Grammar of a C++ Translation Unit

Question

My understanding, for a long time now, was that a C++ translation unit, after the preprocessor has run, is a sequence of declarations (let me remind that any definition is also a declaration).

Many people have argued with this statement but no one has ever given a counterexample. But I myself found this example which troubles me:

int x;       //declaration

;            // ??? EMPTY DECLARATION?

int main()   //dec
{            //la
}            //ration

This compiles fine with MSVC and online comeau. I know the standard defines an empty statement but I never heard of an empty declaration. So, I see three options:

• My understanding is correct and the standard defines an empty declaration
• My understanding is correct but the standard doesn't define empty declarations and the above translation is ill-formed
• My understanding is incorrect, i.e. a C++ TU is not a sequence of declarations

Please help me dissolve my doubts. Thanks

Answer 1

Your understanding is correct and the standard (or at least Stroustrup) does define an empty declaration.

EDIT: It seems this answer is wrong (there's a semantic rule on the standard - but not on the book, as far as I can tell - that prohibits both decl-specified-seq and init-declarator-list of being empty at the same time). See Charles Bailey's answer.

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n "The C++ Programming Language", appendix A, section A.4:

A program is a collection of translation-units (...). A translation-unit, often called a source file, is a sequence of declarations:

translation-unit:
   declaration-seq_opt

opt means the production is optional. In this rule, it means an empty translation unit is valid.

Section A.7:

declaration-seq:
    declaration
    declaration-seq declaration

declaration:
    block-declaration
    (...)

block-declaration:
    simple-declaration
    (...)

simple-declaration:
    decl-specified-seq_opt init-declarator-list_opt ;

So declaration-seq is a sequence of at least one declaration. A declaration can, amongst other things, be a block-declaration, which in turn produces simple-declaration. As both the decl-specified-seq and init-declarator-list non-literals are optional, ; is a valid declaration.