Ubuntu Manpage: geninfo - Generate tracefiles from .da files

NAME

       geninfo - Generate tracefiles from .da files

SYNOPSIS

       geninfo [-h|--help] [-v|--version] [-q|--quiet]
               [-i|--initial] [-t|--test-name test-name]
               [-o|--output-filename filename] [-f|--follow]
               [-b|--base-directory directory]
               [--checksum] [--no-checksum]
               [--compat-libtool] [--no-compat-libtool]
               [--gcov-tool tool] [--ignore-errors errors]
               [--no-recursion] directory [--external] [--no-external]
               [--config-file config-file] [--no-markers]
               [--derive-func-data] [--compat mode=on|off|auto]
               [--rc keyword=value]

DESCRIPTION

       geninfo  converts all GCOV coverage data files found in directory into tracefiles, which the genhtml tool
       can convert to HTML output.

       Unless the --output-filename option is specified, geninfo writes its output to one file per .da file, the
       name of which is generated by simply appending ".info" to the respective .da file name.

       Note  that  the  current user needs write access to both directory as well as to the original source code
       location. This is necessary because some temporary files have to be created there during  the  conversion
       process.

       Note also that geninfo is called from within lcov, so that there is usually no need to call it directly.

       Exclusion markers

       To  exclude  specific  lines  of code from a tracefile, you can add exclusion markers to the source code.
       Additionally you can exclude specific branches from branch coverage without excluding the involved  lines
       from  line  and  function  coverage. Exclusion markers are keywords which can for example be added in the
       form of a comment.  See lcovrc(5) how to override some of them.

       The following markers are recognized by geninfo:

       LCOV_EXCL_LINE
              Lines containing this marker will be excluded.
       LCOV_EXCL_START
              Marks the beginning of an excluded section. The current line is part of this section.
       LCOV_EXCL_STOP
              Marks the end of an excluded section. The current line not part of this section.
       LCOV_EXCL_BR_LINE
              Lines containing this marker will be excluded from branch coverage.
       LCOV_EXCL_BR_START
              Marks the beginning of a section which is excluded from branch coverage. The current line is  part
              of this section.
       LCOV_EXCL_BR_STOP
              Marks  the  end  of a section which is excluded from branch coverage. The current line not part of
              this section.

OPTIONS

-b directory
--base-directory directory
Use directory as base directory for relative paths.

Use this option to specify the base directory of a build-environment when geninfo produces error
messages like:

ERROR: could not read source file /home/user/project/subdir1/subdir2/subdir1/subdir2/file.c

In this example, use /home/user/project as base directory.

This option is required when using geninfo on projects built with libtool or similar build
environments that work with a base directory, i.e. environments, where the current working
directory when invoking the compiler is not the same directory in which the source code file is
located.

Note that this option will not work in environments where multiple base directories are used. In
that case use configuration file setting geninfo_auto_base=1 (see lcovrc(5)).

--checksum
--no-checksum
Specify whether to generate checksum data when writing tracefiles.

Use --checksum to enable checksum generation or --no-checksum to disable it. Checksum generation
is disabled by default.

When checksum generation is enabled, a checksum will be generated for each source code line and
stored along with the coverage data. This checksum will be used to prevent attempts to combine
coverage data from different source code versions.

If you don't work with different source code versions, disable this option to speed up coverage
data processing and to reduce the size of tracefiles.

--compat mode=value[,mode=value,...]
Set compatibility mode.

Use --compat to specify that geninfo should enable one or more compatibility modes when capturing
coverage data. You can provide a comma-separated list of mode=value pairs to specify the values
for multiple modes.

Valid values are:

on
Enable compatibility mode.
off
Disable compatibility mode.
auto
Apply auto-detection to determine if compatibility mode is required. Note that auto-
detection is not available for all compatibility modes.

If no value is specified, 'on' is assumed as default value.

Valid modes are:

libtool
Enable this mode if you are capturing coverage data for a project that was built using the
libtool mechanism. See also --compat-libtool.

The default value for this setting is 'on'.

hammer
Enable this mode if you are capturing coverage data for a project that was built using a
version of GCC 3.3 that contains a modification (hammer patch) of later GCC versions. You
can identify a modified GCC 3.3 by checking the build directory of your project for files
ending in the extension '.bbg'. Unmodified versions of GCC 3.3 name these files '.bb'.

The default value for this setting is 'auto'.

split_crc
Enable this mode if you are capturing coverage data for a project that was built using a
version of GCC 4.6 that contains a modification (split function checksums) of later GCC
versions. Typical error messages when running geninfo on coverage data produced by such GCC
versions are ´out of memory' and 'reached unexpected end of file'.

The default value for this setting is 'auto'

--compat-libtool
--no-compat-libtool
Specify whether to enable libtool compatibility mode.

Use --compat-libtool to enable libtool compatibility mode or --no-compat-libtool to disable it.
The libtool compatibility mode is enabled by default.

When libtool compatibility mode is enabled, geninfo will assume that the source code relating to a
.da file located in a directory named ".libs" can be found in its parent directory.

