You can enable LAC with the following directive: + + %define parse.lac full + + See the documentation for `%define parse.lac' in the section `Bison + Declaration Summary' in the Bison manual for additional details. + + LAC is an experimental feature. More user feedback will help to + stabilize it. -*** Can now be invoked via the command line. +** Grammar symbol names can now contain dashes: + + Consistently with directives (such as %error-verbose) and variables + (e.g. push-pull), grammar symbol names may include dashes in any + position, similarly to periods and underscores. This is GNU + extension over POSIX Yacc whose use is reported by -Wyacc, and + rejected in Yacc mode (--yacc). + +** %define improvements: + +*** Can now be invoked via the command line: Each of these command-line options @@ -144,7 +186,7 @@ Bison News quietly override %define, but -D and --define do not. For further details, see the section "Bison Options" in the Bison manual. -*** Variables renamed. +*** Variables renamed: The following %define variables @@ -159,7 +201,7 @@ Bison News The old names are now deprecated but will be maintained indefinitely for backward compatibility. -*** Values no longer need to be quoted in grammar file. +*** Values no longer need to be quoted in grammar file: If a %define value is an identifier, it no longer needs to be placed within quotations marks. For example, @@ -170,47 +212,13 @@ Bison News %define api.push-pull push -** Symbol names. +*** Unrecognized variables are now errors not warnings. - Consistently with directives (such as %error-verbose) and variables - (e.g. push-pull), symbol names may include dashes in any position, - similarly to periods and underscores. This is GNU extension over - POSIX Yacc whose use is reported by -Wyacc, and rejected in Yacc - mode (--yacc). - -** YYFAIL now produces warnings and Java parsers no longer implement it. - - YYFAIL has existed for many years as an undocumented feature of - deterministic parsers in C generated by Bison. More recently, it was - a documented feature of Bison's experimental Java parsers. As - promised in Bison 2.4.2's NEWS entry, any appearance of YYFAIL in a - semantic action now produces a deprecation warning, and Java parsers - no longer implement YYFAIL at all. For further details, including a - discussion of how to suppress C preprocessor warnings about YYFAIL - being unused, see the Bison 2.4.2 NEWS entry. - -** Temporary hack for adding a semicolon to the user action. - - Previously, Bison appended a semicolon to every user action for - reductions when the output language defaulted to C (specifically, when - neither %yacc, %language, %skeleton, or equivalent command-line - options were specified). This allowed actions such as - - exp: exp "+" exp { $$ = $1 + $3 }; - - instead of - - exp: exp "+" exp { $$ = $1 + $3; }; +*** Multiple invocations for any variable is now an error not a warning. - As a first step in removing this misfeature, Bison now issues a - warning when it appends a semicolon. Moreover, in cases where Bison - cannot easily determine whether a semicolon is needed (for example, an - action ending with a cpp directive or a braced compound initializer), - it no longer appends one. Thus, the C compiler might now complain - about a missing semicolon where it did not before. Future releases of - Bison will cease to append semicolons entirely. +** Unrecognized %code qualifiers are now errors not warnings. -** Character literals not of length one. +** Character literals not of length one: Previously, Bison quietly converted all character literals to length one. For example, without warning, Bison interpreted the operators in @@ -221,25 +229,16 @@ Bison News ; Bison now warns when a character literal is not of length one. In - some future release, Bison will report an error instead. - -** Verbose error messages fixed for nonassociative tokens. + some future release, Bison will start reporting an error instead. - When %error-verbose is specified, syntax error messages produced by - the generated parser include the unexpected token as well as a list of - expected tokens. Previously, this list erroneously included tokens - that would actually induce a syntax error because conflicts for them - were resolved with %nonassoc. Such tokens are now properly omitted - from the list. - -** Destructor calls fixed for lookaheads altered in semantic actions. +** Destructor calls fixed for lookaheads altered in semantic actions: Previously for deterministic parsers in C, if a user semantic action altered yychar, the parser in some cases used the old yychar value to determine which destructor to call for the lookahead upon a syntax error or upon parser return. This bug has been fixed. -** C++ parsers use YYRHSLOC +** C++ parsers use YYRHSLOC: Similarly to the C parsers, the C++ parsers now define the YYRHSLOC macro and use it in the default YYLLOC_DEFAULT. You are encouraged @@ -274,14 +273,84 @@ Bison News } \ while (false) -** YYLLOC_DEFAULT in C++ +** YYLLOC_DEFAULT in C++: The default implementation of YYLLOC_DEFAULT used to be issued in the header file. It is now output in the implementation file, after the user %code sections so that its #ifndef guard does not try to override the user's YYLLOC_DEFAULT if provided. -* Changes in version 2.4.3 (????