Re: Seeking clarification of ABNF "name formation" reference

["Clive D.W. Feather" <[e-mail]>]

Dave Crocker said:
>><section title="Operator Precedence">
>>
>>            <t> The various mechanisms described above have the following
>>               precedence, from highest (binding tightest) at the top, to
>>               lowest (loosest) at the bottom: <list>
>>
>>                  <t>Strings, Names formation</t>
>>                  <t>Comment</t>
>>                  <t>Value range</t>
>>                  <t>Repetition</t>
>>                  <t>Grouping, Optional</t>
>>                  <t>Concatenation</t>
>>                  <t>Alternative</t>
>>
>>               </list>
>>            </t>

If "value range" means the "%x20-3F" construct, then that has higher
precedence than comment, I would suggest. More significantly, repetition
has lower precedence than grouping and optional: this is shown firstly by
the formal grammar, and secondly because "*(A B)" means zero or more sets
of A-then-B, while if repetition had higher precedence then it would mean
zero or more As followed by one B (that is, the same as "((*A) B)").

> The reference to "Name formation" has been in this form since RFC 2234.

I assumed it was <prose-val>.

However, as Philip points out, it's not defined anywhere in sections 2 or
3. Rather, 2.1 implies that the "<rulename>" form can occur on the left of
the <defined-as> if the author wants. This means that the grammar should
have the following definitions for rulename:

    rulename = ub-rulename / "<" ub-rulename ">"
    ub-rulename = ALPHA *(ALPHA / DIGIT / "-")

I've used "ub-rulename" to mean "unbracketed rulename"; feel free to change
it.

Is it intentional to allow <rulename> to end in a hyphen?

As well as needing a textual description of <prose-val>, there are two other
considerations:
(1) the comment implies that "<" cannot occur in a <prose-val>, but the
    formal grammar allows it;
(2) with the above change, the grammar is ambiguous, because "<rulename>"
    can be either a <rulename> or a <prose-val>. This needs disambiguating
    in some way, either in a comment or by requiring a prose-val to contain
    a non alphanumeric character (which might be space).

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