cflow(1)

cflow -- generate C flowgraph

Synopsis

   cflow [-c] [-r] [-ix] [-i_] [-dnum] -V files

Description

The cflow command analyzes a collection of C, yacc, lex, assembler, and object files and builds a graph charting the external function references. Files suffixed with .y, .l, and .c are processed by yacc, lex, and the C compiler as appropriate. The results of the preprocessed files, and files suffixed with .i, are then run through the first pass of lint. Files suffixed with .s are assembled. Assembled files, and files suffixed with .o, have information extracted from their symbol tables. The results are collected and turned into a graph of external references that is written on the standard output. When used with the -c option cflow produces an intermediate .cf file which can be given to cflow as input for further processing. cflow processes supplementary code set characters in literals and constants according to the locale specified in the LC_CTYPE environment variable [see LANG on environ(5)].

Each line of output begins with a reference number, followed by a suitable number of tabs indicating the level, then the name of the global symbol followed by a colon and its definition. Normally only function names that do not begin with an underscore are listed (see the -i options below). For information extracted from C source, the definition consists of an abstract type declaration (for example, char ), and, delimited by angle brackets, the name of the source file and the line number where the definition was found. Definitions extracted from object files indicate the file name and location counter under which the symbol appeared (for example, text). If the compilation system adds a leading underscore to external names, it is removed. Once a definition of a name has been printed, subsequent references to that name contain only the reference number of the line where the definition may be found. For undefined references, only ``<>'' is printed.

As an example, suppose the following code is in file.c:

   int	i;
   
   main()
   {
   	f();
   	g();
   	f();
   }
   

   f()
   {
   	i = h();
   }

The command

   cflow -ix file.c

produces the output

   1	main: int(), <file.c 4>
   2		f: int(), <file.c 11>
   3			h: <>
   4			i: int, <file.c 1>
   5		g: <>

When the nesting level becomes too deep, the output of cflow can be piped to the pr command, using the -e option, to compress the tab expansion to something less than every eight spaces.

In addition to the -D, -I, -Kdollar and -U options (which are interpreted just as they are by cc), the following options are interpreted by cflow:

-r: Reverse the ``caller:callee'' relationship producing an inverted listing showing the callers of each function. The listing is also sorted in lexicographical order by callee.
-ix: Include external and static data symbols. The default is to include only functions in the flowgraph.
-i_: Include names that begin with an underscore. The default is to exclude these functions (and data if -ix is used).
-dnum: The num decimal integer indicates the depth at which the flowgraph is cut off. By default this number is very large. Attempts to set the cutoff depth to a nonpositive integer will be ignored.
-V: Prints version information on the standard error output.

Errors

Complains about multiple definitions and only believes the first.

References

as(1), cc(1), lex(1), lint(1), nm(1), yacc(1)

Notices

Files produced by lex and yacc cause the reordering of line number declarations, which can confuse cflow. To get proper results, feed cflow the yacc or lex input.