-??-??): +** YYFAIL now produces warnings and Java parsers no longer implement it: + + YYFAIL has existed for many years as an undocumented feature of + deterministic parsers in C generated by Bison. More recently, it was + a documented feature of Bison's experimental Java parsers. As + promised in Bison 2.4.2's NEWS entry, any appearance of YYFAIL in a + semantic action now produces a deprecation warning, and Java parsers + no longer implement YYFAIL at all. For further details, including a + discussion of how to suppress C preprocessor warnings about YYFAIL + being unused, see the Bison 2.4.2 NEWS entry. + +** Temporary hack for adding a semicolon to the user action: + + Previously, Bison appended a semicolon to every user action for + reductions when the output language defaulted to C (specifically, when + neither %yacc, %language, %skeleton, or equivalent command-line + options were specified). This allowed actions such as + + exp: exp "+" exp { $$ = $1 + $3 }; + + instead of + + exp: exp "+" exp { $$ = $1 + $3; }; + + As a first step in removing this misfeature, Bison now issues a + warning when it appends a semicolon. Moreover, in cases where Bison + cannot easily determine whether a semicolon is needed (for example, an + action ending with a cpp directive or a braced compound initializer), + it no longer appends one. Thus, the C compiler might now complain + about a missing semicolon where it did not before. Future releases of + Bison will cease to append semicolons entirely. + +** Verbose syntax error message fixes: + + When %error-verbose or `#define YYERROR_VERBOSE' is specified, + syntax error messages produced by the generated parser include the + unexpected token as well as a list of expected tokens. The effect + of %nonassoc on these verbose messages has been corrected in two + ways, but a complete fix requires LAC, described above: + +*** When %nonassoc is used, there can exist parser states that accept no + tokens, and so the parser does not always require a lookahead token + in order to detect a syntax error. Because no unexpected token or + expected tokens can then be reported, the verbose syntax error + message described above is suppressed, and the parser instead + reports the simpler message, "syntax error". Previously, this + suppression was sometimes erroneously triggered by %nonassoc when a + lookahead was actually required. Now verbose messages are + suppressed only when all previous lookaheads have already been + shifted or discarded. + +*** Previously, the list of expected tokens erroneously included tokens + that would actually induce a syntax error because conflicts for them + were resolved with %nonassoc in the current parser state. Such + tokens are now properly omitted from the list. + +*** Expected token lists are still often wrong due to state merging + (from LALR or IELR) and default reductions, which can both add + invalid tokens and subtract valid tokens. Canonical LR almost + completely fixes this problem by eliminating state merging and + default reductions. However, there is one minor problem left even + when using canonical LR and even after the fixes above. That is, + if the resolution of a conflict with %nonassoc appears in a later + parser state than the one at which some syntax error is + discovered, the conflicted token is still erroneously included in + the expected token list. Bison's new LAC implementation, + described above, eliminates this problem and the need for + canonical LR. However, LAC is still experimental and is disabled + by default. + +* Changes in version 2.4.3 (2010-08-05): ** Bison now obeys -Werror and --warnings=error for warnings about grammar rules that are useless in the parser due to conflicts. @@ -299,6 +368,8 @@ Bison News errors in Bison 2.5. They will remain warnings, which should be sufficient for POSIX while avoiding backward compatibility issues. +** Minor documentation fixes. + * Changes in version 2.4.2 (2010-03-20): ** Some portability problems that resulted in failures and livelocks @@ -1440,9 +1511,7 @@ End: ----- -Copyright (C) 1995, 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, -2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010 Free Software Foundation, -Inc. +Copyright (C) 1995-2011 Free Software Foundation, Inc. This file is part of Bison, the GNU Parser Generator.