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7 <title>Splint FAQ</title>
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15 <h1>Splint frequently asked questions</h1>
16
17 <h3>Index</h3><ol><li><a href="#quest1"><p>What is the difference between Splint and LCLint?</p>
18 </a></li>
19 <p><li><a href="#quest2">What is the Splint logo?</p>
20 </a></li>
21 <p><li><a href="#quest3">Can I include Splint in my software distribution?</p>
22 </a></li>
23 <p><li><a href="#quest4">Can we use your software in our company? (We are not a GNU organization.)</p>
24 </a></li>
25 <p><li><a href="#quest5">Does Splint handle C++?</p>
26 </a></li>
27 <p><li><a href="#quest6">I downloaded the Splint .tgz file but can't figure out how to extract it.
28 There is no 'z' option on the tar on my system.</p>
29 </a></li>
30 <p><li><a href="#quest7">I want to use Splint in win2000. How do I do that?</p>
31 </a></li>
32 <p><li><a href="#quest8">I have installed Splint for Windows 2000. Where should I put the ".splintrc"
33 file?</p>
34 </a></li>
35 <p><li><a href="#quest9">Which compilers does Splint support?</p>
36 </a></li>
37 <p><li><a href="#quest10">How does Splint handle const?</p>
38 </a></li>
39 <p><li><a href="#quest11">Why do I get a warning when multiplying different integer types? The C
40 standard says this is ok. Why is this wrong?</p>
41 </a></li>
42 <p><li><a href="#quest12">The C standard says that what I'm doing is okay. Why does Splint give me a
43 warning?</p>
44 </a></li>
45 <p><li><a href="#quest13">Splint complains if I ignore the return value of scanf but not printf?</p>
46 </a></li>
47 <p><li><a href="#quest14">I develop code on an embedded system with a compiler that uses nonstandard key
48 words and data types. I would like to run Splint on my code but these nonstandard
49 keywords cause parse errors. What should I do?</p>
50 </a></li>
51 <p><li><a href="#quest14b">How can I get Splint to recognize directory trees and local source include
52 directories?</p>
53 </a></li>
54 <p><li><a href="#quest15">I heard that we will get lot of parse errors when we run this tool first time.
55 Hence we need to modify source code. Is it correct ?</p>
56 </a></li>
57 <p><li><a href="#quest16">I heard that Splint can generate some spurious errors ( not genuine errors).
58 Is it correct ?</p>
59 </a></li>
60 <p><li><a href="#quest17">When I build Splint I get the following errors.... Should I be worried?</p>
61 </a></li>
62 <p><li><a href="#quest18"> I just installed Splint on a new machine. I get a bunch of errors during building when the test suite is run.
63 When I look through the results, it seems like Splint is not reporting any errors in the code it analyzes. What is going on?
64 </p>
65 </a></li>
66 <p><li><a href="#quest18b">I get parse errors when I try to run Splint on code like #define
67 MACROdebug(...) blahblah . Can I use variadic macros in Splint?</p>
68 </a></li>
69 <p><li><a href="#quest20">I use realloc in my code. How can I get Splint in check this code more
70 effectively?</p>
71 </a></li>
72 <p><li><a href="#quest21">I think I've found a bug in Splint. What should I do?</p>
73 </a></li>
74 <p><li><a href="#quest22">Splint tells me that there is a bug and I should report it. What information
75 should I send?</p>
76 </a></li>
77 <p><li><a href="#quest23">My question isn't answered here. How can I get more information about
78 Splint?</p>
79 </a></li>
80 </ol>
81
82 <h3>Questions and Answers</h3>
83 <ol>
84
85 <li><p><a name="quest1">What is the difference between Splint and LCLint?</p>
86 <p>Before 2002, Splint was known as LCLint. Splint 3.0 is the successor to LCLint
87 2.5.</p>
88
89 <p><blockquote>LCLint was originally named for LCL, the Larch C Interface Language and lint, a
90 well-known C program checking tool. Because our tool has diverged from LCL, and our
91 focus now is on secure programming, it was renamed Splint. Splint's name has (at
92 least) three interpretations: specifications lint, secure programming lint, and first
93 aid for programmers. It's also easier to pronounce than LCLint.</p></blockquote>
94 <li><p><a name="quest2">What is the Splint logo?</p>
95 <p><blockquote>Thomas Jefferson's Serpentine Walls at the University of Virginia. The walls are
96 one brick thick, but because of their design are both strong and aesthetic. Like a
97 secure program, secure walls depend on sturdy bricks, solid construction, and elegant
98 and principled design.</p></blockquote>
99 <li><p><a name="quest3">Can I include Splint in my software distribution?</p>
100 <p><blockquote>Yes. Splint is licensed under the GNU General Public License. You may redistribute
101 it as you wish so long as credits and pointers to <a
102 href="http://www.splint.org/">www.splint.org</a> are not changed or removed. Splint
