X-Git-Url: https://git.saurik.com/bison.git/blobdiff_plain/8b3ba7ff05c1f293e168d2762580a5326c0aab1a..47eced3099712180364f4e01b839242027d9a9d8:/TODO?ds=inline diff --git a/TODO b/TODO index 01e1a081..c3aac317 100644 --- a/TODO +++ b/TODO @@ -1,118 +1,314 @@ -*- outline -*- -* Coding system independence -Paul notes: +* Short term +** Use syntax_error from the scanner? +This would provide a means to raise syntax error from function called +from the scanner. Actually, there is no good solution to report a +lexical error in general. Usually they are kept at the scanner level +only, ignoring the guilty token. But that might not be the best bet, +since we don't benefit from the syntactic error recovery. - Currently Bison assumes 8-bit bytes (i.e. that UCHAR_MAX is - 255). It also assumes that the 8-bit character encoding is - the same for the invocation of 'bison' as it is for the - invocation of 'cc', but this is not necessarily true when - people run bison on an ASCII host and then use cc on an EBCDIC - host. I don't think these topics are worth our time - addressing (unless we find a gung-ho volunteer for EBCDIC or - PDP-10 ports :-) but they should probably be documented - somewhere. +We still have the possibility to return an invalid token number, which +does the trick. But then the error message from the parser is poor +(something like "unexpected $undefined"). Since the scanner probably +already reported the error, we should directly enter error-recovery, +without reporting the error message (i.e., YYERROR's semantics). + +Back to lalr1.cc (whose name is now quite unfortunate, since it also +covers lr and ielr), if we support exceptions from yylex, should we +propose a lexical_error in addition to syntax_error? Should they have +a common root, say parse_error? Should syntax_error be renamed +syntactic_error for consistency with lexical_error? + +** Variable names. +What should we name `variant' and `lex_symbol'? + +** Use b4_symbol in all the skeleton +Then remove the older system, including the tables generated by +output.c + +** Update the documentation on gnu.org + +** Get rid of fake #lines [Bison: ...] +Possibly as simple as checking whether the column number is nonnegative. + +I have seen messages like the following from GCC. + +:0: fatal error: opening dependency file .deps/libltdl/argz.Tpo: No such file or directory + + +** Discuss about %printer/%destroy in the case of C++. +It would be very nice to provide the symbol classes with an operator<< +and a destructor. Unfortunately the syntax we have chosen for +%destroy and %printer make them hard to reuse. For instance, the user +is invited to write something like + + %printer { debug_stream() << $$; } ; + +which is hard to reuse elsewhere since it wants to use +"debug_stream()" to find the stream to use. The same applies to +%destroy: we told the user she could use the members of the Parser +class in the printers/destructors, which is not good for an operator<< +since it is no longer bound to a particular parser, it's just a +(standalone symbol). + +** Rename LR0.cc +as lr0.cc, why upper case? + +** bench several bisons. +Enhance bench.pl with %b to run different bisons. + +** Use b4_symbol everywhere. +Move its definition in the more standard places and deploy it in other +skeletons. + +* Various +** YYPRINT +glr.c inherits its symbol_print function from c.m4, which supports +YYPRINT. But to use YYPRINT yytoknum is needed, which not defined by +glr.c. + +Anyway, IMHO YYPRINT is obsolete and should be restricted to yacc.c. + +** YYERRCODE +Defined to 256, but not used, not documented. Probably the token +number for the error token, which POSIX wants to be 256, but which +Bison might renumber if the user used number 256. Keep fix and doc? +Throw away? + +Also, why don't we output the token name of the error token in the +output? It is explicitly skipped: + + /* Skip error token and tokens without identifier. */ + if (sym != errtoken && id) + +Of course there are issues with name spaces, but if we disable we have +something which seems to be more simpler and more consistent instead +of the special case YYERRCODE. + + enum yytokentype { + error = 