CFlow and call graph functionality

[Roberto Santa Escolástica]

Hi everyone,

first of all, this is not a bug found in cflow, but this is the only mailing list I could found to ask my questions. Sorry for any inconvenience if I am doing it in a wrong way.

I am evaluating some tools which allow the generation of call graphs and I have some doubts about CFlow. What I am doing right now is an analysis of these tools in order to select the most suitable to the necessities of our project. Because of that I will be grateful if someone could answer these questions:

• Is it possible to export the generated call graph to a specific format? (XML, XLS, CSV, TXT, ...)

• The final intention of using the tool would be to automatically detect the interface elements (for example methods which are used by other modules/applications) who have been affected by a change in the software. As CFlow generates the necessary information to generate a call graph, has it any functionality which can detect the interface elements affected by a change? If not, does it have an API or something similar to operate with the call graph?
  

Thank you in advance for any help provided.

Best regards,

Roberto
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[Sergey Poznyakoff-2]

Hi Roberto,

>    first of all, this is not a bug found in cflow, but this is the only
>    mailing list I could found to ask my questions. Sorry for any
>    inconvenience if I am doing it in a wrong way.

You are doing it right, don't worry.

>      * Is it possible to export the generated call graph to a specific
>        format? (XML, XLS, CSV, TXT, ...)

Two call graph formats are supported right now: POSIX format (as defined
in the POSIX cflow specification) and GNU format (an improved version of
it).  Both are described in detail in the cflow docs[1].  These perhaps
match what you call "TXT".  A VCG representation of the call graphs
can be obtained[1].  There is also an ongoing effort to introduce
support for the 'dot' format.

To create graphs in any other format, you will need to write a new
output module or a filter for converting from one of the supported
formats.

>      * The final intention of using the tool would be to automatically
>        detect the interface elements (for example methods which are used
>        by other modules/applications) who have been affected by a change
>        in the software. As CFlow generates the necessary information to
>        generate a call graph, has it any functionality which can detect
>        the interface elements affected by a change?

No, it has not.  The purpose of cflow is to generate a call graph, any
analysis thereof is left to the caller.

>        If not, does it have
>        an API or something similar to operate with the call graph?

There is no public API at the moment.

Regards,
Sergey

[1] http://www.gnu.org/software/cflow/manual/html_node/Output-Formats.html

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