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Cppcheck 1.85

Cppcheck 1.85

Table of Contents
1. Introduction .................................................................................................................... 1
2. Getting started (GUI) ....................................................................................................... 2
New Project ............................................................................................................... 2
New Project - Paths and Defines ................................................................................... 2
New Project - Project .................................................................................................. 2
New Project - Addons ................................................................................................. 2
Analyze ..................................................................................................................... 2
3. Getting started (command line) .......................................................................................... 3
First test .................................................................................................................... 3
Checking all files in a folder ........................................................................................ 3
Check files manually or use project file .......................................................................... 3
Excluding a file or folder from checking ........................................................................ 4
Severities ................................................................................................................... 4
Enable messages ......................................................................................................... 4
Inconclusive checks ............................................................................................. 5
Saving results in file ................................................................................................... 5
Multithreaded checking ................................................................................................ 5
Platform .................................................................................................................... 5
4. Project ........................................................................................................................... 7
CMake ...................................................................................................................... 7
Visual Studio ............................................................................................................. 7
5. Preprocessor settings ........................................................................................................ 8
Defines ..................................................................................................................... 8
Include paths .............................................................................................................. 8
6. XML output ................................................................................................................... 9
The  element .................................................................................................... 9
The  element ............................................................................................... 9
7. Reformatting the output .................................................................................................. 10
Predefined output formats ........................................................................................... 10
User defined output format (single line) ........................................................................ 10
User defined output format (multi line) ......................................................................... 10
Format specifiers for --template ................................................................................... 11
Format specifiers for --template-location ....................................................................... 12
8. Misra ........................................................................................................................... 13
Requirements ............................................................................................................ 13
MISRA Text file ....................................................................................................... 13
9. Suppressions ................................................................................................................. 14
Plain text suppressions ............................................................................................... 14
Command line suppression ................................................................................. 14
Listing suppressions in a file ............................................................................... 14
XML suppressions ..................................................................................................... 14
Inline suppressions .................................................................................................... 15
10. Library configuration .................................................................................................... 16
Using your own custom .cfg file .................................................................................. 16
Memory/resource leaks .............................................................................................. 16
alloc and dealloc ............................................................................................... 16
leak-ignore and use ........................................................................................... 17
Function behaviour .................................................................................................... 17
Function arguments ........................................................................................... 18
noreturn ........................................................................................................... 22
use-retval ......................................................................................................... 23

iii

Cppcheck 1.85

11.

12.

13.
14.

pure and const ..................................................................................................
Example configuration for strcpy() .......................................................................
define ......................................................................................................................
podtype ...................................................................................................................
container ..................................................................................................................
Rules .........................................................................................................................
 ...............................................................................................................
 .................................................................................................................
 ........................................................................................................................
 ................................................................................................................
 ..............................................................................................................
Cppcheck addons .........................................................................................................
Using Cppcheck addons .............................................................................................
Where to find some Cppcheck addons ..................................................................
Writing Cppcheck addons ...........................................................................................
Example 1 - print all tokens ................................................................................
Example 2 - List all functions .............................................................................
Example 3 - List all classes ................................................................................
HTML report ..............................................................................................................
Graphical user interface ................................................................................................
Introduction ..............................................................................................................
Check source code ....................................................................................................
Inspecting results ......................................................................................................
Settings ...................................................................................................................
Project files ..............................................................................................................

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Chapter 1. Introduction
Cppcheck is an analysis tool for C/C++ code. Unlike C/C++ compilers and many other analysis tools, it
doesn't detect syntax errors. Instead, Cppcheck detects the types of bugs that the compilers normally fail
to detect. The goal is no false positives.
Supported code and platforms:
• You can check non-standard code that includes various compiler extensions, inline assembly code, etc.
• Cppcheck should be compilable by any C++ compiler that handles the latest C++ standard.
• Cppcheck should work on any platform that has sufficient CPU and memory.
Please understand that there are limits of Cppcheck. Cppcheck is rarely wrong about reported errors. But
there are many bugs that it doesn't detect.
You will find more bugs in your software by testing your software carefully, than by using Cppcheck.
You will find more bugs in your software by instrumenting your software, than by using Cppcheck. But
Cppcheck can still detect some of the bugs that you miss when testing and instrumenting your software.

1

Chapter 2. Getting started (GUI)
Start the GUI.

New Project
It is not required but creating a new project file is a good first step. You do so through File and New
project file.

