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structure of how we're building concrete tools as well as tooling infrastructure as part of the Clang project. This documentation is definitely still rough. If anyone can improve it, flesh it out, or help structure it in a more natural way, please, help! =] This is not my forte, and patches here are more than welcome! llvm-svn: 161855
121 lines
4.7 KiB
HTML
121 lines
4.7 KiB
HTML
<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01//EN"
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"http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/strict.dtd">
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<html>
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<head>
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<title>Writing Clang Tools</title>
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<link type="text/css" rel="stylesheet" href="../menu.css">
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<link type="text/css" rel="stylesheet" href="../content.css">
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</head>
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<body>
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<!--#include virtual="../menu.html.incl"-->
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<div id="content">
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<h1>Writing Clang Tools</h1>
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<p>Clang provides infrastructure to write tools that need syntactic and semantic
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information about a program. This document will give a short introduction of the
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different ways to write clang tools, and their pros and cons.</p>
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<!-- ======================================================================= -->
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<h2 id="libclang"><a href="http://clang.llvm.org/doxygen/group__CINDEX.html">LibClang</a></h2>
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<!-- ======================================================================= -->
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<p>LibClang is a stable high level C interface to clang. When in doubt LibClang
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is probably the interface you want to use. Consider the other interfaces only
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when you have a good reason not to use LibClang.</p>
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<p>Canonical examples of when to use LibClang:</p>
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<ul>
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<li>Xcode</li>
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<li>Clang Python Bindings</li>
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</ul>
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<p>Use LibClang when you...</p>
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<ul>
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<li>want to interface with clang from other languages than C++</li>
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<li>need a stable interface that takes care to be backwards compatible</li>
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<li>want powerful high-level abstractions, like iterating through an AST
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with a cursor, and don't want to learn all the nitty gritty details of Clang's
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AST.</li>
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</ul>
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<p>Do not use LibClang when you...</p>
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<ul>
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<li>want full control over the Clang AST</li>
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</ul>
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<!-- ======================================================================= -->
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<h2 id="clang-plugins"><a href="ClangPlugins.html">Clang Plugins</a></h2>
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<!-- ======================================================================= -->
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<p>Clang Plugins allow you to run additional actions on the AST as part of
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a compilation. Plugins are dynamic libraries that are loaded at runtime by
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the compiler, and they're easy to integrate into your build environment.</p>
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<p>Canonical examples of when to use Clang Plugins:</p>
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<ul>
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<li>special lint-style warnings or errors for your project</li>
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<li>creating additional build artifacts from a single compile step</li>
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</ul>
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<p>Use Clang Plugins when you...</p>
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<ul>
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<li>need your tool to rerun if any of the dependencies change</li>
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<li>want your tool to make or break a build</li>
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<li>need full control over the Clang AST</li>
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</ul>
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<p>Do not use Clang Plugins when you...</p>
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<ul>
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<li>want to run tools outside of your build environment</li>
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<li>want full control on how Clang is set up, including mapping of in-memory
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virtual files</li>
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<li>need to run over a specific subset of files in your project which is not
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necessarily related to any changes which would trigger rebuilds</li>
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</ul>
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<!-- ======================================================================= -->
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<h2 id="libtooling"><a href="LibTooling.html">LibTooling</a></h2>
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<!-- ======================================================================= -->
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<p>LibTooling is a C++ interface aimed at writing standalone tools, as well as
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integrating into services that run clang tools.</p>
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<p>Canonical examples of when to use LibTooling:</p>
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<ul>
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<li>a simple syntax checker</li>
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<li>refactoring tools</li>
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</ul>
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<p>Use LibTooling when you...</p>
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<ul>
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<li>want to run tools over a single file, or a specific subset of files,
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independently of the build system</li>
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<li>want full control over the Clang AST</li>
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<li>want to share code with Clang Plugins</li>
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</ul>
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<p>Do not use LibTooling when you...</p>
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<ul>
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<li>want to run as part of the build triggered by dependency changes</li>
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<li>want a stable interface so you don't need to change your code when the
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AST API changes</li>
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<li>want high level abstractions like cursors and code completion out of the
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box</li>
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<li>do not want to write your tools in C++</li>
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</ul>
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<!-- ======================================================================= -->
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<h2 id="clang-tools"><a href="ClangTools.html">Clang Tools</a></h2>
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<!-- ======================================================================= -->
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<p>These are a collection of specific developer tools built on top of the
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LibTooling infrastructure as part of the Clang project. They are targeted at
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automating and improving core development activities of C/C++ developers.</p>
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<p>Examples of tools we are building or planning as part of the Clang
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project:</p>
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<ul>
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<li>Syntax checking (clang-check)</li>
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<li>Automatic fixing of compile errors (clangc-fixit)</li>
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<li>Automatic code formatting</li>
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<li>Migration tools for new features in new language standards</li>
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<li>Core refactoring tools</li>
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</ul>
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</div>
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</body>
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</html>
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