256, + // ... + }; + + +We could (should?) also treat the case of the undef_token, which is +numbered 257 for yylex, and 2 internal. Both appear for instance in +toknum: + + const unsigned short int + parser::yytoken_number_[] = + { + 0, 256, 257, 258, 259, 260, 261, 262, 263, 264, + +while here + + enum yytokentype { + TOK_EOF = 0, + TOK_EQ = 258, + +so both 256 and 257 are "mysterious". + + const char* + const parser::yytname_[] = + { + "\"end of command\"", "error", "$undefined", "\"=\"", "\"break\"", + + +** YYFAIL +It is seems to be *really* obsolete now, shall we remove it? + +** YYBACKUP +There is no test about it, no examples in the doc, and I'm not sure +what it should look like. For instance what follows crashes. + + %error-verbose + %debug + %pure-parser + %code { + # include + # include + # include + + static void yyerror (const char *msg); + static int yylex (YYSTYPE *yylval); + } + %% + exp: + 'a' { printf ("a: %d\n", $1); } + | 'b' { YYBACKUP('a', 123); } + ; + %% + static int + yylex (YYSTYPE *yylval) + { + static char const input[] = "b"; + static size_t toknum; + assert (toknum < sizeof input); + *yylval = (toknum + 1) * 10; + return input[toknum++]; + } + + static void + yyerror (const char *msg) + { + fprintf (stderr, "%s\n", msg); + } + + int + main (void) + { + yydebug = !!getenv("YYDEBUG"); + return yyparse (); + } + +** yychar == yyempty_ +The code in yyerrlab reads: + + if (yychar <= YYEOF) + { + /* Return failure if at end of input. */ + if (yychar == YYEOF) + YYABORT; + } + +There are only two yychar that can be <= YYEOF: YYEMPTY and YYEOF. +But I can't produce the situation where yychar is YYEMPTY here, is it +really possible? The test suite does not exercise this case. + +This shows that it would be interesting to manage to install skeleton +coverage analysis to the test suite. + +** Table definitions +It should be very easy to factor the definition of the various tables, +including the separation bw declaration and definition. See for +instance b4_table_define in lalr1.cc. This way, we could even factor +C vs. C++ definitions. + +* From lalr1.cc to yacc.c +** Single stack +Merging the three stacks in lalr1.cc simplified the code, prompted for +other improvements and also made it faster (probably because memory +management is performed once instead of three times). I suggest that +we do the same in yacc.c. + +** yysyntax_error +The code bw glr.c and yacc.c is really alike, we can certainly factor +some parts. + +* Header guards + +From Franc,ois: should we keep the directory part in the CPP guard? + + +* Yacc.c: CPP Macros + +Do some people use YYPURE, YYLSP_NEEDED like we do in the test suite? +They should not: it is not documented. But if they need to, let's +find something clean (not like YYLSP_NEEDED...). + + +* Installation + +* Documentation +Before releasing, make sure the documentation ("Understanding your +parser") refers to the current `output' format. + +* Report + +** Figures +Some statistics about the grammar and the parser would be useful, +especially when asking the user to send some information about the +grammars she is working on. We should probably also include some +information about the variables (I'm not sure for instance we even +specify what LR variant was used). + +** GLR +How would Paul like to display the conflicted actions? In particular, +what when two reductions are possible on a given lookahead token, but one is +part of $default. Should we make the two reductions explicit, or just +keep $default? See the following point. + +** Disabled Reductions +See `tests/conflicts.at (Defaulted Conflicted Reduction)', and decide +what we want to do. + +** Documentation +Extend with error productions. The hard part will probably be finding +the right rule so that a single state does not exhibit too many yet +undocumented ``features''. Maybe an empty action ought to be +presented too. Shall we try to make a single grammar with all these +features, or should we have several very small grammars? + +** --report=conflict-path +Provide better assistance for understanding the conflicts by providing +a sample text exhibiting the (LALR) ambiguity. See the paper from +DeRemer and Penello: they already provide the algorithm. + +** Statically check for potential ambiguities in GLR grammars. See + for an approach. + + +* Extensions + +** Labeling the symbols +Have a look at the Lemon parser generator: instead of $1, $2 etc. they +can name the values. This is much more pleasant. For instance: -* Using enums instead of int for tokens. -Paul suggests: - - #ifndef YYTOKENTYPE - # if defined (__STDC__) || defined (__cplusplus) - /* Put the tokens into the symbol table, so that GDB and other debuggers - know about them. */ - enum yytokentype { - FOO = 256, - BAR, - ... - }; - /* POSIX requires `int' for tokens in interfaces. */ - # define YYTOKENTYPE int - # endif - #endif - #define FOO 256 - #define BAR 257 - ... - -> I'm in favor of -> -> %token FOO 256 -> %token BAR 257 -> -> and Bison moves error into 258. - -Yes, I think that's a valid extension too, if the user doesn't define -the token number for error. - -* Output directory -Akim: - -| I consider this to be a bug in bison: -| -| /tmp % mkdir src -| /tmp % cp ~/src/bison/tests/calc.y src -| /tmp % mkdir build && cd build -| /tmp/build % bison ../src/calc.y -| /tmp/build % cd .. -| /tmp % ls -l build src -| build: -| total 0 -| -| src: -| total 32 -| -rw-r--r-- 1 akim lrde 27553 oct 2 16:31 calc.tab.c -| -rw-r--r-- 1 akim lrde 3335 oct 2 16:31 calc.y -| -| -| Would it be safe to change this behavior to something more reasonable? -| Do you think some people depend upon this? - -Jim: - -Is it that behavior documented? -If so, then it's probably not reasonable to change it. -I've Cc'd the automake list, because some of automake's -rules use bison through $(YACC) -- though I'll bet they -all use it in yacc-compatible mode. - -Pavel: - -Hello, Jim and others! - -> Is it that behavior documented? -> If so, then it's probably not reasonable to change it. -> I've Cc'd the automake list, because some of automake's -> rules use bison through $(YACC) -- though I'll bet they -> all use it in yacc-compatible mode. - -Yes, Automake currently used bison in Automake-compatible mode, but it -would be fair for Automake to switch to the native mode as long as the -processed files are distributed and "missing" emulates bison. - -In any case, the makefiles should specify the output file explicitly -instead of relying on weird defaults. - -> | src: -> | total 32 -> | -rw-r--r-- 1 akim lrde 27553 oct 2 16:31 calc.tab.c -> | -rw-r--r-- 1 akim lrde 3335 oct 2 16:31 calc.y - -This is not _that_ ugly as it seems - with Automake you want to put -sources where they belong - to the source directory. - -> | This is not _that_ ugly as it seems - with Automake you want to put -> | sources where they belong - to the source directory. -> -> The difference source/build you are referring to is based on Automake -> concepts. They have no sense at all for tools such as bison or gcc -> etc. They have input and output. I do not want them to try to grasp -> source/build. I want them to behave uniformly: output *here*. - -I realize that. - -It's unfortunate that the native mode of Bison behaves in a less uniform -way than the yacc mode. I agree with your point. Bison maintainters may -want to fix it along with the documentation. + exp (res): exp (a) '+' exp (b) { $res = $a + $b; }; +I love this. I have been bitten too often by the removal of the +symbol, and forgetting to shift all the $n to $n-1. If you are +unlucky, it compiles... + +But instead of using $a etc., we can use regular variables. And +instead of using (), I propose to use `:' (again). Paul suggests +supporting `->' in addition to `:' to separate LHS and RHS. In other +words: + + r:exp -> a:exp '+' b:exp { r = a + b; }; + +That requires an significant improvement of the grammar parser. Using +GLR would be nice. It also requires that Bison know the type of the +symbols (which will be useful for %include anyway). So we have some +time before... + +Note that there remains the problem of locations: `@r'? + + +** $-1 +We should find a means to provide an access to values deep in the +stack. For instance, instead of + + baz: qux { $$ = $-1 + $0 + $1; } + +we should be able to have: + + foo($foo) bar($bar) baz($bar): qux($qux) { $baz = $foo + $bar + $qux; } + +Or something like this. + +** %if and the like +It should be possible to have %if/%else/%endif. The implementation is +not clear: should it be lexical or syntactic. Vadim Maslow thinks it +must be in the scanner: we must not parse what is in a switched off +part of %if. Akim Demaille thinks it should be in the parser, so as +to avoid falling into another CPP mistake. + +** XML Output +There are couple of available extensions of Bison targeting some XML +output. Some day we should consider including them. One issue is +that they seem to be quite orthogonal to the parsing technique, and +seem to depend mostly on the possibility to have some code triggered +for each reduction. As a matter of fact, such hooks could also be +used to generate the yydebug traces. Some generic scheme probably +exists in there. + +XML output for GNU Bison and gcc + http://www.cs.may.ie/~jpower/Research/bisonXML/ + +XML output for GNU Bison + http://yaxx.sourceforge.net/ * Unit rules Maybe we could expand unit rules, i.e., transform @@ -126,206 +322,155 @@ into exp: exp '+' exp | exp '&' exp; when there are no actions. This can significantly speed up some -grammars. - -* Stupid error messages -An example shows it easily: - -src/bison/tests % ./testsuite -k calc,location,error-verbose -l -GNU Bison 1.49a test suite test groups: - - NUM: FILENAME:LINE TEST-GROUP-NAME - KEYWORDS - - 51: calc.at:440 Calculator --locations --yyerror-verbose - 52: calc.at:442 Calculator --defines --locations --name-prefix=calc --verbose --yacc --yyerror-verbose - 54: calc.at:445 Calculator --debug --defines --locations --name-prefix=calc --verbose --yacc --yyerror-verbose -src/bison/tests % ./testsuite 51 -d -## --------------------------- ## -## GNU Bison 1.49a test suite. ## -## --------------------------- ## - 51: calc.at:440 ok -## ---------------------------- ## -## All 1 tests were successful. ## -## ---------------------------- ## -src/bison/tests % cd ./testsuite.dir/51 -tests/testsuite.dir/51 % echo "()" | ./calc -1.2-1.3: parse error, unexpected ')', expecting error or "number" or '-' or '(' - -* read_pipe.c -This is not portable to DOS for instance. Implement a more portable -scheme. Sources of inspiration include GNU diff, and Free Recode. - -* Memory leaks in the generator -A round of memory leak clean ups would be most welcome. Dmalloc, -Checker GCC, Electric Fence, or Valgrind: you chose your tool. - -* Memory leaks in the parser -The same applies to the generated parsers. In particular, this is -critical for user data: when aborting a parsing, when handling the -error token etc., we often throw away yylval without giving a chance -of cleaning it up to the user. - -* NEWS -Sort from 1.31 NEWS. - -* Prologue -The %union is declared after the user C declarations. It can be -a problem if YYSTYPE is declared after the user part. [] - -Actually, the real problem seems that the %union ought to be output -where it was defined. For instance, in gettext/intl/plural.y, we -have: - - %{ - ... - #include "gettextP.h" - ... - %} - - %union { - unsigned long int num; - enum operator op; - struct expression *exp; - } +grammars. I can't find the papers. In particular the book `LR +parsing: Theory and Practice' is impossible to find, but according to +`Parsing Techniques: a Practical Guide', it includes information about +this issue. Does anybody have it? + + + +* Documentation + +** History/Bibliography +Some history of Bison and some bibliography would be most welcome. +Are there any Texinfo standards for bibliography? + +** %printer +Wow, %printer is not documented. Clearly mark YYPRINT as obsolete. + +* Java, Fortran, etc. + - %{ - ... - static int yylex PARAMS ((YYSTYPE *lval, const char **pexp)); - ... - %} +* Coding system independence +Paul notes: + + Currently Bison assumes 8-bit bytes (i.e. that UCHAR_MAX is + 255). It also assumes that the 8-bit character encoding is + the same for the invocation of 'bison' as it is for the + invocation of 'cc', but this is not necessarily true when + people run bison on an ASCII host and then use cc on an EBCDIC + host. I don't think these topics are