3.7 Comments
There are two kinds of comments:
/* text */ |
A traditional comment: all the text from the ASCII characters /* to the ASCII characters */ is ignored (as in C and C++). |
// text |
A end-of-line comment: all the text from the ASCII characters // to the end of the line is ignored (as in C++). |
These comments are formally specified by the following productions:
Comment: TraditionalComment EndOfLineComment TraditionalComment: / * CommentTail EndOfLineComment: / / CharactersInLineopt CommentTail: * CommentTailStar NotStar CommentTail CommentTailStar: / * CommentTailStar NotStarNotSlash CommentTail NotStar: InputCharacter but not * LineTerminator NotStarNotSlash: InputCharacter but not * or / LineTerminator CharactersInLine: InputCharacter CharactersInLine InputCharacter
These productions imply all of the following properties:
- Comments do not nest.
- /* and */ have no special meaning in comments that begin with //.
- // has no special meaning in comments that begin with /* or /**.
As a result, the text:
/* this comment /* // /** ends here: */
is a single complete comment.
The lexical grammar implies that comments do not occur within character literals (§3.10.4) or string literals (§3.10.5).