New Project - Paths and Defines
What kind of project do you have? If it is a Visual Studio project or if you can generate a compile database
(cmake/qbs/etc), then you can import the project.
Otherwise you can configure the paths and defines manually. In this screenshot below, a Visual Studio
project file is imported:

New Project - Project
In the Project tab it is highly recommended that a Cppcheck build dir is configured. This will be
used by Cppcheck to store various analysis information. It gives you whole program analysis, incremental
analysis, statistics, etc. Each project should have its own unique build dir. In the screenshot below the
build dir is configured as cppcheck-build-dir. The path is relative to the project file.
You should also choose all the libraries that you use. In the screenshot below the microsoft_sal and windows libraries are selected. You can read more about libraries in this manual.

New Project - Addons
We skip the Exclude and Suppressions tabs now, they can be used later to tweak the results.
In the Addons tab you can add extra analysis. The addons require python.

Analyze
Click the OK button in the dialog. Analysis will start immediately.
All warnings are activated and therefore it is pretty noisy. There are likely various warnings that you don't
care about. You can fix that easily, right click on messages and choose Hide or Suppress. Hiding
messages is not permanent, they will be shown after next analysis. Suppressing messages is permanent,
suppressed ids are stored in the project file and those will not be shown again.

2

Chapter 3. Getting started (command
line)
First test
Here is a simple code
int main()
{
char a[10];
a[10] = 0;
return 0;
}
If you save that into file1.c and execute:
cppcheck file1.c
The output from cppcheck will then be:
Checking file1.c...
[file1.c:4]: (error) Array 'a[10]' index 10 out of bounds

Checking all files in a folder
Normally a program has many source files. And you want to check them all. Cppcheck can check all
source files in a directory:
cppcheck path
If "path" is a folder then cppcheck will recursively check all source files in this folder.
Checking path/file1.cpp...
1/2 files checked 50% done
Checking path/file2.cpp...
2/2 files checked 100% done

Check files manually or use project file
With Cppcheck you can check files manually, by specifying files/paths to check and settings. Or you can
use a project file (cmake/visual studio).
Using the project file is quicker since it requires very little configuration from you.
Checking files manually gives you better control of the analysis.
We don't know which approach will give you the best results. It is recommended that you try both. It is
possible that you will get different results so that to find most bugs you need to use both approaches.
Later chapters will describe this in more detail.

3

Getting started (command line)

Excluding a file or folder from checking
To exclude a file or folder, there are two options. The first option is to only provide the paths and files
you want to check.
cppcheck src/a src/b
All files under src/a and src/b are then checked.
The second option is to use -i, with it you specify files/paths to ignore. With this command no files in
src/c are checked:
cppcheck -isrc/c src
This option does not currently work with the --project option and is only valid when supplying an input
directory.To ignore multiple directories supply the -i multiple times. The following command ignores
both the src/b and src/c directories.
cppcheck -isrc/b -isrc/c

Severities
The possible severities for messages are:
error

used when bugs are found

warning

suggestions about defensive programming to prevent bugs

style

stylistic issues related to code cleanup (unused functions, redundant code, constness,
and such)

performance

Suggestions for making the code faster. These suggestions are only based on common
knowledge. It is not certain you'll get any measurable difference in speed by fixing
these messages.

portability

portability warnings. 64-bit portability. code might work different on different compilers. etc.

information

Configuration problems. The recommendation is to only enable these during configuration.

Enable messages
By default only error messages are shown. Through the --enable command more checks can be
enabled.
# enable warning messages
cppcheck --enable=warning file.c
# enable performance messages
cppcheck --enable=performance file.c
# enable information messages
cppcheck --enable=information file.c

4

Getting started (command line)

# For historical reasons, --enable=style enables warning, performance,
# portability and style messages. These are all reported as "style" when
# using the old xml format.
cppcheck --enable=style file.c
# enable warning and performance messages
cppcheck --enable=warning,performance file.c
# enable unusedFunction checking. This is not enabled by --enable=style
# because it doesn't work well on libraries.
cppcheck --enable=unusedFunction file.c
# enable all messages
cppcheck --enable=all
Please note that --enable=unusedFunction should only be used when the whole program is
scanned. Therefore, --enable=all should also only be used when the whole program is scanned. The
reason is that the unusedFunction checking will warn if a function is not called. There will be noise if
function calls are not seen.

Inconclusive checks
By default Cppcheck only writes error messages if it is certain. With --inconclusive error messages
will also be written when the analysis is inconclusive.
cppcheck --inconclusive path
This can of course cause false warnings, it might be reported that there are bugs even though there are not.
Only use this command if false warnings are acceptable.

Saving results in file
Many times you will want to save the results in a file. You can use the normal shell redirection for piping
error output to a file.
cppcheck file1.c 2> err.txt

Multithreaded checking
The option -j is used to specify the number of threads you want to use. For example, to use 4 threads
to check the files in a folder:
cppcheck -j 4 path
Please note that this will disable unusedFunction checking.

