CScout: The C Refactoring Browser

CScout: The C Refactoring Browser

CScout is a source code analyzer and refactoring browser forcollections of C programs.It can process workspaces of multiple projects (we define a projectas a collection of C source files that are linked together)mapping the complexity introducedby the C preprocessor back into the original C source code files. CScout takes advantage of modern hardware advances (fast processorsand large memory capacities) to analyze C source code beyond the levelof detail and accuracy provided by current compilers, linkers, andother source code analyzers.The analysis CScout performs takes into account the identifier scopesintroduced by the C preprocessor and the C language proper scopes andnamespaces.After the source code analysis CScout can

• perform accurate cross project identifier renames,
• process sophisticated queries on identifiers, files, and functions,
• locate unused or wrongly-scoped identifiers,
• identify header files that don't need to be included, and
• create call graphs spanning both C functions and function-like macros.

CScout has already been applied on projects ranging fromtens of thousands of lines,like the Apache web server, to millions oflines, like the Linux, the FreeBSD, and the Windows Research kernels.With CScout you can make your hardware really work for its money.For example, processing the 2.6.11 Linux kernel (4.2 million lines of code)requires 4052MB of RAM and 4.7 hours of processing on adual-CPU 2.2MHz AMD Opteron computer.After the processing CScout holds details on 1.1 million identifiers and 89 thousandfunctions and function-like macros.
Read more ..., walkthrough( CScout documentation).

The licenseof the free unsupported CScout version allows youto freely use CScout on open source software code.A different CScout version is available under asupport contract for use on proprietary software.

CScout runs and has been tested under Linux, Microsoft Windows, Apple Mac OS X, FreeBSD, and Sun Solaris,under several processor architectures.