Tools for finding unused function declarations? - c++

Whilst refactoring some old code I realised that a particular header file was full of function declarations for functions long since removed from the .cpp file. Does anyone know of a tool that could find (and strip) these automatically?

You could if possible make a test.cpp file to call them all, the linker will flag the ones that have no code as unresolved, this way your test code only need compile and not worry about actually running.

PC-lint can be tunned for dedicated purpose:
I tested the following code against for your question:
void foo(int );
int main()
{
return 0;
}
lint.bat test_unused.cpp
and got the following result:
============================================================
--- Module: test_unused.cpp (C++)
--- Wrap-up for Module: test_unused.cpp
Info 752: local declarator 'foo(int)' (line 2, file test_unused.cpp) not referenced
test_unused.cpp(2) : Info 830: Location cited in prior message
============================================================
So you can pass the warning number 752 for your puropse:
lint.bat -"e*" +e752 test_unused.cpp
-e"*" will remove all the warnings and +e752 will turn on this specific one

If you index to code with Doxygen you can see from where is each function referenced. However, you would have to browse through each class (1 HTML page per class) and scan for those that don't have anything pointing to them.
Alternatively, you could use ctags to generate list of all functions in the code, and then use objdump or some similar tool to get list of all function in .o files - and then compare those lists. However, this can be problematic due to name mangling.

I don't think there is such thing because some functions not having a body in the actual source tree might be defined in some external library. This can only be done by creating a script which makes a list of declared functions in a header and verifies if they are sometimes called.

I have a C++ ftplugin for vim that is able is check and report unmatched functions -- vimmers, the ftplugin suite is not yet straightforward to install. The ftplugin is based on ctags results (hence its heuristic could be easily adapted to other environments), sometimes there are false positives in the case of inline functions.
HTH,

In addition Doxygen (#Milan Babuskov), you can see if there are warnings for this in your compiler. E.g. gcc has -Wunused-function for static functions; -fdump-ipa-cgraph.

I've heard good things about PC-Lint, but I imagine it's probably overkill for your needs.

Related

How to find if a function is present in a cpp file using cppcheck?

I wanted to find whether the cpp file has a certain function implemented.
For example if a() is present in the cpp file. How do I write a rule for this? I want it throw exception, if it is not present.
static code analysis tools are not used to find the compile or linking errors.
If the 'a` function or method is not declared and defined the compiler or linker will inform you - you will get an error.
If the CppCheck can't detect this kind of check, you can try CppDepend and its code query language CQLinq to create your custom rules.
from file in Files where file.ChildMethods.Where(m=>m.Name=="a").Count()==0 select file
I am a Cppcheck developer.
Cppcheck has "rules" and "addons". A "rule" is executed by "--rule". With a "rule" you cannot check this as far as I see.
With an "addon" you can definitely implement this. A good start is to loop through the scope list. If you see a function scope for "a()" you can see where the scope body is.
You can read more about addons in the cppcheck manual. http://cppcheck.sourceforge.net/manual.pdf
Chapter 12.

Parsing C++ to make some changes in the code

I would like to write a small tool that takes a C++ program (a single .cpp file), finds the "main" function and adds 2 function calls to it, one in the beginning and one in the end.
How can this be done? Can I use g++'s parsing mechanism (or any other parser)?
If you want to make it solid, use clang's libraries.
As suggested by some commenters, let me put forward my idea as an answer:
So basically, the idea is:
... original .cpp file ...
#include <yourHeader>
namespace {
SpecialClass specialClassInstance;
}
Where SpecialClass is something like:
class SpecialClass {
public:
SpecialClass() {
firstFunction();
}
~SpecialClass() {
secondFunction();
}
}
This way, you don't need to parse the C++ file. Since you are declaring a global, its constructor will run before main starts and its destructor will run after main returns.
The downside is that you don't get to know the relative order of when your global is constructed compared to others. So if you need to guarantee that firstFunction is called
before any other constructor elsewhere in the entire program, you're out of luck.
I've heard the GCC parser is both hard to use and even harder to get at without invoking the whole toolchain. I would try the clang C/C++ parser (libparse), and the tutorials linked in this question.
Adding a function at the beginning of main() and at the end of main() is a bad idea. What if someone calls return in the middle?.
A better idea is to instantiate a class at the beginning of main() and let that class destructor do the call function you want called at the end. This would ensure that that function always get called.
If you have control of your main program, you can hack a script to do this, and that's by far the easiet way. Simply make sure the insertion points are obvious (odd comments, required placement of tokens, you choose) and unique (including outlawing general coding practices if you have to, to ensure the uniqueness you need is real). Then a dumb string hacking tool to read the source, find the unique markers, and insert your desired calls will work fine.
If the souce of the main program comes from others sources, and you don't have control, then to do this well you need a full C++ program transformation engine. You don't want to build this yourself, as just the C++ parser is an enormous effort to get right. Others here have mentioned Clang and GCC as answers.
An alternative is our DMS Software Reengineering Toolkit with its C++ front end. DMS, using its C++ front end, can parse code (for a variety of C++ dialects), builds ASTs, carry out full name/type resolution to determine the meaning/definition/use of all symbols. It provides procedural and source-to-source transformations to enable changes to the AST, and can regenerate compilable source code complete with original comments.

How to check what parts of template are instantiated?