Platform
You should use a platform configuration that match your target.
By default Cppcheck uses native platform configuration that works well if your code is compiled and
executed locally.

5

Getting started (command line)

Cppcheck has builtin configurations for unix and windows targets. You can easily use these with the
--platform command line flag.
You can also create your own custom platform configuration in a xml file. Here is an example:


8
signed

2
4
4
8
4
8
12
4
4
2



6

Chapter 4. Project
When you use CMake or Visual Studio you can use --project to analyse your project.
It will give you quick and easy results. There is not much configuration you need to do. But it is hard to say
if this will give you the best results, it is recommended that you try it and also try to analyse your source
code without --project and see which option works best for you.

CMake
Cppcheck can understand compile databases. You can generate these with CMake.
Example:
$ cmake -DCMAKE_EXPORT_COMPILE_COMMANDS=ON .
The file compile_commands.json is created in the current folder.
Now run Cppcheck like this:
$ cppcheck --project=compile_commands.json

Visual Studio
You can run Cppcheck on individual project files (*.vcxproj) or on a whole solution (*.sln)
# run cppcheck on a whole solution
$ cppcheck --project=foobar.sln
# run cppcheck on a individual project
$ cppcheck --project=foobar.vcxproj
Please note that there is also a Visual Studio plugin that allows you to run cppcheck inside Visual Studio.

7

Chapter 5. Preprocessor settings
If you use --project then Cppcheck will use the preprocessor settings from the project file.
Otherwise you'll probably want to configure the include paths, defines etc.

Defines
Here is a file that has 2 configurations (with A defined and without A):
#ifdef A
x = y;
#else
x = z;
#endif
By default Cppcheck will check all preprocessor configurations (except those that have #error in them).
So the above code will be analysed both when A is defined and when it is not.
You can use -D to change this. When you use -D, cppcheck will by default only check the given configuration and nothing else. This is how compilers work. But you can use --force or --max-configs
to override the number of configurations.
# check all configurations
cppcheck file.c
# only check the configuration A
cppcheck -DA file.c
# check all configurations when macro A is defined
cppcheck -DA --force file.c
Another useful flag might be -U. It undefines a symbol. Example usage:
cppcheck -UX file.c
That will mean that X is not defined. Cppcheck will not check what happens when X is defined.

Include paths
To add an include path, use -I, followed by the path.
Cppcheck's preprocessor basically handles includes like any other preprocessor. However, while other
preprocessors stop working when they encounter a missing header, cppcheck will just print an information
message and continues parsing the code.
The purpose of this behaviour is that cppcheck is meant to work without necessarily seeing the entire
code. Actually, it is recommended to not give all include paths. While it is useful for cppcheck to see the
declaration of a class when checking the implementation of its members, passing standard library headers
is highly discouraged because it will result in worse results and longer checking time. For such cases, .cfg
files (see below) are the better way to provide information about the implementation of functions and
types to cppcheck.

8

Chapter 6. XML output
Cppcheck can generate output in XML format. Use --xml to enable this format.
A sample command to check a file and output errors in the XML format:
cppcheck --xml file1.cpp
Here is a sample report:










The  element
Each error is reported in a  element. Attributes:
id

id of error. These are always valid symbolnames.

severity

either: error, warning, style, performance, portability or information

msg

the error message in short format

verbose

the error message in long format.

inconclusive

This attribute is only used when the message is inconclusive.

cwe

CWE ID for message. This attribute is only used when the CWE ID for the message
is known.

The  element
All locations related to an error is listed with  elements. The primary location is listed first.
Attributes:
file

filename. Both relative and absolute paths are possible

file0

name of the source file (optional)

line

a number

info

short information message for each location (optional)

9

Chapter 7. Reformatting the output
If you want to reformat the output so it looks different you can use templates.

Predefined output formats
To get Visual Studio compatible output you can use --template=vs:
cppcheck --template=vs samples/arrayIndexOutOfBounds/bad.c
This output will look like this:

Checking samples/arrayIndexOutOfBounds/bad.c ...
samples/arrayIndexOutOfBounds/bad.c(6): error: Array 'a[2]' accessed at index 2, wh
To get gcc compatible output you can use --template=gcc:
cppcheck --template=gcc samples/arrayIndexOutOfBounds/bad.c
The output will look like this:

Checking samples/arrayIndexOutOfBounds/bad.c ...
samples/arrayIndexOutOfBounds/bad.c:6:6: warning: Array 'a[2]' accessed at index 2,
a[2] = 0;
^