If you have directories named ".libs" in your build environment but don't use libtool, disable
this option to prevent problems when capturing coverage data.

--config-file config-file
Specify a configuration file to use.

When this option is specified, neither the system-wide configuration file /etc/lcovrc, nor the
per-user configuration file ~/.lcovrc is read.

This option may be useful when there is a need to run several instances of geninfo with different
configuration file options in parallel.

--derive-func-data
Calculate function coverage data from line coverage data.

Use this option to collect function coverage data, even if the version of the gcov tool installed
on the test system does not provide this data. lcov will instead derive function coverage data
from line coverage data and information about which lines belong to a function.

--external
--no-external
Specify whether to capture coverage data for external source files.

External source files are files which are not located in one of the directories specified by
--directory or --base-directory. Use --external to include external source files while capturing
coverage data or --no-external to ignore this data.

Data for external source files is included by default.

-f
--follow
Follow links when searching .da files.

--gcov-tool tool
Specify the location of the gcov tool.

-h
--help
Print a short help text, then exit.

--ignore-errors errors
Specify a list of errors after which to continue processing.

Use this option to specify a list of one or more classes of errors after which geninfo should
continue processing instead of aborting.

errors can be a comma-separated list of the following keywords:

gcov: the gcov tool returned with a non-zero return code.

source: the source code file for a data set could not be found.

-i
--initial
Capture initial zero coverage data.

Run geninfo with this option on the directories containing .bb, .bbg or .gcno files before running
any test case. The result is a "baseline" coverage data file that contains zero coverage for every
instrumented line and function. Combine this data file (using lcov -a) with coverage data files
captured after a test run to ensure that the percentage of total lines covered is correct even
when not all object code files were loaded during the test.

Note: currently, the --initial option does not generate branch coverage information.

--no-markers
Use this option if you want to get coverage data without regard to exclusion markers in the source
code file.

--no-recursion
Use this option if you want to get coverage data for the specified directory only without
processing subdirectories.

-o output-filename
--output-filename output-filename
Write all data to output-filename.

If you want to have all data written to a single file (for easier handling), use this option to
specify the respective filename. By default, one tracefile will be created for each processed .da
file.

-q
--quiet
Do not print progress messages.

Suppresses all informational progress output. When this switch is enabled, only error or warning
messages are printed.

--rc keyword=value
Override a configuration directive.

Use this option to specify a keyword=value statement which overrides the corresponding
configuration statement in the lcovrc configuration file. You can specify this option more than
once to override multiple configuration statements. See lcovrc(5) for a list of available
keywords and their meaning.

-t testname
--test-name testname
Use test case name testname for resulting data. Valid test case names can consist of letters,
decimal digits and the underscore character ('_').

This proves useful when data from several test cases is merged (i.e. by simply concatenating the
respective tracefiles) in which case a test name can be used to differentiate between data from
each test case.

-v
--version
Print version number, then exit.

FILES

       /etc/lcovrc
              The system-wide configuration file.

       ~/.lcovrc
              The per-user configuration file.

       Following is a quick description of the tracefile format as used by genhtml, geninfo and lcov.

       A tracefile is made up of several human-readable lines of text, divided into sections.  If  available,  a
       tracefile begins with the testname which is stored in the following format:

         TN:<test name>

       For  each  source  file  referenced  in the .da file, there is a section containing filename and coverage
       data:

         SF:<absolute path to the source file>

       Following is a list of line numbers for each function name found in the source file:

         FN:<line number of function start>,<function name>

       Next, there is a list of execution counts for each instrumented function:

         FNDA:<execution count>,<function name>

       This list is followed by two lines containing the number of functions found and hit:

         FNF:<number of functions found>
         FNH:<number of function hit>

       Branch coverage information is stored which one line per branch:

         BRDA:<line number>,<block number>,<branch number>,<taken>

       Block number and branch number are gcc internal IDs for the branch. Taken is  either  '-'  if  the  basic
       block containing the branch was never executed or a number indicating how often that branch was taken.

       Branch coverage summaries are stored in two lines:

         BRF:<number of branches found>
         BRH:<number of branches hit>

       Then  there  is  a  list  of  execution  counts for each instrumented line (i.e. a line which resulted in
       executable code):

         DA:<line number>,<execution count>[,<checksum>]

       Note that there may be an optional checksum present for  each  instrumented  line.  The  current  geninfo
       implementation uses an MD5 hash as checksumming algorithm.

       At  the  end  of a section, there is a summary about how many lines were found and how many were actually
       instrumented:

         LH:<number of lines with a non-zero execution count>
         LF:<number of instrumented lines>

       Each sections ends with:

         end_of_record

       In addition to the main source code file there are sections for all #included files  which  also  contain
       executable code.

       Note  that the absolute path of a source file is generated by interpreting the contents of the respective
       .bb file (see gcov (1) for more information on this file type). Relative filenames are prefixed with  the
       directory in which the .bb file is found.

       Note  also  that  symbolic  links  to  the .bb file will be resolved so that the actual file path is used
       instead of the path to a link. This approach is necessary for the mechanism to work with  the  /proc/gcov
       files.

AUTHOR