7.1.4 The latest earleme

The latest earleme is the earleme of the latest Earley set. If there is an Earley set at the current earleme, it is the latest Earley set and the latest earleme is equal to the current earleme. There is never an Earley set after the current earleme, and therefore the latest Earley set is never after the current earleme.

The latest earleme is different from the current earleme if and only if there is no Earley set at the current earleme. A different end of parse can be specified, but by default, parsing is of the input in the range from earleme 0 to the latest earleme. See End of parse.

The latest earleme is set implicitly by the marpa_start_input() (see marpa_r_start_input) and marpa_r_earleme_complete() (see marpa_r_earleme_complete) methods. Applications can access the value of the latest earleme by first calling the marpa_r_latest_earley_set() method (see marpa_r_latest_earley_set), then converting its return value with the marpa_r_earleme() method (see marpa_r_earleme method).