User defined output format (single line)
You can write your own pattern. For instance, to get warning messages that are formatted like old gcc
such format can be used:

cppcheck --template="{file}:{line}: {severity}: {message}" samples/arrayIndexOutOfB
The output will look like this:

Checking samples/arrayIndexOutOfBounds/bad.c ...
samples/arrayIndexOutOfBounds/bad.c:6: error: Array 'a[2]' accessed at index 2, whi
A comma separated format:

cppcheck --template="{file},{line},{severity},{id},{message}" samples/arrayIndexOut
The output will look like this:

Checking samples/arrayIndexOutOfBounds/bad.c ...
samples/arrayIndexOutOfBounds/bad.c,6,error,arrayIndexOutOfBounds,Array 'a[2]' acce

User defined output format (multi line)
Many warnings have multiple locations. Example code:
void f(int *p)
{

10

Reformatting the output

*p = 3;

// line 3

int main()
{
int *p = 0;
f(p);
return 0;
}

// line 8
// line 9

}

There is a possible null pointer dereference at line 3. Cppcheck can show how it came to that conclusion by
showing extra location information. You need to use both --template and --template-location
at the command line.
Example command:

cppcheck --template="{file}:{line}: {severity}: {message}\n{code}" --template-locat
The output from Cppcheck is:
Checking multiline.c ...
multiline.c:3: warning: Possible null pointer dereference: p
*p = 3;
^
multiline.c:8: note: Assignment 'p=0', assigned value is 0
int *p = 0;
^
multiline.c:9: note: Calling function 'f', 1st argument 'p' value is 0
f(p);
^
multiline.c:3: note: Null pointer dereference
*p = 3;
^
The first line in the warning is formatted by the --template format.
The other lines in the warning are formatted by the --template-location format.

Format specifiers for --template
The available specifiers for --template are:
{file}

File name

{line}

Line number

{column}

Column number

{callstack}

Write all locations. Each location is written in [{file}:{line}] format and the
locations are separated by ->. For instance it might look like: [multiline.c:8]
-> [multiline.c:9] -> [multiline.c:3]

{inconclusive:text}

If warning is inconclusive then the given text is written. The given text can
be any arbitrary text that does not contain }. Example: {inconclusive:inconclusive,}

11

Reformatting the output

{severity}

error/warning/style/performance/portability/information

{message}

The warning message

{id}

Warning id

{code}

The real code.

\t

Tab

\t

Newline

\r

Carriage return

Format specifiers for --template-location
The available specifiers for --template-location are:
{file}

File name

{line}

Line number

{column}

Column number

{info}

Information message about current location

{code}

The real code.

\t

Tab

\t

Newline

\r

Carriage return

12

Chapter 8. Misra
Cppcheck has an addon that checks for MISRA C 2012 compliance.

Requirements
You need:
• Python 2.X or 3.X
• The MISRA C 2012 PDF. You can buy this from http://www.misra.org.uk (costs 15-20
pounds)

MISRA Text file
It is not allowed to publish the MISRA rule texts. Therefore the MISRA rule texts are not available directly
in the addon. Instead, the addon can read the rule texts from a text file. If you copy/paste all text in "Appendix A Summary of guidelines" from the MISRA pdf, then you have all the rule texts.
If you have installed xpdf, such text file can be generated on the command line (using pdftotext that
is included in xpdf):
pdftotext misra-c-2012.pdf output.txt
The output might not be 100% perfect so you might need to make minor tweaks manually.
Other pdf-to-text utilities might work also.
To create the text file manually, copy paste Appendix A "Summary of guidelines" from the MISRA PDF.
Format:
Appendix A Summary of guidelines
Rule 1.1
Rule text
Rule 1.2
Rule text
...
Rules that you want to disable does not need to have a rule text. Rules that don't have rule text will be
suppressed by the addon.

13

Chapter 9. Suppressions
If you want to filter out certain errors you can suppress these.

Plain text suppressions
You can suppress certain types of errors. The format for such a suppression is one of:
[error id]:[filename]:[line]
[error id]:[filename2]
[error id]
The error id is the id that you want to suppress. The easiest way to get it is to use the --xml command
line flag. Copy and paste the id string from the XML output. This may be * to suppress all warnings (for
a specified file or files).
The filename may include the wildcard characters * or ?, which match any sequence of characters or
any single character respectively. It is recommended that you use "/" as path separator on all operating
systems.

