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CTAGS(P)		   POSIX Programmer's Manual		      CTAGS(P)

NAME
       ctags - create a tags file (DEVELOPMENT, FORTRAN)

SYNOPSIS
       ctags [-a][-f tagsfile] pathname ...

       ctags -x pathname ...

DESCRIPTION
       The  ctags  utility  shall be provided on systems that support the User
       Portability  Utilities  option,	the  Software  Development   Utilities
       option,	and  either  or	 both  of the C-Language Development Utilities
       option and FORTRAN Development Utilities option. On other  systems,  it
       is optional.

       The ctags utility shall write a tagsfile or an index of objects from C-
       language or FORTRAN source files specified by  the  pathname  operands.
       The  tagsfile  shall  list  the	locators  of language-specific objects
       within the source files.	 A locator consists of a name,	pathname,  and
       either  a search pattern or a line number that can be used in searching
       for the object definition. The objects that  shall  be  recognized  are
       specified in the EXTENDED DESCRIPTION section.

OPTIONS
       The  ctags  utility  shall  conform  to	the Base Definitions volume of
       IEEE Std 1003.1-2001, Section 12.2, Utility Syntax Guidelines.

       The following options shall be supported:

       -a     Append to tagsfile.

       -f  tagsfile
	      Write the object locator lists  into  tagsfile  instead  of  the
	      default file named tags in the current directory.

       -x     Produce a list of object names, the line number, and filename in
	      which each is defined, as well as the text  of  that  line,  and
	      write  this to the standard output. A tagsfile shall not be cre‐
	      ated when -x is specified.

OPERANDS
       The following pathname operands are supported:

       file.c Files with basenames ending with the .c suffix shall be  treated
	      as  C-language  source code. Such files that are not valid input
	      to c99 produce unspecified results.

       file.h Files with basenames ending with the .h suffix shall be  treated
	      as  C-language  source code. Such files that are not valid input
	      to c99 produce unspecified results.

       file.f Files with basenames ending with the .f suffix shall be  treated
	      as  FORTRAN-language  source code. Such files that are not valid
	      input to fort77 produce unspecified results.

       The handling of other files is implementation-defined.

STDIN
       See the INPUT FILES section.

INPUT FILES
       The input files shall be text files containing source code in the  lan‐
       guage indicated by the operand filename suffixes.

ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES
       The  following  environment  variables  shall  affect  the execution of
       ctags:

       LANG   Provide a default value for the  internationalization  variables
	      that  are	 unset	or  null.  (See the Base Definitions volume of
	      IEEE Std 1003.1-2001, Section  8.2,  Internationalization	 Vari‐
	      ables  for the precedence of internationalization variables used
	      to determine the values of locale categories.)

       LC_ALL If set to a non-empty string value, override the values  of  all
	      the other internationalization variables.

       LC_COLLATE

	      Determine the order in which output is sorted for the -x option.
	      The POSIX locale determines the order in which the  tagsfile  is
	      written.

       LC_CTYPE
	      Determine	 the  locale  for  the	interpretation of sequences of
	      bytes of text data as characters (for  example,  single-byte  as
	      opposed  to multi-byte characters in arguments and input files).
	      When processing C-language source code, if  the  locale  is  not
	      compatible  with	the  C locale described by the ISO C standard,
	      the results are unspecified.

       LC_MESSAGES
	      Determine the locale that should be used to  affect  the	format
	      and contents of diagnostic messages written to standard error.

       NLSPATH
	      Determine the location of message catalogs for the processing of
	      LC_MESSAGES .

ASYNCHRONOUS EVENTS
       Default.

STDOUT
       The list of object name information produced by the -x option shall  be
       written to standard output in the following format:

	      "%s %d %s %s", <object-name>, <line-number>, <filename>, <text>

       where <text> is the text of line <line-number> of file <filename>.

STDERR
       The standard error shall be used only for diagnostic messages.

OUTPUT FILES
       When  the  -x  option  is  not specified, the format of the output file
       shall be:

	      "%s\t%s\t/%s/\n", <identifier>, <filename>, <pattern>

       where <pattern> is a search pattern that could be used by an editor  to
       find  the defining instance of <identifier> in <filename> (where defin‐
       ing instance is indicated by the declarations listed  in	 the  EXTENDED
       DESCRIPTION).

       An  optional  circumflex ( '^' ) can be added as a prefix to <pattern>,
       and an optional dollar sign can be appended to  <pattern>  to  indicate
       that  the pattern is anchored to the beginning (end) of a line of text.
       Any slash or backslash characters in <pattern> shall be preceded	 by  a
       backslash  character. The anchoring circumflex, dollar sign, and escap‐
       ing backslash characters shall not be considered	 part  of  the	search
       pattern. All other characters in the search pattern shall be considered
       literal characters.

       An alternative format is:

	      "%s\t%s\t?%s?\n", <identifier>, <filename>, <pattern>

       which is identical to the first format except that slashes in <pattern>
       shall  not  be  preceded by escaping backslash characters, and question
       mark characters in <pattern> shall be preceded by backslash characters.

       A second alternative format is:

	      "%s\t%s\t%d\n", <identifier>, <filename>, <lineno>

       where <lineno> is a decimal line number that could be used by an editor
       to find <identifier> in <filename>.

       Neither	alternative  format shall be produced by ctags when it is used
       as described by IEEE Std 1003.1-2001, but the standard  utilities  that
       process	tags  files  shall be able to process those formats as well as
       the first format.

       In any of these formats, the file shall be sorted by identifier,	 based
       on the collation sequence in the POSIX locale.