103 may be included in commercial distributions, and is included in several Linux and
104 freeware CDs. If you redistribute Splint, please let us know by sending a message to
105 <a href="mailto:splint@cs.virginia.edu">splint@cs.virginia.edu</a>.</p></blockquote>
106 <li><p><a name="quest4">Can we use your software in our company? (We are not a GNU organization.)</p>
107 <p><blockquote>Yes, splint is GPL-licensed. Anyone may use it. If you want to
108 redistribute it, check the license for details or contact us.</p></blockquote>
109 <li><p><a name="quest5">Does Splint handle C++?</p>
110 <p><blockquote>No. Splint handles ISO C99 (and some gcc extensions if +gnuextensions is used). We
111 don't have the resources (or the research justification) to build a C++ front end,
112 but if you are interested in building a C++ front end the source code is available,
113 and I will certainly be willing to help.</p></blockquote>
114 <li><p><a name="quest6">I downloaded the Splint .tgz file but can't figure out how to extract it. There is
115 no 'z' option on the tar on my system.</p>
116 <p><blockquote>Check to see if there is GNU tar on your system, it is usually invoked by the
117 command gtar or gnutar. GNU tar supports the -z option.</p>
118 <p>You can also unzip the file then untar it. Do: gunzip filename.tar.gz to unzip
119 then tar -xvf filename.tar</p></blockquote>
120 <li><p><a name="quest7">I want to use Splint in win2000. How do I do that?</p>
121 <p><blockquote>See <a href="http://www.splint.org/">www.splint.org</a> for information on
122 Splint.</p>
123 <p><a href="http://www.splint.org/win32.html">http://www.splint.org/win32.html</a>
124 for Windows instructions.</p></blockquote>
125 <li><p><a name="quest8">I have installed Splint for Windows 2000. Where should I put the ".splintrc"
126 file?</p>
127 <p><blockquote>For Win32, Splint looks for splint.rc instead of .splintrc due to the DOS filename problems. It will look first in the current directory, then in</p>
128 <p>your home directory. See the Splint manual for more information.</p>
129 </blockquote>
130 <li><p><a name="quest9">Which compilers does Splint support?</p>
131 <p><blockquote>It is independent from your compiler.</p></blockquote>
132 <li><p><a name="quest10">How does Splint handle const?</p>
133 <p><blockquote>Splint doesn't interpret const (at all). See the manual section on
134 modifies checking (<a href="http://www.splint.org/manual/html/sec7.html">http://www.splint.org/manual/html/sec7.html</a>).</p></blockquote>
135 <li><p><a name="quest11">Why do I get a Warning when multiplying different integer types? The C standard
136 says this is ok. Why is this wrong?</p>
137 <p><blockquote>There are lots of things that the C spec allows and defines clearly, that Splint will provide warnings for. It's not a question of it being "wrong",
138 it's a matter of it being likely to reveal a programming mistake.</p></blockquote>
139 <li><p><a name="quest12">The C standard says that what I'm doing is okay. Why does Splint give me a
140 warning?</p>
141 <p><blockquote>See the previous question.</p></blockquote>
142 <li><p><a name="quest13">Splint complains if I ignore the return value of scanf but not printf?</p>
143 <p><blockquote>This is just a strategic decision --- we view ignoring the result of a
144 scanf to be more likely to reveal a problem with the code than ignoring
145 the result of a printf, even though strict programmers will want to check
146 printf also.</p>
147 <p><blockquote>If you want stricter checking, use the flags +ansistrictlib, +posixstrictlib,
148 +unixstrictlib to select the strict versions of these libraries.</p></blockquote>
149 </blockquote>
150 <li><p><a name="quest14">I develop code on an embedded system with a compiler that uses nonstandard key
151 words and data types. I would like to run Splint on my code but these nonstandard
152 keywords cause parse errors. What should I do?</p>
153
154 <blockquote><p>You can often use -D to solve this problem.</p>
155 <p>If you just want to ignore a keyword, you can add
156 -Dnonstandardkeyword=
157 to make the preprocessor eliminate the keyword, where nonstandardkeyword is the
158 name of the keyword. Similarly, you can use
159 -Dspecialtype=int
160 to make a custom type parse as an int.</p></blockquote>
161 <li><p><a name="quest14b">How can I get Splint to recognize directory trees and local source include
162 directories? I've tried putting them in my path but it doesn't seem to look beyond
163 the current directory.</p>
164 <p><blockquote>You can use -I to set the include path like you would with a compiler.</p></blockquote>
165 <li><p><a name="quest15">I heard that we will get lot of parse errors when we run this tool first time.