Command line suppression
The --suppress= command line option is used to specify suppressions on the command line. Example:
cppcheck --suppress=memleak:src/file1.cpp src/

Listing suppressions in a file
You can create a suppressions file. Example:
// suppress memleak and exceptNew errors in the file src/file1.cpp
memleak:src/file1.cpp
exceptNew:src/file1.cpp
// suppress all uninitvar errors in all files
uninitvar
Note that you may add empty lines and comments in the suppressions file.
You can use the suppressions file like this:
cppcheck --suppressions-list=suppressions.txt src/

XML suppressions
You can specify suppressions in a XML file. Example file:



uninitvar
src/file1.c

14

Suppressions

10
var


The xml format is extensible and may be extended with further attributes in the future.

Inline suppressions
Suppressions can also be added directly in the code by adding comments that contain special keywords.
Before adding such comments, consider that the code readability is sacrificed a little.
This code will normally generate an error message:
void f() {
char arr[5];
arr[10] = 0;
}
The output is:
# cppcheck test.c
Checking test.c...
[test.c:3]: (error) Array 'arr[5]' index 10 out of bounds
To suppress the error message, a comment can be added:
void f() {
char arr[5];
// cppcheck-suppress arrayIndexOutOfBounds
arr[10] = 0;
}
Now the --inline-suppr flag can be used to suppress the warning. No error is reported when invoking
cppcheck this way:
cppcheck --inline-suppr test.c
you can specify that the inline suppression only applies to a specific symbol:
// cppcheck-suppress arrayIndexOutOfBounds symbolName=arr
You can write comments for the suppress, however is recommended to use ; or // to specify where they start:
// cppcheck-suppress arrayIndexOutOfBounds ; some comment
// cppcheck-suppress arrayIndexOutOfBounds // some comment

15

Chapter 10. Library configuration
When external libraries are used, such as WinAPI, POSIX, gtk, Qt, etc, Cppcheck doesn't know how
the external functions behave. Cppcheck then fails to detect various problems such as leaks, buffer overflows, possible null pointer dereferences, etc. But this can be fixed with configuration files.
Cppcheck already contains configurations for several libraries. They can be loaded as described below.
Note that the configuration for the standard libraries of C and C++, std.cfg, is always loaded by cppcheck. If you create or update a configuration file for a popular library, we would appreciate if you upload
it to us.

Using your own custom .cfg file
You can create and use your own .cfg files for your projects. Use --check-library and --enable=information to get hints about what you should configure.
It is recommended that you use the Library Editor in the Cppcheck GUI to edit configuration
files. It is available in the View menu. All settings are not documented in this manual.
If you have a question about the .cfg file format it is recommended you ask in the forum (http://sourceforge.net/p/cppcheck/discussion/).
The command line cppcheck will try to load custom .cfg files from the working path - execute cppcheck
from the path where the .cfg files are.
The cppcheck GUI will try to load custom .cfg files from the project file path. The custom .cfg files should
be shown in the Edit Project File dialog that you open from the File menu.

Memory/resource leaks
Cppcheck has configurable checking for leaks, e.g. you can specify which functions allocate and free
memory or resources and which functions do not affect the allocation at all.

alloc and dealloc
Here is an example program:
void test()
{
HPEN pen = CreatePen(PS_SOLID, 1, RGB(255,0,0));
}
The code example above has a resource leak - CreatePen() is a WinAPI function that creates a pen.
However, Cppcheck doesn't assume that return values from functions must be freed. There is no error
message:
# cppcheck pen1.c
Checking pen1.c...
If you provide a configuration file then Cppcheck detects the bug:
# cppcheck --library=windows.cfg pen1.c
Checking pen1.c...
[pen1.c:3]: (error) Resource leak: pen

16

Library configuration

Here is a minimal windows.cfg file:



CreatePen
DeleteObject


The allocation and deallocation functions are organized in groups. Each group is defined in a  or  tag and is identified by its  functions. This means, groups with
overlapping  tags are merged.

leak-ignore and use
Often the allocated pointer is passed to functions. Example:
void test()
{
char *p = malloc(100);
dostuff(p);
}
If Cppcheck doesn't know what dostuff does, without configuration it will assume that dostuff takes
care of the memory so there is no memory leak.
To specify that dostuff doesn't take care of the memory in any way, use leak-ignore in the  tag (see next section):







If instead dostuff takes care of the memory then this can be configured with:



free
dostuff


The  configuration has no logical purpose. You will get the same warnings without it. Use it to
silence --check-library information messages.

Function behaviour
To specify the behaviour of functions and how they should be used,  tags can be used.
Functions are identified by their name, specified in the name attribute and their number of arguments. The

17

Library configuration

name is a comma-separated list of function names. For functions in namespaces or classes, just provide
their fully qualified name. For example: . If you have
template functions then provide their instantiated names .

