1.\" $NetBSD: error.1,v 1.14 2010/04/05 21:18:20 joerg Exp $ 2.\" 3.\" Copyright (c) 1980, 1990, 1993 4.\" The Regents of the University of California. All rights reserved. 5.\" 6.\" Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without 7.\" modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions 8.\" are met: 9.\" 1. Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright 10.\" notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer. 11.\" 2. Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright 12.\" notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the 13.\" documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution. 14.\" 3. Neither the name of the University nor the names of its contributors 15.\" may be used to endorse or promote products derived from this software 16.\" without specific prior written permission. 17.\" 18.\" THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE REGENTS AND CONTRIBUTORS ``AS IS'' AND 19.\" ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE 20.\" IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE 21.\" ARE DISCLAIMED. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE REGENTS OR CONTRIBUTORS BE LIABLE 22.\" FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL 23.\" DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS 24.\" OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION) 25.\" HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT 26.\" LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING IN ANY WAY 27.\" OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF 28.\" SUCH DAMAGE. 29.\" 30.\" @(#)error.1 8.1 (Berkeley) 6/6/93 31.\" 32.Dd June 6, 1993 33.Dt ERROR 1 34.Os 35.Sh NAME 36.Nm error 37.Nd analyze and disperse compiler error messages 38.Sh SYNOPSIS 39.Nm 40.Op Fl n 41.Op Fl s 42.Op Fl q 43.Op Fl v 44.Op Fl t Ar suffixlist 45.Op Fl I Ar ignorefile 46.Op name 47.Sh DESCRIPTION 48.Nm 49analyzes and optionally disperses the diagnostic error messages 50produced by a number of compilers and language processors to the source 51file and line where the errors occurred. It can replace the painful, 52traditional methods of scribbling abbreviations of errors on paper, and 53permits error messages and source code to be viewed simultaneously 54without machinations of multiple windows in a screen editor. 55.Pp 56Options are: 57.Bl -tag -width Ds 58.It Fl n 59Do 60.Em not 61touch any files; all error messages are sent to the 62standard output. 63.It Fl q 64The user is 65.Ar queried 66whether s/he wants to touch the file. 67A ``y'' or ``n'' to the question is necessary to continue. 68Absence of the 69.Fl q 70option implies that all referenced files 71(except those referring to discarded error messages) 72are to be touched. 73.It Fl v 74After all files have been touched, 75overlay the visual editor 76.Xr \&vi 1 77with it set up to edit all files touched, 78and positioned in the first touched file at the first error. 79If 80.Xr \&vi 1 81can't be found, try 82.Xr \&ex 1 83or 84.Xr \&ed 1 85from standard places. 86.It Fl t 87Take the following argument as a suffix list. 88Files whose suffixes do not appear in the suffix list are not touched. 89The suffix list is dot separated, and ``*'' wildcards work. 90Thus the suffix list: 91.Pp 92.Dl ".c.y.foo*.h" 93.Pp 94allows 95.Nm 96to touch files ending with ``.c'', ``.y'', ``.foo*'' and ``.h''. 97.It Fl s 98Print out 99.Em statistics 100regarding the error categorization. 101Not too useful. 102.El 103.Pp 104.Nm 105looks at the error messages, 106either from the specified file 107.Ar name 108or from the standard input, 109and attempts to determine which 110language processor produced each error message, 111determines the source file and line number to which the error message refers, 112determines if the error message is to be ignored or not, 113and inserts the (possibly slightly modified) error message into 114the source file as a comment on the line preceding to which the 115line the error message refers. 116Error messages which can't be categorized by language processor 117or content are not inserted into any file, 118but are sent to the standard output. 119.Nm 120touches source files only after all input has been read. 121.Pp 122.Nm 123is intended to be run 124with its standard input 125connected via a pipe to the error message source. 126Some language processors put error messages on their standard error file; 127others put their messages on the standard output. 128Hence, both error sources should be piped together into 129.Nm . 130For example, when using the 131.Xr csh 1 132syntax, 133.Pp 134.Dl make \-s lint \&| error \-q \-v 135.Pp 136will analyze all the error messages produced 137by whatever programs 138.Xr make 1 139runs when making lint. 140.Pp 141.Nm 142knows about the error messages produced by: 143.Xr make 1 , 144.Xr \&cc 1 , 145.Xr cpp 1 , 146.Ic ccom , 147.Xr \&as 1 , 148.Xr \&ld 1 , 149.Xr lint 1 , 150.Ic \&pi , 151.Ic \&pc , 152.Xr f77 1 , 153and 154.Em DEC Western Research Modula\-2 . 