Re: flex beta 2.5.22 released

[W. L. Estes]

On Friday, 11 October 2002,01:03 -0400, Bruce Lilly wrote:

> W. L. Estes wrote:
> 
> >** more portability fixes around how we get ahold of the integral
> >   types; there is a constant FLEX_NEED_INTEGRAL_TYPE_DEFINITIONS
> [...]
> 
> That's an improvement, but the choice of types used is rather
> puzzling.  The only int[0-9]+_t used is int32_t... it would
> have been simpler in that case to just use a plain int and
> avoid all of the hassle.

Not so. there are a few int8 and int16 references scattered here and
there. And we're trying to guarantee the size of the ints we use. so
just "int" is not sufficient.

Bruce, can you confirm for me that you're able to build flex and
scanners it generates? (I know you had troubles with 2.15.21 so I'd
like to be sure you're ok on this point.)

> Some uses are really odd: for example in a rather complex
> lexical analyzer, I get:
> 
> static yyconst int32_t yy_rule_linenum[83] =
>     {   0,
>       213,  239,  264,  289,  298,  319,  330,  338,  349,  357,
>       367,  377,  387,  422,  434,  449,  460,  470,  478,  488,
>       496,  504,  512,  520,  528,  537,  545,  553,  561,  570,
>       578,  586,  597,  606,  616,  625,  639,  648,  658,  666,
>       677,  689,  698,  709,  718,  727,  737,  748,  783,  815,
>       836,  844,  853,  861,  871,  882,  893,  902,  911,  919,
>       934,  942,  957,  965,  973,  981,  989,  997, 1005, 1013,
>      1029, 1039, 1047, 1056, 1065, 1075, 1086, 1108, 1118, 1127,
>      1136, 1145
>     } ;
> 
> Line numbers are always nonnegative, so an unsigned type
> would be more appropriate.  Also, as the maximum value in
> this case is well under 65535, a uint16_t could have been
> used, halving the memory used for the table.

John, could you comment on this?

Bruce, I don't know how big the numbers get so it might be that in
most cases 16 bits is ok but in a few cases 16 bits is not enough.

> Good.  But with %option header, the generated header need
> not include <errno.h>, <string.h>, or <stdlib.h> as there's
> nothing in that header file which needs any of those.

I'll look at this.

--Will