166 Hence we need to modify source code. Is it correct ?</p>
167 <p><blockquote>Usually not, but Splint doesn't support all C99 extensions.</p></blockquote>
168 <li><p><a name="quest16">I heard that Splint can generate some spurious errors ( not genuine errors). Is it
169 correct ?</p>
170 <p><blockquote>Yes, please see <a href="http://www.splint.org/">www.splint.org</a> for
171 details.</p></blockquote>
172 <li><p><a name="quest17">When I build Splint I get the following error:</p>
173 <p><blockquote>Checking for...</p>
174 <p>Checking manual...</p>
175 <p>cmx &gt; / Checking tests2.2...</p>
176 <p>Checking tests2.4...</p>
177 <p>Checking tests2.5...</p>
178 <p>Checking db1...</p>
179 <p>0a1,2</p>
180 <p>&gt; /cmx/tools/make -e clean</p>
181 <p>&gt; /cmx/tools/make -e check</p>
182 <p>*** FAIL ***</p>
183 <p>Checking db2...</p>
184 <p>0a1,/tools/make -e clean</p>
185 <p>&gt; /cmx/tools/make -e check</p>
186 <p>*** FAIL ***</p>
187 <p>Checking db3...</p>
188 </blockquote>
189 <p>Should I be worried?</p>
190 </blockquote>
191 <p><blockquote>Those diffs look harmless. It is likely that your make is set up slightly
192 differently than ours.</p></blockquote>
193 <li><p><a name="quest18">I just installed Splint on a new machine. I get a bunch of errors during building
194 when the test suite is run. When I look through the results, it seems like Splint is
195 not reporting any errors in the code it analyzes. What is going on?</p>
196 <p><blockquote>One possibility is that the installation directory where the test suite is
197 running is on the system path (hence, splint won't report errors if
198 -sysdirerrors is set, as it is by default). Try adding +sysdirerrors to
199 the command line for the test suite to see if that is the problem, or installing
200 Splint in a different directory not in the system path.</p></blockquote>
201 <li><p><a name="quest18b">I get parse errors when I try to run Splint on code like #define MACROdebug(...)
202 blahblah . Can I use variadic macros in Splint?</p>
203 <p><blockquote>Sorry, Splint does not yet support variadic macros. We hope to fix this in a
204 future release.</p></blockquote>
205 <li><p><a name="quest20">I use realloc in my code. How can I get Splint in check this code more
206 effectively?</p>
207 <p><blockquote>realloc has complicated semantics that make it difficult to use correctly. Make
208 sure that you understand realloc and that you really need to use it.</p>
209 <p>If you decide to use realloc, we recommend that you wrapper it. The document Using
210 Wrapper Functions explains how to do this. That document is included in the Splint
211 documentation and is also available at:</p>
212 <p><a
213 href="http://www.splint.org/documentation/realloc.htm">http://www.splint.org/documentation/realloc.htm</a></p></blockquote>
214 <li><p><a name="quest21">I think I've found a bug in Splint. What should I do?</p>
215 <p><blockquote>See <a href="http://www.splint.org/bugs.html">http://www.splint.org/bugs.html</a>
216 for a list of known bugs and instructions on reporting bugs.</p></blockquote>
217 <li><p><a name="quest22">Splint tells me that there is a bug and I should report it. What information
218 should I send?</p>
219 <p><blockquote>Ideally we would like enough code to reproduce the problem. Small snippets of code
220 which trigger the bug are the best but more code is also acceptable.</p>
221 <p>If we're not able to reproduce the problem, then we are unlikely to be able to
222 patch Splint. However, we would still appreciate hearing about the bug and may be
223 able to at least to offer you advice on working around the problem.</p></blockquote>
224 <li><p><a name="quest23">My question isn't answered here. How can I get more information about Splint?</p>
225 <p><blockquote>First check the Splint manual and the mailing list archives.</p>
226 <p>The Splint manual is available at: <a
227 href="http://www.splint.org/manual/l">http://www.splint.org/manual/</a></p>
228 <p>The mailing list archives are at:</p>
229 <p><a
230 href="http://www.mail-archive.com/lclint-interest@virginia.edu/u">http://www.mail-archive.com/lclint-interest%40virginia.edu/</a></p>
231 <p>If you're still unable to find the information to answer your question, you can
232 try posting the question to the splint-discuss mailing list (see <a
233 href="http://www.splint.org/lists.html">http://www.splint.org/lists.html</a>)</p>
234 <p>You can also email us at splint@splint.org.</p>
235 </blockquote>
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