You can browse C++ class hierarchies from within Emacs by using Ebrowse.
When working in software projects using C++, I frequently missed software support for two things:
The design of Ebrowse reflects these two needs.
How does it work?
A fast parser written in C is used to process C++ source files. The parser generates a data base containing information about classes, members, global functions, defines, types etc. found in the sources.
The second part of Ebrowse is a Lisp program. This program reads the data base generated by the parser. It displays its contents in various forms and allows you to perform operations on it, or do something with the help of the knowledge contained in the data base.
Navigational use of Ebrowse is centered around two types of buffers which define their own major modes:
Tree buffers are used to view class hierarchies in tree form. They allow you to quickly find classes, find or view class declarations, perform operations like query replace on sets of your source files, and finally tree buffers are used to produce the second buffer form—member buffers. See Tree Buffers.
Members are displayed in member buffers. Ebrowse distinguishes between six different types of members; each type is displayed as a member list of its own:
enums, and typedefs defined with class
scope).
You can switch member buffers from one list to another, or to another class. You can include inherited members in the display, you can set filters that remove categories of members from the display, and most importantly you can find or view member declarations and definitions with a keystroke. See Member Buffers.
These two buffer types and the commands they provide support the navigational use of the browser. The second form resembles Emacs' Tags package for C and other procedural languages. Ebrowse's commands of this type are not confined to special buffers; they are most often used while you are editing your source code.
To list just a subset of what you can use the Tags part of Ebrowse for:
Before you can start browsing a class hierarchy, you must run the parser ebrowse on your source files in order to generate a Lisp data base describing your program.
The operation of ebrowse can be tailored with command line options. Under normal circumstances it suffices to let the parser use its default settings. If you want to do that, call it with a command line like:
ebrowse *.h *.cc
or, if your shell doesn't allow all the file names to be specified on the command line,
ebrowse --files=file
where file contains the names of the files to be parsed, one per line.
When invoked with option `--help', ebrowse prints a list of available command line options.
It is generally a good idea to specify input files so that header files are parsed before source files. This facilitates the parser's work of properly identifying friend functions of a class.
If you regularly use data base names different from the default, you might want to add this to your init file:
(add-to-list 'auto-mode-alist '(NAME . ebrowse-tree-mode))
where NAME is the Lisp data base name you are using.
struct or union in the output.
This is mainly useful when you are converting an existing C program to C++, and do not want to see the old C structs in a class tree.
The parser ebrowse normally writes regular expressions to its output file that help the Lisp part of Ebrowse to find functions, variables etc. in their source files.
You can instruct ebrowse to omit these regular expressions by calling it with the command line switch `--no-regexps'.
When you do this, the Lisp part of Ebrowse tries to guess, from member or class names, suitable regular expressions to locate that class or member in source files. This works fine in most cases, but the automatic generation of regular expressions can be too weak if unusual coding styles are used.
The smaller the minimum length, the higher the probability that Ebrowse will find a wrong match. The larger the value, the larger the output file and therefore the memory consumption once the file is read from Emacs.
The larger the maximum length, the higher the probability that the browser will find a correct match, but the larger the value the larger the output file and therefore the memory consumption once the data is read. As a second effect, the larger the regular expression, the higher the probability that it will no longer match after editing the file.
You start browsing a class hierarchy parsed by ebrowse by just finding the BROWSE file with C-x C-f.
An example of a tree buffer display is shown below.
| Collection
| IndexedCollection
| Array
| FixedArray
| Set
| Dictionary
When you run Emacs on a display which supports colors and the mouse, you will notice that certain areas in the tree buffer are highlighted when you move the mouse over them. This highlight marks mouse-sensitive regions in the buffer. Please notice the help strings in the echo area when the mouse moves over a sensitive region.
A click with Mouse-3 on a mouse-sensitive region opens a context menu. In addition to this, each buffer also has a buffer-specific menu that is opened with a click with Mouse-3 somewhere in the buffer where no highlight is displayed.
Class trees are displayed in tree buffers which install their own major mode. Most Emacs keys work in tree buffers in the usual way, e.g. you can move around in the buffer with the usual C-f, C-v etc., or you can search with C-s.
Tree-specific commands are bound to simple keystrokes, similar to
Gnus. You can take a look at the key bindings by entering
? which calls M-x describe-mode in both tree and member
buffers.
You can view or find a class declaration when the cursor is on a class name.
The same functionality is available from the menu opened with Mouse-3 on the class name.
Ebrowse distinguishes six different kinds of members, each of which is displayed as a separate member list: instance variables, instance functions, static variables, static functions, friend functions, and types.
Each of these lists can be displayed in a member buffer with a command starting with L when the cursor is on a class name. By default, there is only one member buffer named *Members* that is reused each time you display a member list—this has proven to be more practical than to clutter up the buffer list with dozens of member buffers.
If you want to display more than one member list at a time you can freeze its member buffer. Freezing a member buffer prevents it from being overwritten the next time you display a member list. You can toggle this buffer status at any time.
Every member list display command in the tree buffer can be used with a prefix argument (C-u). Without a prefix argument, the command will pop to a member buffer displaying the member list. With prefix argument, the member buffer will additionally be frozen.
These lists are also available from the class' context menu invoked with Mouse-3 on the class name.