Function arguments
The arguments a function takes can be specified by  tags. Each of them takes the number of the argument (starting from 1) in the nr attribute, nr="any" for arbitrary arguments, or nr="variadic" for
variadic arguments. Optional arguments can be specified by providing a default value: default="value". The specifications for individual arguments override this setting.

Not bool
Here is an example program with misplaced comparison:
void test()
{
if (MemCmp(buffer1, buffer2, 1024==0)) {}
}
Cppcheck assumes that it is fine to pass boolean values to functions:
# cppcheck notbool.c
Checking notbool.c...
If you provide a configuration file then Cppcheck detects the bug:

# cppcheck --library=notbool.cfg notbool.c
Checking notbool.c...
[notbool.c:5]: (error) Invalid MemCmp() argument nr 3. A non-boolean value is requi
Here is the minimal notbool.cfg











Uninitialized memory
Here is an example program:
void test()
{
char buffer1[1024];
char buffer2[1024];
CopyMemory(buffer1, buffer2, 1024);
}

18

Library configuration

The bug here is that buffer2 is uninitialized. The second argument for CopyMemory needs to be initialized.
However, Cppcheck assumes that it is fine to pass uninitialized variables to functions:
# cppcheck uninit.c
Checking uninit.c...
If you provide a configuration file then Cppcheck detects the bug:
# cppcheck --library=windows.cfg uninit.c
Checking uninit.c...
[uninit.c:5]: (error) Uninitialized variable: buffer2
Note that this implies for pointers that the memory they point at has to be initialized, too.
Here is the minimal windows.cfg:











Null pointers
Cppcheck assumes it's ok to pass NULL pointers to functions. Here is an example program:
void test()
{
CopyMemory(NULL, NULL, 1024);
}
The MSDN documentation is not clear if that is ok or not. But let's assume it's bad. Cppcheck assumes
that it's ok to pass NULL to functions so no error is reported:
# cppcheck null.c
Checking null.c...
If you provide a configuration file then Cppcheck detects the bug:
cppcheck --library=windows.cfg null.c
Checking null.c...
[null.c:3]: (error) Null pointer dereference
Note that this implies  as far as values are concerned. Uninitialized memory might still
be passed to the function.
Here is a minimal windows.cfg file:




19

Library configuration









Format string
You can define that a function takes a format string. Example:
void test()
{
do_something("%i %i\n", 1024);
}
No error is reported for that:
# cppcheck formatstring.c
Checking formatstring.c...
A configuration file can be created that says that the string is a format string. For instance:









Now Cppcheck will report an error:

cppcheck --library=test.cfg formatstring.c
Checking formatstring.c...
[formatstring.c:3]: (error) do_something format string requires 2 parameters but on
The type attribute can be either:
• printf - format string follows the printf rules
• scanf - format string follows the scanf rules

Value range
The valid values can be defined. Imagine:
void test()
{
do_something(1024);
}
No error is reported for that:

20

Library configuration

# cppcheck valuerange.c
Checking valuerange.c...
A configuration file can be created that says that 1024 is out of bounds. For instance:




0:1023



Now Cppcheck will report an error:

cppcheck --library=test.cfg range.c
Checking range.c...
[range.c:3]: (error) Invalid do_something() argument nr 1. The value is 1024 but th
Some example expressions you can use in the valid element:
0,3,5 => only values 0, 3 and 5 are valid
-10:20 => all values between -10 and 20 are valid
:0 => all values that are less or equal to 0 are valid
0: => all values that are greater or equal to 0 are valid
0,2:32 => the value 0 and all values between 2 and 32 are valid
-1.5:5.6 => all values between -1.5 and 5.6 are valid

minsize
Some function arguments take a buffer. With minsize you can configure the min size of the buffer (in
bytes, not elements). Imagine:
void test()
{
char str[5];
do_something(str,"12345");
}
No error is reported for that:
# cppcheck minsize.c
Checking minsize.c...
A configuration file can for instance be created that says that the size of the buffer in argument 1 must be
larger than the strlen of argument 2.For instance:









21

Library configuration


Now Cppcheck will report this error:
cppcheck --library=1.cfg minsize.c
Checking minsize.c...
[minsize.c:4]: (error) Buffer is accessed out of bounds: str
There are different types of minsizes:
strlen

buffer size must be larger than other arguments string length. Example: see strcpy configuration in std.cfg

argvalue

buffer size must be larger than value in other argument. Example: see memset configuration
in std.cfg

sizeof

buffer size must be larger than other argument buffer size. Example: see memccpy configuration in posix.cfg

mul

buffer size must be larger than multiplication result when multiplying values given in two
other arguments. Typically one argument defines the element size and another element defines the number of elements. Example: see fread configuration in std.cfg

strz
This setting is not used by Cppcheck currently. But with this you can say that an argument must be a
zero-terminated string.