worth our time + addressing (unless we find a gung-ho volunteer for EBCDIC or + PDP-10 ports :-) but they should probably be documented + somewhere. -Where the first part defines struct expression, the second uses it to -define YYSTYPE, and the last uses YYSTYPE. Only this order is valid. + More importantly, Bison does not currently allow NUL bytes in + tokens, either via escapes (e.g., "x\0y") or via a NUL byte in + the source code. This should get fixed. * --graph -Show reductions. [] +Show reductions. * Broken options ? -** %no-lines [ok] -** %no-parser [] -** %pure-parser [] -** %semantic-parser [] -** %token-table [] -** Options which could use parse_dquoted_param (). -Maybe transfered in lex.c. -*** %skeleton [ok] -*** %output [] -*** %file-prefix [] -*** %name-prefix [] - -** Skeleton strategy. [] -Must we keep %no-parser? - %token-table? -*** New skeletons. [] - -* src/print_graph.c -Find the best graph parameters. [] - -* doc/bison.texinfo -** Update -informations about ERROR_VERBOSE. [] -** Add explainations about -skeleton muscles. [] -%skeleton. [] - -* testsuite -** tests/pure-parser.at [] -New tests. - -* Debugging parsers - -From Greg McGary: - -akim demaille writes: - -> With great pleasure! Nonetheless, things which are debatable -> (or not, but just `big') should be discuss in `public': something -> like help- or bug-bison@gnu.org is just fine. Jesse and I are there, -> but there is also Jim and some other people. - -I have no idea whether it qualifies as big or controversial, so I'll -just summarize for you. I proposed this change years ago and was -surprised that it was met with utter indifference! - -This debug feature is for the programs/grammars one develops with -bison, not for debugging bison itself. I find that the YYDEBUG -output comes in a very inconvenient format for my purposes. -When debugging gcc, for instance, what I want is to see a trace of -the sequence of reductions and the line#s for the semantic actions -so I can follow what's happening. Single-step in gdb doesn't cut it -because to move from one semantic action to the next takes you through -lots of internal machinery of the parser, which is uninteresting. - -The change I made was to the format of the debug output, so that it -comes out in the format of C error messages, digestible by emacs -compile mode, like so: - -grammar.y:1234: foo: bar(0x123456) baz(0x345678) - -where "foo: bar baz" is the reduction rule, whose semantic action -appears on line 1234 of the bison grammar file grammar.y. The hex -numbers on the rhs tokens are the parse-stack values associated with -those tokens. Of course, yytype might be something totally -incompatible with that representation, but for the most part, yytype -values are single words (scalars or pointers). In the case of gcc, -they're most often pointers to tree nodes. Come to think of it, the -right thing to do is to make the printing of stack values be -user-definable. It would also be useful to include the filename & -line# of the file being parsed, but the main filename & line# should -continue to be that of grammar.y - -Anyway, this feature has saved my life on numerous occasions. The way -I customarily use it is to first run bison with the traces on, isolate -the sequence of reductions that interests me, put those traces in a -buffer and force it into compile-mode, then visit each of those lines -in the grammar and set breakpoints with C-x SPACE. Then, I can run -again under the control of gdb and stop at each semantic action. -With the hex addresses of tree nodes, I can inspect the values -associated with any rhs token. - -You like? - -* input synclines -Some users create their foo.y files, and equip them with #line. Bison -should recognize these, and preserve them. +** %token-table +** Skeleton strategy +Must we keep %token-table? * BTYacc -See if we can integrate backtracking in Bison. Contact the BTYacc -maintainers. +See if we can integrate backtracking in Bison. Charles-Henri de +Boysson has been working on this, but never gave +the results. -* Automaton report -Display more clearly the lookaheads for each item. +Vadim Maslow, the maintainer of BTYacc was once