cppcheck/readme.md

# **Cppcheck** 

|GitHub Actions|Linux Build Status|Windows Build Status|OSS-Fuzz|Coverity Scan Build Status|License|
|:-:|:--:|:--:|:--:|:--:|:-:|
|[![Github Action Status](https://github.com/danmar/cppcheck/workflows/CI/badge.svg)](https://github.com/danmar/cppcheck/actions?query=workflow%3ACI)|[![Linux Build Status](https://img.shields.io/travis/danmar/cppcheck/main.svg?label=Linux%20build)](https://travis-ci.org/danmar/cppcheck)|[![Windows Build Status](https://img.shields.io/appveyor/ci/danmar/cppcheck/main.svg?label=Windows%20build)](https://ci.appveyor.com/project/danmar/cppcheck/branch/main)|[![OSS-Fuzz](https://oss-fuzz-build-logs.storage.googleapis.com/badges/cppcheck.svg)](https://bugs.chromium.org/p/oss-fuzz/issues/list?sort=-opened&can=1&q=proj:cppcheck)|[![Coverity Scan Build Status](https://img.shields.io/coverity/scan/512.svg)](https://scan.coverity.com/projects/512)|[![License](https://img.shields.io/badge/license-GPL3.0-blue.svg)](https://opensource.org/licenses/GPL-3.0) 

## About the name

The original name of this program was "C++check", but it was later changed to "Cppcheck".

Despite the name, Cppcheck is designed for both C and C++.

## Manual

A manual is available [online](http://cppcheck.sourceforge.net/manual.pdf).

## Donate CPU

Cppcheck is a hobby project with limited resources. You can help us by donating CPU (1 core or as many as you like). It is simple:

 1. Download (and extract) Cppcheck source code
 2. Run script: python cppcheck/tools/donate-cpu.py

The script will analyse debian source code and upload the results to a cppcheck server. We need these results both to improve Cppcheck and to detect regressions.

You can stop the script whenever you like with Ctrl C.

## Compiling

Any C++11 compiler should work. For compilers with partial C++11 support it may work. If your compiler has the C++11 features that are available in Visual Studio 2013 / GCC 4.6 then it will work.

To build the GUI, you need Qt.

When building the command line tool, [PCRE](http://www.pcre.org/) is optional. It is used if you build with rules.

There are multiple compilation choices:
* qmake - cross platform build tool
* cmake - cross platform build tool
* Windows: Visual Studio (VS 2013 and above)
* Windows: Qt Creator + mingw
* gnu make
* g++ 4.6 (or later)
* clang++

### cmake

Example, compiling Cppcheck with cmake:

```shell
mkdir build
cd build
cmake ..
cmake --build .
```

If you want to compile the GUI you can use the flag
-DBUILD_GUI=ON

For rules support (requires pcre) use the flag
-DHAVE_RULES=ON

For release builds it is recommended that you use:
-DUSE_MATCHCOMPILER=ON

Using cmake you can generate project files for Visual Studio, XCode, etc.

### qmake

You can use the gui/gui.pro file to build the GUI.

```shell
cd gui
qmake
make
```

### Visual Studio

Use the cppcheck.sln file. The file is configured for Visual Studio 2019, but the platform toolset can be changed easily to older or newer versions. The solution contains platform targets for both x86 and x64.

To compile with rules, select "Release-PCRE" or "Debug-PCRE" configuration. pcre.lib (pcre64.lib for x64 builds) and pcre.h are expected to be in /externals then. A current version of PCRE for Visual Studio can be obtained using [vcpkg](https://github.com/microsoft/vcpkg).

### Qt Creator + MinGW

The PCRE dll is needed to build the CLI. It can be downloaded here:
http://software-download.name/pcre-library-windows/

### GNU make

Simple, unoptimized build (no dependencies):

```shell
make
```

The recommended release build is:

```shell
make MATCHCOMPILER=yes FILESDIR=/usr/share/cppcheck HAVE_RULES=yes CXXFLAGS="-O2 -DNDEBUG -Wall -Wno-sign-compare -Wno-unused-function"
```

Flags:

1.  `MATCHCOMPILER=yes`
    Python is used to optimise cppcheck. The Token::Match patterns are converted into C++ code at compile time.

2.  `FILESDIR=/usr/share/cppcheck`
    Specify folder where cppcheck files are installed (addons, cfg, platform)

3.  `HAVE_RULES=yes`
    Enable rules (PCRE is required if this is used)

4.  `CXXFLAGS="-O2 -DNDEBUG -Wall -Wno-sign-compare -Wno-unused-function"`
    Enables most compiler optimizations, disables cppcheck-internal debugging code and enables basic compiler warnings.

### g++ (for experts)

If you just want to build Cppcheck without dependencies then you can use this command:

```shell
g++ -o cppcheck -std=c++11 -Iexternals -Iexternals/simplecpp -Iexternals/tinyxml -Ilib cli/*.cpp lib/*.cpp externals/simplecpp/simplecpp.cpp externals/tinyxml/*.cpp
```

If you want to use `--rule` and `--rule-file` then dependencies are needed:

```shell
g++ -o cppcheck -std=c++11 -lpcre -DHAVE_RULES -Ilib -Iexternals -Iexternals/simplecpp -Iexternals/tinyxml cli/*.cpp lib/*.cpp externals/simplecpp/simplecpp.cpp externals/tinyxml/*.cpp
```

### MinGW

```shell
mingw32-make LDFLAGS=-lshlwapi
```

### Other Compiler/IDE

1. Create an empty project file / makefile.
2. Add all cpp files in the cppcheck cli and lib folders to the project file / makefile.
3. Add all cpp files in the externals folders to the project file / makefile.
4. Compile.

### Cross compiling Win32 (CLI) version of Cppcheck in Linux

```shell
sudo apt-get install mingw32
make CXX=i586-mingw32msvc-g++ LDFLAGS="-lshlwapi" RDYNAMIC=""
mv cppcheck cppcheck.exe
```

## Webpage

http://cppcheck.sourceforge.net/