noreturn
Cppcheck doesn't assume that functions always return. Here is an example code:
void test(int x)
{
int data, buffer[1024];
if (x == 1)
data = 123;
else
ZeroMemory(buffer, sizeof(buffer));
buffer[0] = data; // <- error: data is uninitialized if x is not 1
}
In theory, if ZeroMemory terminates the program then there is no bug. Cppcheck therefore reports no
error:
# cppcheck noreturn.c

22

Library configuration

Checking noreturn.c...
However if you use --check-library and --enable=information you'll get this:

# cppcheck --check-library --enable=information noreturn.c
Checking noreturn.c...
[noreturn.c:7]: (information) --check-library: Function ZeroMemory() should have 


false





use-retval
As long as nothing else is specified, cppcheck assumes that ignoring the return value of a function is ok:

bool test(const char* a, const char* b)
{
strcmp(a, b); // <- bug: The call of strcmp does not have side-effects, but th
return true;
}
In case strcmp has side effects, such as assigning the result to one of the parameters passed to it, nothing
bad would happen:
# cppcheck useretval.c
Checking useretval.c...
If a proper lib.cfg is provided, the bug is detected:
# cppcheck --library=lib.cfg --enable=warning useretval.c
Checking useretval.c...
[useretval.c:3]: (warning) Return value of function strcmp() is not used.
Here is a minimal lib.cfg file:








23

Library configuration



pure and const
These correspond to the GCC function attributes pure and const.
A pure function has no effects except to return a value, and its return value depends only on the parameters
and global variables.
A const function has no effects except to return a value, and its return value depends only on the parameters.
Here is an example code:
void f(int x)
{
if (calculate(x) == 213) {
} else if (calculate(x) == 213) {
// unreachable code
}
}
If calculate() is a const function then the result of calculate(x) will be the same in both conditions, since the same parameter value is used.
Cppcheck normally assumes that the result might be different, and reports no warning for the code:
# cppcheck const.c
Checking const.c...
If a proper const.cfg is provided, the unreachable code is detected:

# cppcheck --enable=style --library=const const.c
Checking const.c...
[const.c:7]: (style) Expression is always false because 'else if' condition matches
Here is a minimal const.cfg file:








Example configuration for strcpy()
The proper configuration for the standard strcpy() function would be:


false



24

Library configuration








The  tells Cppcheck to ignore this function call in the leaks checking. Passing allocated memory to this function won't mean it will be deallocated.
The  tells Cppcheck if this function returns or not.
The first argument that the function takes is a pointer. It must not be a null pointer, therefore  is used.
The second argument the function takes is a pointer. It must not be null. And it must point at initialized
data. Using  and  is correct. Moreover it must point at a zero-terminated
string so  is also used.

define
Libraries can be used to define preprocessor macros as well. For example:




Each occurrence of "NULL_VALUE" in the code would then be replaced by "0" at preprocessor stage.

podtype
Lots of code relies on typedefs providing platform independent types. "podtype"-tags can be used to provide necessary information to cppcheck to support them. Without further information, cppcheck does not
understand the type "uint16_t" in the following example:
void test() {
uint16_t a;
}
No message about variable 'a' being unused is printed:
# cppcheck --enable=style unusedvar.cpp
Checking unusedvar.cpp...
If uint16_t is defined in a library as follows, the result improves:




The size of the type is specified in bytes. Possible values for the "sign" attribute are "s" (signed) and
"u" (unsigned). Both attributes are optional. Using this library, cppcheck prints:

25

Library configuration

# cppcheck --library=lib.cfg --enable=style unusedvar.cpp
Checking unusedvar.cpp...
[unusedvar.cpp:2]: (style) Unused variable: a

container
A lot of C++ libraries, among those the STL itself, provide containers with very similar functionality.
Libraries can be used to tell cppcheck about their behaviour. Each container needs a unique ID. It can
optionally have a startPattern, which must be a valid Token::Match pattern and an endPattern that is compared to the linked token of the first token with such a link. The optional attribute "inherits" takes an ID
from a previously defined container.
Inside the  tag, functions can be defined inside of the tags ,  and  (on
your choice). Each of them can specify an action like "resize" and/or the result it yields, for example "enditerator".
The following example provides a definition for std::vector, based on the definition of "stdContainer" (not
shown):














26

Chapter 11. Rules
You can define custom rules using regular expressions.
These rules can not perform sophisticated analysis of the code. But they give you an easy way to check
for various simple patterns in the code.
To get started writing rules, see the related articles here:
http://sourceforge.net/projects/cppcheck/files/Articles/
The file format for rules is:


LIST
PATTERN

ID
SEVERITY
SUMMARY


CDATA can be used to include characters in a pattern that might interfere with XML:
pattern]]>


The  element is optional. With this element you can control what tokens are checked. The
LIST can be either define, raw, normal or simple.
define

used to check #define preprocessor statements.

raw

used to check the preprocessor output.

normal

used to check the normal token list. There are some simplifications.

simple

used to check the simple token list. All simplifications are used. Most Cppcheck checks use
the simple token list.