155.Nm 156knows a standard format for error messages produced by 157the language processors, 158so is sensitive to changes in these formats. 159For all languages except 160.Em Pascal , 161error messages are restricted to be on one line. 162Some error messages refer to more than one line in more than 163one files; 164.Nm 165will duplicate the error message and insert it at 166all of the places referenced. 167.Pp 168.Nm 169will do one of six things with error messages. 170.Bl -tag -width synchronize 171.It Em synchronize 172Some language processors produce short errors describing 173which file it is processing. 174.Nm 175uses these to determine the file name for languages that 176don't include the file name in each error message. 177These synchronization messages are consumed entirely by 178.Nm . 179.It Em discard 180Error messages from 181.Xr lint 1 182that refer to one of the two 183.Xr lint 1 184libraries, 185.Pa /usr/libdata/lint/llib-lc 186and 187.Pa /usr/libdata/lint/llib-port 188are discarded, 189to prevent accidentally touching these libraries. 190Again, these error messages are consumed entirely by 191.Nm . 192.It Em nullify 193Error messages from 194.Xr lint 1 195can be nullified if they refer to a specific function, 196which is known to generate diagnostics which are not interesting. 197Nullified error messages are not inserted into the source file, 198but are written to the standard output. 199The names of functions to ignore are taken from 200either the file named 201.Pa .errorrc 202in the user's home directory, 203or from the file named by the 204.Fl I 205option. 206If the file does not exist, 207no error messages are nullified. 208If the file does exist, there must be one function 209name per line. 210.It Em not file specific 211Error messages that can't be intuited are grouped together, 212and written to the standard output before any files are touched. 213They will not be inserted into any source file. 214.It Em file specific 215Error message that refer to a specific file, 216but to no specific line, 217are written to the standard output when 218that file is touched. 219.It Em true errors 220Error messages that can be intuited are candidates for 221insertion into the file to which they refer. 222.El 223.Pp 224Only true error messages are candidates for inserting into 225the file they refer to. 226Other error messages are consumed entirely by 227.Nm 228or are written to the standard output. 229.Nm 230inserts the error messages into the source file on the line 231preceding the line the language processor found in error. 232Each error message is turned into a one line comment for the 233language, 234and is internally flagged 235with the string ``###'' at 236the beginning of the error, 237and ``%%%'' at the end of the error. 238This makes pattern searching for errors easier with an editor, 239and allows the messages to be easily removed. 240In addition, each error message contains the source line number 241for the line the message refers to. 242A reasonably formatted source program can be recompiled 243with the error messages still in it, 244without having the error messages themselves cause future errors. 245For poorly formatted source programs in free format languages, 246such as C or Pascal, 247it is possible to insert a comment into another comment, 248which can wreak havoc with a future compilation. 249To avoid this, programs with comments and source 250on the same line should be formatted 251so that language statements appear before comments. 252.Pp 253.Nm 254catches interrupt and terminate signals, 255and if in the insertion phase, 256will orderly terminate what it is doing. 257.Sh FILES 258.Bl -tag -width ~/.errorrc -compact 259.It Pa ~/.errorrc 260function names to ignore for 261.Xr lint 1 262error messages 263.It Pa /dev/tty 264user's teletype 265.El 266.Sh HISTORY 267The 268.Nm 269command 270appeared in 271.Bx 4.0 . 272.Sh AUTHORS 273.An Robert Henry 274.Sh BUGS 275Opens the teletype directly to do user querying. 276.Pp 277Source files with links make a new copy of the file with 278only one link to it. 279.Pp 280Changing a language processor's format of error messages 281may cause 282.Nm 283to not understand the error message. 284.Pp 285.Nm , 286since it is purely mechanical, 287will not filter out subsequent errors caused by `floodgating' 288initiated by one syntactically trivial error. 289Humans are still much better at discarding these related errors. 290.Pp 291Pascal error messages belong after the lines affected 292(error puts them before). The alignment of the `\e' marking 293the point of error is also disturbed by 294.Nm . 295.Pp 296.Nm 297was designed for work on 298.Tn CRT Ns 's 299at reasonably high speed. 300It is less pleasant on slow speed terminals, and has never been 301used on hardcopy terminals. 302