Re: [HACKERS] Re: [PATCHES] Patch for more readable parse error messages

Peter Eisentraut <peter_e@gmx.net> writes:
> On 2000-02-20, Tom Lane mentioned:
>> I would not like us to stop working
>> with non-bison yaccs, since bison's output depends on alloca() which
>> is not available everywhere.

> Couldn't alloca(x) be defined to palloc(x) where missing?

Probably, but I wasn't looking for a workaround; that was just one
quick illustration of a reason not to want to use bison (one that's
bitten me personally, so I knew it offhand).  We should try not to
become dependent on bison when there are near-equivalent tools, just
on general principles of maintaining portability.  For an analogy,
I believe most of the developers use gcc, but it would be a real bad
idea for us to abandon support for other compilers.

For the same sort of reasons I'd prefer that our scanner worked
with vanilla lex, not just flex.  I'm not sure how far away we are
from that; it may be an unrealistic goal.  But if it is within reach
then we shouldn't give it up lightly.
        regards, tom lane