If there is no  element then simple is used automatically.


The PATTERN is the PCRE-compatible regular expression that will be executed.


The ID specify the user-defined message id.

27

Rules


The SEVERITY must be one of the Cppcheck severities: information, performance, portability, style, warning, or error.


Optional. The summary for the message. If no summary is given, the matching tokens is written.

28

Chapter 12. Cppcheck addons
Cppcheck addons are implemented as standalone scripts or programs. With Cppcheck addons, you can
for instance:
• add extra custom checkers that use sophisticated analysis
• visualize your code
• etc

Using Cppcheck addons
Currently there are two steps to use an addon:
1. Run Cppcheck to generate dump files
2. Run the addon on the dump files
The --dump flag is used to generate dump files. To generate a dump file for every source file in the
foo/ folder:
cppcheck --dump foo/
To run a addon script on all dump files in the foo/ folder:
python addon.py foo/*.dump

Where to find some Cppcheck addons
There are a few addons that can be downloaded.
• Addons provided by the Cppcheck project: http://github.com/danmar/cppcheck/blob/
master/addons
• ublinter, a project that wants to "lint" for "undefined behaviour": http://github.com/danmar/ublinter
We would be happy to add a link to your addon here (no matter if it's commercial or free).

Writing Cppcheck addons
Cppcheck generates dump files in XML format that contains:
• Token list
• Syntax trees
• Symbol database (functions, classes, variables, all scopes, ..)
• Known values (value flow analysis)
Cppcheck can't execute addons directly. There is no direct interface. This means there are not much restrictions:

29

Cppcheck addons

• You can use any licensing you want for your addons
• You can use an arbitrary script/programming language to write addons
• The user interface and output is defined by you
• You can use addons for other use cases than generating warnings
For your convenience, Cppcheck provides cppcheckdata.py that you can use to access Cppcheck data from
Python. Using this is optional.

Example 1 - print all tokens
Script:
import sys
import cppcheckdata
def printtokens(data):
for token in data.tokenlist:
print(token.str)
for arg in sys.argv[1:]:
printtokens(cppcheckdata.parse(arg))

Example 2 - List all functions
Script:
import sys
import cppcheckdata
def printfunctions(data):
for scope in data.scopes:
if scope.type == 'Function':
print(scope.className)
for arg in sys.argv[1:]:
printfunctions(cppcheckdata.parse(arg))

Example 3 - List all classes
Script:
import sys
import cppcheckdata
def printclasses(data):
for scope in data.scopes:
if scope.type == 'Class':
print(scope.className)
for arg in sys.argv[1:]:
printfunctions(cppcheckdata.parse(arg))

30

Chapter 13. HTML report
You can convert the XML output from cppcheck into a HTML report. You'll need Python and the pygments
module (http://pygments.org/) for this to work. In the Cppcheck source tree there is a folder htmlreport
that contains a script that transforms a Cppcheck XML file into HTML output.
This command generates the help screen:
htmlreport/cppcheck-htmlreport -h
The output screen says:
Usage: cppcheck-htmlreport [options]
Options:
-h, --help
--file=FILE

show this help message and exit
The cppcheck xml output file to read defects from.
Default is reading from stdin.
--report-dir=REPORT_DIR
The directory where the html report content is written.
--source-dir=SOURCE_DIR
Base directory where source code files can be found.

An example usage:
./cppcheck gui/test.cpp --xml 2> err.xml
htmlreport/cppcheck-htmlreport --file=err.xml --report-dir=test1 --source-dir=.

31

Chapter 14. Graphical user interface
Introduction
A Cppcheck GUI is available.
The main screen is shown immediately when the GUI is started.

Check source code
Use the Check menu.

Inspecting results
The results are shown in a list.
You can show/hide certain types of messages through the View menu.
Results can be saved to an XML file that can later be opened. See Save results to file and
Open XML.

Settings
The language can be changed at any time by using the Language menu.
More settings are available in Edit → Preferences.

Project files
The project files are used to store project specific settings. These settings are:
• include folders
• preprocessor defines
As you can read in chapter 3 in this manual the default is that Cppcheck checks all configurations. So only
provide preprocessor defines if you want to limit the checking.

32



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