contacted. Adjusting +the Bison grammar parser will be needed to support some extra BTYacc +features. This is less urgent. + +** Keeping the conflicted actions +First, analyze the differences between byacc and btyacc (I'm referring +to the executables). Find where the conflicts are preserved. + +** Compare with the GLR tables +See how isomorphic the way BTYacc and the way the GLR adjustments in +Bison are compatible. *As much as possible* one should try to use the +same implementation in the Bison executables. I insist: it should be +very feasible to use the very same conflict tables. + +** Adjust the skeletons +Import the skeletons for C and C++. -* RR conflicts -See if we can use precedence between rules to solve RR conflicts. See -what POSIX says. * Precedence + +** Partial order It is unfortunate that there is a total order for precedence. It makes it impossible to have modular precedence information. We should -move to partial orders. +move to partial orders (sounds like series/parallel orders to me). + +** RR conflicts +See if we can use precedence between rules to solve RR conflicts. See +what POSIX says. + -* Parsing grammars -Rewrite the reader in Bison. +* $undefined +From Hans: +- If the Bison generated parser experiences an undefined number in the +character range, that character is written out in diagnostic messages, an +addition to the $undefined value. + +Suggest: Change the name $undefined to undefined; looks better in outputs. + + +* Default Action +From Hans: +- For use with my C++ parser, I transported the "switch (yyn)" statement +that Bison writes to the bison.simple skeleton file. This way, I can remove +the current default rule $$ = $1 implementation, which causes a double +assignment to $$ which may not be OK under C++, replacing it with a +"default:" part within the switch statement. + +Note that the default rule $$ = $1, when typed, is perfectly OK under C, +but in the C++ implementation I made, this rule is different from +$$ = $1. I therefore think that one should implement +a Bison option where every typed default rule is explicitly written out +(same typed ruled can of course be grouped together). + +* Pre and post actions. +From: Florian Krohm +Subject: YYACT_EPILOGUE +To: bug-bison@gnu.org +X-Sent: 1 week, 4 days, 14 hours, 38 minutes, 11 seconds ago + +The other day I had the need for explicitly building the parse tree. I +used %locations for that and defined YYLLOC_DEFAULT to call a function +that returns the tree node for the production. Easy. But I also needed +to assign the S-attribute to the tree node. That cannot be done in +YYLLOC_DEFAULT, because it is invoked before the action is executed. +The way I solved this was to define a macro YYACT_EPILOGUE that would +be invoked after the action. For reasons of symmetry I also added +YYACT_PROLOGUE. Although I had no use for that I can envision how it +might come in handy for debugging purposes. +All is needed is to add + +#if YYLSP_NEEDED + YYACT_EPILOGUE (yyval, (yyvsp - yylen), yylen, yyloc, (yylsp - yylen)); +#else + YYACT_EPILOGUE (yyval, (yyvsp - yylen), yylen); +#endif + +at the proper place to bison.simple. Ditto for YYACT_PROLOGUE. + +I was wondering what you think about adding YYACT_PROLOGUE/EPILOGUE +to bison. If you're interested, I'll work on a patch. + +* Better graphics +Equip the parser with a means to create the (visual) parse tree. ----- -Copyright (C) 2001, 2002 Free Software Foundation, Inc. +Copyright (C) 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2006, 2008-2009 Free Software +Foundation, Inc. -This file is part of GNU Autoconf. +This file is part of Bison, the GNU Compiler Compiler. -GNU Autoconf is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify +This program is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by -the Free Software Foundation; either version 2, or (at your option) -any later version. +the Free Software Foundation, either version 3 of the License, or +(at your option) any later version. -GNU Autoconf is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, +This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. 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