Hi,
I want to write semantic checker for newbie mistakes/undefined behavior using Clang. Where should I put the code - into Sema module or into a new ASTConsumer module crammed between Sema and other ASTConsumers?
Regards,
Martin
Hi Martin,
You have three options. Put the logic in Sema, create a new ASTConsumer, or use the AnalysisConsumer interface, which was designed explicitly for running different kinds of static analysis checks. If you want your checks committed back to Clang, probably the best place is to use the new AnalysisConsumer interface (so that it hooks in nicely with the other static analysis checks), but it's entirely up to you. Note that the AnalysisConsumer interface is designed to be us
If you use the new AnalysisConsumer interface, you will need to make a few small changes to AnalysisConsumer.h, AnalysisConsumer.cpp, and a small place in clang.cpp to hook up your checks to the driver. AnalysisConsumer calls the dead store checker, the memory leak checker, and so on. The actual logic for your checks should go into a separate .cpp file, either in the Driver or in the Analysis library, with a header file included by AnalysisConsumer.cpp to actually invoke the logic of your checks.
Eventually, this interface will be further simplified, hopefully obviating the need to modify AnalysisConsumer.h, AnalysisConsumer.cpp, and clang.cpp.
Using the AnalysisConsumer interface (or your own ASTConsumer) uses a different code path than code generation, so using that interface means the checks won't be performed when code is compiled using Clang. You can use scan-build/ccc-analyzer, however, to invoke your checker over an entire code base by modifying the clang command line invoked by ccc-analyzer.
If your checks prove to be both effective and very quick, this logic could be migrated to Sema. I only suggest hooking it into AnalysisConsumer to start with because the logic is easier to work with than Sema (Sema is doing a lot of things), you get to harness the scan-build checker harness, and adding a new driver option is a snap.
More specifically, you need to modify the following to use the AnalysisConsumer interface:
To avoid unexpected troubles when doing svn update, I copy the whole clang/Driver directory to another place and do all things in that directory, and linking against the necessary LLVM/clang libraries to build a custom driver.