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AutoFSM Usage

This page defines all the valid Automated Finite State Machine attributes. state, event and transition attributes are required. The rest (method, type, prefix and cookie) are optional, as noted.

Please see the example page to see exactly how many of these machine attributes are used.

state

For every valid processing state, you must specify a state name.

event

For every valid event that can cause a state transition, you must specify an event name.

transition

Transition entries specify which transitions are valid, based on the original state and the transition event. It may specify an advisory destination state, but if it does not, then the transition defaults to an unchanged result state. Conflicting transition specifications will silently override each other. This makes specifying all state or all event type transitions useful.

Every transition must specify one or more initial state attributes (tst) and one or more transition events (tev).

tst: Transition initial state. You may specify a list of states, as in `tst = first, second, another;', or you may specify all states with an asterisk, as in: ``tst = "*";''
tev: Transition event. You may specify a list of events, as in `tev = evt-1, evt-2, evt-n;', or you may specify all events with an asterisk, as in: ``tev = "*";''
next: Next state. You may only specify one. If you do not specify it, the transition will default to not changing state.
ttype: Transition type. Occasionally, it is convenient to handle different transitions with the same code. Often, when you specify multiple states or multiple events in a single transition specification. Specifying this attribute will cause the FSM to invoke the same code. Specifying `invalid' will render the transition invalid, as if it had not been specified before.

method

There are three FSM implementation methods supported, including no implementation. That "method" leaves it to you to supply all the code. You must set the method attribute to one of the following, or omit it entirely:

case: the switch statement in C. A procedure will be emitted that contains a giant switch statement. Each case element will have stylized comments that will enable any code that has been inserted there to be carried forward to new generations of the code. You can see an example of this here.
call: Instead of containing a transition enumeration, the transition table will contain pointers to transition procedures. The main FSM processing routine will indirectly call the proper procedure for handling each transition. The called procedure will be stubbed out and contain the same type of stylized comments that the case version, above, does.
none: No implementation code will be emitted. However, the state, event, transition enumerations and the transition table are all emitted. The emitted header file will contain external declarations for the transition table and transition error procedure, unless you #define the DEFINE_FSM name. See the file agen5/pseudo-fsm.h in the AutoGen sources for an example of this.

type

The machine type must be set to either step or loop, unless you are not choosing an implementation method.

step: Normally, a FSM runs until it reaches a terminal state, either INVALID or DONE. Sometimes, external code must control the loop and it must call a transition `step' when a transition event is detected. For these situations, choose the `step' machine type. The procedure emitted will return the current state at the end of each call.
loop: A looping finite state machine is the normal implementation. You call it, it initializes itself and runs until a terminal state is reached.
none: If you do not specify an implementation method, you may omit the ``type'' attribute.

prefix

External value prefix. This will keep the generated external values disambiguated. If you do not specify this, it will default to the base name of the definitions file. Our example FSM specifies ``EX'' for its prefix.

cookie

This must be a C-type plus a name suitable for use in an ANSI procedure definition. It is used to pass whatever arguments you need to the transition handling code. For example, ``void* cookie'' will pass a void pointer named `cookie'. Note: the name must be preceeded by a space character in order to be correctly separated from the type.