Error while compiling vls from source. Invalid regular expression.

[RocketRide9]

Describe the bug Error while trying to compile vls from source

Software OS and version: Ubuntu 22.10 Vala version (valac --version): Vala 0.56.2

Steps to reproduce the behavior:

1. Clone vls repo
2. apt install meson valac libjsonrpc-glib-1.0-dev libvala-0.56-dev libgee-0.8-dev scdoc build-essential
3. meson -Dprefix=/usr build
4. ninja -C build
5. See error

ninja -C build output

~/git/vala-language-server$ ninja -C build
ninja: Entering directory `build'
[2/43] Compiling Vala source ../src/analysis/codeanalyzer.vala ../src/analysis/codelensanalyz...eporter.vala ../src/request.vala ../src/server.vala config.vala ../src/util.vala version.vala
FAILED: src/vala-language-server.p/analysis/codeanalyzer.c src/vala-language-server.p/analysis/codelensanalyzer.c src/vala-language-server.p/analysis/codestyleanalyzer.c src/vala-language-server.p/analysis/inlayhintnodes.c src/vala-language-server.p/analysis/symbolenumerator.c src/vala-language-server.p/codeaction/baseconverteraction.c src/vala-language-server.p/codeaction/implementmissingprereqsaction.c src/vala-language-server.p/codehelp/callhierarchy.c src/vala-language-server.p/codehelp/codeaction.c src/vala-language-server.p/codehelp/codehelp.c src/vala-language-server.p/codehelp/codelensengine.c src/vala-language-server.p/codehelp/completionengine.c src/vala-language-server.p/codehelp/find_scope.c src/vala-language-server.p/codehelp/formatter.c src/vala-language-server.p/codehelp/nodesearch.c src/vala-language-server.p/codehelp/signaturehelpengine.c src/vala-language-server.p/codehelp/symbolextractor.c src/vala-language-server.p/codehelp/symbolreferences.c src/vala-language-server.p/codehelp/symbolvisitor.c src/vala-language-server.p/codehelp/typehierarchy.c src/vala-language-server.p/documentation/cnamemapper.c src/vala-language-server.p/documentation/doccomment.c src/vala-language-server.p/documentation/girdocumentation.c src/vala-language-server.p/projects/buildtarget.c src/vala-language-server.p/projects/buildtask.c src/vala-language-server.p/projects/ccproject.c src/vala-language-server.p/projects/compilation.c src/vala-language-server.p/projects/defaultproject.c src/vala-language-server.p/projects/filecache.c src/vala-language-server.p/projects/mesonproject.c src/vala-language-server.p/projects/project.c src/vala-language-server.p/projects/textdocument.c src/vala-language-server.p/projects/types.c src/vala-language-server.p/protocol.c src/vala-language-server.p/reporter.c src/vala-language-server.p/request.c src/vala-language-server.p/server.c src/vala-language-server.p/config.c src/vala-language-server.p/util.c src/vala-language-server.p/version.c 
valac -C --debug --debug --define=WITH_JSONRPC_GLIB_3_30 --target-glib=auto --enable-gobject-tracing --fatal-warnings --pkg gio-unix-2.0 --pkg posix --pkg libvala-0.56 --pkg jsonrpc-glib-1.0 --pkg json-glib-1.0 --pkg gee-0.8 --pkg gio-2.0 --pkg gobject-2.0 --pkg glib-2.0 --color=always --directory src/vala-language-server.p --basedir ../src ../src/analysis/codeanalyzer.vala ../src/analysis/codelensanalyzer.vala ../src/analysis/codestyleanalyzer.vala ../src/analysis/inlayhintnodes.vala ../src/analysis/symbolenumerator.vala ../src/codeaction/baseconverteraction.vala ../src/codeaction/implementmissingprereqsaction.vala ../src/codehelp/callhierarchy.vala ../src/codehelp/codeaction.vala ../src/codehelp/codehelp.vala ../src/codehelp/codelensengine.vala ../src/codehelp/completionengine.vala ../src/codehelp/find_scope.vala ../src/codehelp/formatter.vala ../src/codehelp/nodesearch.vala ../src/codehelp/signaturehelpengine.vala ../src/codehelp/symbolextractor.vala ../src/codehelp/symbolreferences.vala ../src/codehelp/symbolvisitor.vala ../src/codehelp/typehierarchy.vala ../src/documentation/cnamemapper.vala ../src/documentation/doccomment.vala ../src/documentation/girdocumentation.vala ../src/projects/buildtarget.vala ../src/projects/buildtask.vala ../src/projects/ccproject.vala ../src/projects/compilation.vala ../src/projects/defaultproject.vala ../src/projects/filecache.vala ../src/projects/mesonproject.vala ../src/projects/project.vala ../src/projects/textdocument.vala ../src/projects/types.vala ../src/protocol.vala ../src/reporter.vala ../src/request.vala ../src/server.vala config.vala ../src/util.vala version.vala
../src/documentation/girdocumentation.vala:359.29-359.57: error: Invalid regular expression `//!\[(.*?)\]\(([~:\/\\\w-.]+)\)'.
359 |             comment_data = /!\[(.*?)\]\(([~:\/\\\w-.]+)\)/
    |                             ^~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 
../src/documentation/girdocumentation.vala:389.25-389.47: error: Invalid regular expression `//\[(.*?)\]\[([\w-\s]+)\]'.
389 |         comment_data = /\[(.*?)\]\[([\w-\s]+)\]/
    |                         ^~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 
../src/documentation/doccomment.vala:132.17-132.59: error: Invalid regular expression `//(\[\[|{{)([~:\/\\\w-.]+)(\|(.*?))?(\]\]|}})'.
132 |         body = /(\[\[|{{)([~:\/\\\w-.]+)(\|(.*?))?(\]\]|}})/
    |                 ^~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 
Compilation failed: 3 error(s), 0 warning(s)

[JCWasmx86]

Maybe related: https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/glib/-/merge_requests/2529

[ErikReider]

I had issues building since Glib 2.74. Had issues with segfaults with that GLib version due to regex incompatibilities and deprecations.

[IBBoard]

The error message is very strange - notice how it's got two slashes at the start and none at the end.

error: Invalid regular expression `//(\[\[|{{)([~:\/\\\w-.]+)(\|(.*?))?(\]\]|}})'.
                                   ^^                                           ^

It still seems to parse what I think is a matching regex that's not done as a RegEx literal, though:

new GLib.Regex("""!\[(.*?)\]\(([~:\/\\\w-.]+)\)""")

[IBBoard]

Just made a quick PR in case anyone wants to hack in a custom patch to (hopefully) get it working until the real source is found.

Unfortunately, Vala throws away any useful information when it captures the exception and prints that message.

[Prince781]

This is due to not escaping the - character in the regex used for parsing links in comments.

[SilverRainZ]

Hello @Prince781, can you please make a new release? This issue breaks the building on Arch Linux (valac 0.56.3).

[benwaffle]

@SilverRainZ please try version 0.48.7 in the AUR