EXTENDED DESCRIPTION
       If  the	operand	 identifies C-language source, the ctags utility shall
       attempt to produce an output line for each of the following objects:

	* Function definitions

	* Type definitions

	* Macros with arguments

       It may also produce output for any of the following objects:

	* Function prototypes

	* Structures

	* Unions

	* Global variable definitions

	* Enumeration types

	* Macros without arguments

	* #define statements

	* #line statements

       Any #if and #ifdef statements shall produce no output.  The tag main is
       treated	specially  in  C  programs. The tag formed shall be created by
       prefixing M to the name of the file, with the trailing .c, and  leading
       pathname components (if any) removed.

       On  systems  that  do  not support the C-Language Development Utilities
       option, ctags produces unspecified results for C-language  source  code
       files.  It  should  write  to standard error a message identifying this
       condition and cause a non-zero exit status to be produced.

       If the operand identifies FORTRAN source, the ctags utility shall  pro‐
       duce  an	 output line for each function definition. It may also produce
       output for any of the following objects:

	* Subroutine definitions

	* COMMON statements

	* PARAMETER statements

	* DATA and BLOCK DATA statements

	* Statement numbers

       On systems that	do  not	 support  the  FORTRAN	Development  Utilities
       option,	ctags  produces	 unspecified  results  for FORTRAN source code
       files. It should write to standard error	 a  message  identifying  this
       condition and cause a non-zero exit status to be produced.

       It  is  implementation-defined  what other objects (including duplicate
       identifiers) produce output.

EXIT STATUS
       The following exit values shall be returned:

	0     Successful completion.

       >0     An error occurred.

CONSEQUENCES OF ERRORS
       Default.

       The following sections are informative.

APPLICATION USAGE
       The output with -x is meant to be a simple index that  can  be  written
       out as an off-line readable function index. If the input files to ctags
       (such as .c files) were not created using the same locale  as  that  in
       effect when ctags -x is run, results might not be as expected.

       The description of C-language processing says "attempts to" because the
       C language can be greatly  confused,  especially	 through  the  use  of
       #defines,  and this utility would be of no use if the real C preproces‐
       sor were run to identify them. The output from ctags may be fooled  and
       incorrect for various constructs.

EXAMPLES
       None.

RATIONALE
       The option list was significantly reduced from that provided by histor‐
       ical implementations. The -F option was omitted as redundant, since  it
       is the default. The -B option was omitted as being of very limited use‐
       fulness. The -t option was omitted since the recognition of typedefs is
       now  required for C source files. The -u option was omitted because the
       update function was judged to be not only inefficient, but also	rarely
       needed.

       An early proposal included a -w option to suppress warning diagnostics.
       Since the types of such diagnostics could not be described, the	option
       was omitted as being not useful.

       The  text  for  LC_CTYPE about compatibility with the C locale acknowl‐
       edges that the ISO C standard imposes requirements on the  locale  used
       to  process  C source. This could easily be a superset of that known as
       "the C locale" by way of implementation extensions, or  one  of	a  few
       alternative  locales  for  systems  supporting  different  codesets. No
       statement is made for FORTRAN because the ANSI X3.9-1978 standard (FOR‐
       TRAN  77)  does	not  (yet) define a similar locale concept. However, a
       general rule in this volume of IEEE Std 1003.1-2001 is  that  any  time
       that locales do not match (preparing a file for one locale and process‐
       ing it in another), the results are suspect.

       The collation sequence of the tags file is not affected	by  LC_COLLATE
       because it is typically not used by human readers, but only by programs
       such as vi to locate the tag within the source files. Using  the	 POSIX
       locale  eliminates some of the problems of coordinating locales between
       the ctags file creator and the vi file reader.

       Historically, the tags file has been used only by ex and vi.   However,
       the  format of the tags file has been published to encourage other pro‐
       grams to use the tags in new ways. The format allows either patterns or
       line  numbers  to find the identifiers because the historical vi recog‐
       nizes either. The ctags utility does not produce the format using  line
       numbers because it is not useful following any source file changes that
       add or delete lines. The documented search  patterns  match  historical
       practice.  It should be noted that literal leading circumflex or trail‐
       ing dollar-sign characters in the search pattern will only behave  cor‐
       rectly  if  anchored to the beginning of the line or end of the line by
       an additional circumflex or dollar-sign character.

       Historical implementations also understand the objects used by the lan‐
       guages Pascal and sometimes LISP, and they understand the C source out‐
       put by lex and yacc. The ctags utility is not required  to  accommodate
       these languages, although implementors are encouraged to do so.

       The  following  historical  option  was not specified, as vgrind is not
       included in this volume of IEEE Std 1003.1-2001:

       -v     If the -v flag is given, an index of the form expected by vgrind
	      is  produced  on	the standard output. This listing contains the
	      function name,  filename,	 and  page  number  (assuming  64-line
	      pages).  Since the output is sorted into lexicographic order, it
	      may be desired to run the output through sort -f.	 Sample use:

	      ctags -v files | sort -f > index vgrind -x index

       The special treatment of the tag main makes the use of ctags  practical
       in directories with more than one program.

FUTURE DIRECTIONS
       None.

SEE ALSO
       c99 , fort77 , vi

COPYRIGHT
       Portions	 of  this text are reprinted and reproduced in electronic form
       from IEEE Std 1003.1, 2003 Edition, Standard for Information Technology
       --  Portable  Operating	System	Interface (POSIX), The Open Group Base
       Specifications Issue 6, Copyright (C) 2001-2003	by  the	 Institute  of
       Electrical  and	Electronics  Engineers, Inc and The Open Group. In the
       event of any discrepancy between this version and the original IEEE and
       The  Open Group Standard, the original IEEE and The Open Group Standard
       is the referee document. The original Standard can be  obtained	online
       at http://www.opengroup.org/unix/online.html .

IEEE/The Open Group		     2003			      CTAGS(P)
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