CLANG-QUERY(1)

✨ NAME ✨

clang-query — bestie, it's literally a manual page for clang-query 14 🦋

---

💖 DESCRIPTION 💖

okay so the whole vibe of this tool, first thing you gotta know:

USAGE: clang-query [options] <source0> [... <sourceN>]

and then, the OPTIONS:

---

🌸 OPTIONS 🌸

🎀 Generic Options 🎀

these ones are the universal, everyone-gets-them options, no cap:

• --help — shows you all the available options (and if you want the secret extra ones, hit --help-hidden instead) 👀
• --help-list — prints out a list of the available options (same deal: --help-list-hidden for the hidden crowd) 📋
• --version — tells you what version of this program you're running ✨

💅 clang-query options 💅

the ones that are actually about clang-query, periodt:

• -c=<command> — say which command you want it to run
• --extra-arg=<string> — an extra argument to tack onto the end of the compiler command line
• --extra-arg-before=<string> — an extra argument to tack onto the front of the compiler command line
• -f=<file> — read your commands from a file
• -p=<string> — the build path
• --preload=<file> — preload commands from a file, then drop straight into interactive mode 🫶
• --use-color — use colors in the detailed AST output. If this isn't set, colors get used anyway if the terminal connected to standard output supports colors 🌈

---

🛠️ so about -p <build-path> 🛠️

-p <build-path> is how you read a compile command database. it's giving "here's where my build lives, go look" energy.

fr fr, for example: it can be a CMake build directory that has a file named compile_commands.json sitting in it (you get that output by using the -DCMAKE_EXPORT_COMPILE_COMMANDS=ON CMake option). And when no build path is specified at all? it goes on a little scavenger hunt for compile_commands.json through all the parent paths of the first input file. 🔍

want an example of setting up Clang Tooling on a source tree? it's right here, bestie:

https://clang.llvm.org/docs/HowToSetupToolingForLLVM.html

---

📂 <source0> ... — the source files 📂

<source0> ... is where you specify the paths of your source files.

those paths get looked up in the compile command database, and here's the tea:

• if the path of a file is absolute, it needs to point into CMake's source tree.
• if the path is relative, the current working directory needs to be in the CMake source tree, and the file must be in a subdirectory of the current working directory.
• any "./" prefixes in the relative files get automatically removed 🧹 — but the rest of a relative path has to be a suffix of a path in the compile command database.

lowkey important, highkey a vibe check for your paths — get this wrong and nothing resolves, bestie 😭

---

and that's the whole page, you ate it 💖

this was clang-query 14, from May 2025 — go forth and query, icon 👑✨