EBNSF

Extended Backus-Naur Syntax FDiagrams

Create railroad diagrams from EBNF

Usage

Usage: ebnsf [OPTIONS] <INPUT>

Arguments:
  <INPUT>  File to read EBNF spec from

Options:
  -o, --output <OUTPUT>  Where to save the rendered SVG
  -h, --help             Print help

Example

Run ebnsf ./test/bnf.ebnf -o ./doc/bnf.svg to turn

<syntax>         ::= <rule>+
<rule>           ::= <opt_whitespace> "<" <rule_name> ">" <opt_whitespace> "::=" <opt_whitespace> <group> <line_end>
<opt_whitespace> ::= " "*
<expression>     ::= <list> (<opt_whitespace> "|" <opt_whitespace> <expression>)?
<group>          ::= "(" <expression> ")" | <expression>
<line_end>       ::= <opt_whitespace> "\n"+
<list>           ::= <term> | <term> <opt_whitespace> <list>
<term>           ::= <literal> | "<" <rule_name> ">"
<literal>        ::= '"' <text> '"'
<text>           ::= <character>+
<character>      ::= <letter> | <digit>
<letter>         ::= "[A-Za-z]"
<digit>          ::= "[0-9]"
<rule_name>      ::= <letter> <rule_char>*
<rule_char>      ::= <letter> | <digit> | "_"

into

Todo

• support repitition specifiers and ranges (i.e. [a-z], +, *)
  • ?, +, and * now supported
  • ranges can be specified by cheating and treating them as literals, e.g. "[a-z]". first-class support for ranges without wrapping them in quotes will be added later (but they probably won't be validated).
• support grouping
  • grouping now supported (with repitition modifiers) using parenthesis
• support rules spanning multiple lines
• decide on the full syntax I want to use/support for EBNF. See dwheeler.com, grammarware.net, w3.org, and cl.cam.ac.uk links below.
• figure out if/how I want to handle bounded repitition
• figure out if/how I want to handle negation
• support escape characters
  • supports escaping nested quotes and backslashes
• decide what comment syntax to use

Credit

• Initial parser and grammars/bnf.ebnf file based on from BNF specification in EBNF form from https://bnfplayground.pauliankline.com/ > Examples > BNF
• grammars/semver.ebnf from https://semver.org/spec/v2.0.0.html#backusnaur-form-grammar-for-valid-semver-versions

Additional reading on EBNF syntax:

• https://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/~mgk25/iso-14977.pdf
• https://dwheeler.com/essays/dont-use-iso-14977-ebnf.html
• https://www.grammarware.net/text/2012/bnf-was-here.pdf
• https://www.w3.org/TR/xml/#sec-notation