I have a huge template file and only few functions are used, and I want to isolate that part for test and comment the other half. How can i find what's the best way to do this ?
How can I do this on a Windows system and the template file is .hxx ?
I like Mohammad's answer. Oops... he removed it - but basically - use a tool like nm - I don't know a windows equivalent but there's sure to be one - to query the objects for instantations. While your templates may be in a .hxx, you can only meaningfully talk about the subset of methods instantiated by some body of client code. You may need to do this analysis with inlining disabled, to ensure the function bodies are actually instantiated in a tangible form in the object files.
In the less likely event that you might have instantiated stuff because some code handles cases that you know the data doesn't - and won't evolve to - use, then you may prefer automated run-time coverage analysis. Many compilers (e.g. GCC's g++ -ftest-coverage) and tools (e.g. purecov) provide this.
How about commenting out the whole file, then uncommenting individual methods when the linker complains, until the program can be compiled ?
By the way, if you are using Visual Studio, commenting the whole file is just a matter of using the following key shortcuts : Ctrl+A, then Ctrl+K+C. You can uncomment selected lines using Ctrl+K+U.

How To Extract Function Name From Main() Function Of C Source

I just want to ask your ideas regarding this matter. For a certain important reason, I must extract/acquire all function names of functions that were called inside a "main()" function of a C source file (ex: main.c).
Example source code:
int main()
{
int a = functionA(); // functionA must be extracted
int b = functionB(); // functionB must be extracted
}
As you know, the only thing that I can use as a marker/sign to identify these function calls are it's parenthesis "()". I've already considered several factors in implementing this function name extraction. These are:
1. functions may have parameters. Ex: functionA(100)
2. Loop operators. Ex: while()
3. Other operators. Ex: if(), else if()
4. Other operator between function calls with no spaces. Ex: functionA()+functionB()
As of this moment I know what you're saying, this is a pain in the $$$... So please share your thoughts and ideas... and bear with me on this one...
Note: this is in C++ language...
You can write a Small C++ parser by combining FLEX (or LEX) and BISON (or YACC).
Take C++'s grammar
Generate a C++ program parser with the mentioned tools
Make that program count the funcion calls you are mentioning
Maybe a little bit too complicated for what you need to do, but it should certainly work. And LEX/YACC are amazing tools!
One option is to write your own C tokenizer (simple: just be careful enough to skip over strings, character constants and comments), and to write a simple parser, which counts the number of {s open, and finds instances of identifier + ( within. However, this won't be 100% correct. The disadvantage of this option is that it's cumbersome to implement preprocessor directives (e.g. #include and #define): there can be a function called from a macro (e.g. getchar) defined in an #include file.
An option that works for 100% is compiling your .c file to an assembly file, e.g. gcc -S file.c, and finding the call instructions in the file.S. A similar option is compiling your .c file to an object file, e.g, gcc -c file.c, generating a disassembly dump with objdump -d file.o, and searching for call instructions.
Another option is finding a parser using Clang / LLVM.
gnu cflow might be helpful

Automatically adding Enter/Exit Function Logs to a Project

I have a 3rd party source code that I have to investigate. I want to see in what order the functions are called but I don't want to waste my time typing:
printf("Entered into %s", __FUNCTION__)
and
printf("Exited from %s", __FUNCTION__)
for each function, nor do I want to touch any source file.
Do you have any suggestions? Is there a compiler flag that automagically does this for me?
Clarifications to the comments:
I will cross-compile the source to run it on ARM.
I will compile it with gcc.
I don't want to analyze the static code. I want to trace the runtime. So doxygen will not make my life easier.
I have the source and I can compile it.
I don't want to use Aspect Oriented Programming.
EDIT:
I found that 'frame' command in the gdb prompt prints the current frame (or, function name, you could say) at that point in time. Perhaps, it is possible (using gdb scripts) to call 'frame' command everytime a function is called. What do you think?
Besides the usual debugger and aspect-oriented programming techniques, you can also inject your own instrumentation functions using gcc's -finstrument-functions command line options. You'll have to implement your own __cyg_profile_func_enter() and __cyg_profile_func_exit() functions (declare these as extern "C" in C++).
They provide a means to track what function was called from where. However, the interface is a bit difficult to use since the address of the function being called and its call site are passed instead of a function name, for example. You could log the addresses, and then pull the corresponding names from the symbol table using something like objdump --syms or nm, assuming of course the symbols haven't been stripped from the binaries in question.
It may just be easier to use gdb. YMMV. :)
You said "nor do I want to touch any source file"... fair game if you let a script do it for you?
Run this on all your .cpp files
sed 's/^{/{ENTRY/'
So that it transforms them into this:
void foo()
{ENTRY
// code here
}
Put this in a header that can be #included by every unit:
#define ENTRY EntryRaiiObject obj ## __LINE__ (__FUNCTION__);
struct EntryRaiiObject {
EntryRaiiObject(const char *f) : f_(f) { printf("Entered into %s", f_); }
~EntryRaiiObject() { printf("Exited from %s", f_); }
const char *f_;
};
You may have to get fancier with the sed script. You can also put the ENTRY macro anywhere else you want to probe, like some deeply nested inner scope of a function.
Use /Gh (Enable _penter Hook Function) and /GH (Enable _pexit Hook Function) compiler switches (if you can compile the sources ofcourse)
NOTE: you won't be able to use those macro's. See here ("you will need to get the function address (in EIP register) and compare it against addresses in the map file that can be generated by the linker (assuming no rebasing has occurred). It'll be very slow though.")
If you're using gcc, the magic compiler flag is -g. Compile with debugging symbols, run the program under gdb, and generate stack traces. You could also use ptrace, but it's probably a lot easier to just use gdb.
Agree with William, use gdb to see the run time flow.
There are some static code analyzer which can tell which functions call which and can give you some call flow graph. One tool is "Understand C++" (support C/C++) but thats not free i guess. But you can find similar tools.