If the branch of the class tree containing the class searched for is currently collapsed, the class itself and all its base classes are recursively made visible. (See also Expanding and Collapsing.)
This function is also available from the tree buffer's context menu.
This command is also provided in the tree buffer's context menu.
Here is an example of a tree buffer with file names displayed.
| Collection (unknown)
| IndexedCollection (indexedcltn.h)
| Array (array.h)
| FixedArray (fixedarray.h)
| Set (set.h)
| Dictionary (dict.h)
You can expand and collapse parts of a tree to reduce the complexity of large class hierarchies. Expanding or collapsing branches of a tree has no impact on the functionality of other commands, like /. (See also Go to Class.)
Collapsed branches are indicated with an ellipsis following the class name like in the example below.
| Collection
| IndexedCollection...
| Set
| Dictionary
Classes can be marked for operations similar to the standard Emacs commands M-x tags-search and M-x tags-query-replace (see also See Tags-like Functions.)
Marked classes are displayed with an > in column one of the tree
display, like in the following example
|> Collection
| IndexedCollection...
|> Set
| Dictionary
Member buffers are used to operate on lists of members of a class. Ebrowse distinguishes six kinds of lists:
enums and typedefs defined with class scope.
Nested classes will be shown in the class tree like normal classes.
Like tree buffers, member buffers install their own major mode. Also like in tree buffers, menus are provided for certain areas in the buffer: members, classes, and the buffer itself.
Both commands cycle through the member list.
Most of the commands are also available from the member buffer's context menu.
You can install a hook function to perform actions after a member or class declaration or definition has been found, or when it is not found.
All the commands described above can also be found in the context menu displayed when clicking Mouse-2 on a member name.
With a prefix argument (C-u), all members in the class tree,
i.e. all members the browser knows about appear in the completion
list. The member display will be switched to the class and member list
containing the member.
Look into the buffer's context menu for a convenient way to do this with a mouse.
public members. The
`a' stands for `access'.
protected members.
private members.
virtual members.
inline members.
const members.
These commands are also found in the buffer's context menu.
The nine member attributes Ebrowse knows about are displayed as a list a single-characters flags enclosed in angle brackets in front the of the member's name. A `-' at a given position means that the attribute is false. The list of attributes from left to right is
extern "C".
virtual.
inline.
const.
mutable.
explicit.
This command is also in the buffer's context menu.
| isEmpty contains hasMember create
| storeSize hash isEqual restoreGuts
| saveGuts
The long display shows one member per line with member name and regular expressions matching the member (if known):
| isEmpty Bool isEmpty () const...
| hash unsigned hash () const...
| isEqual int isEqual (...
Regular expressions will only be displayed when the Lisp database has not been produced with the ebrowse option `--no-regexps'. See –no-regexps.
Regular expressions will only be displayed when the Lisp database has not been produced with the ebrowse option `--no-regexps', see –no-regexps.
describe-mode.
Ebrowse provides tags functions similar to those of the standard Emacs Tags facility, but better suited to the needs of C++ programmers.
The functions in this section are similar to those described in Source Display, and also in Finding/Viewing, except that they work in a C++ source buffer, not in member and tree buffers created by Ebrowse.
If more than one class contains a member with the given name you can
select the class with completion. If there is a scope declaration in
front of the member name, this class name is used as initial input for
the completion.
When jumping to a member declaration or definition with one of Ebrowse's commands, the position from where you performed the jump and the position where you jumped to are recorded in a position stack. There are several ways in which you can quickly move to positions in the stack:
The stack is not popped, i.e. you can always switch back and forth
between positions in the stack. To avoid letting the stack grow to
infinite size there is a maximum number of positions defined. When this
number is reached, older positions are discarded when new positions are
pushed on the stack.
Ebrowse allows you to perform operations on all or a subset of the files mentioned in a class tree. When you invoke one of the following functions and more than one class tree is loaded, you must choose a class tree to use from an electric tree menu. If the selected tree contains marked classes, the following commands operate on the files mentioned in the marked classes only. Otherwise all files in the class tree are used.
The command C-c C-m l, lists all members in a given file. The file name is read from the minibuffer with completion.
The command C-c C-m a can be used to display all members matching a given regular expression. This command can be very useful if you remember only part of a member name, and not its beginning.
A special buffer is popped up containing all identifiers matching the regular expression, and what kind of symbol it is (e.g. a member function, or a type). You can then switch to this buffer, and use the command C-c C-m f, for example, to jump to a specific member.
The command C-c C-m <TAB> completes the symbol in front of point.
You can quickly display a member buffer containing the member the cursor in on with the command C-c C-m m.
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--append: Output file--files: Input files--help: Generating browser files--max-regexp-length: Matching--min-regexp-length: Matching--no-regexps: Matching--no-structs-or-unions: Structs and unions--output-file: Output file--search-path: Input files--verbose: Verbosity--very-verbose: Verbosityconst attribute: Attributesconst members: Filtersexplicit attribute: Attributesextern "C" attribute: Attributesinline: Attributesinline members: Filtersmutable attribute: Attributesprivate members: Filtersprotected members: Filterspublic members: Filterstemplate attribute: Attributesvirtual attribute: Attributesvirtual members: Filters