This file describes the structure and the contents of the ASIS-for-GNAT
distribution and explains how to install ASIS-for-GNAT.
ASIS-for-GNAT Installation Guide
=================================
Contents
1. Structure of the ASIS-for-GNAT Distribution
2. Coordination between ASIS-for-GNAT and GNAT Versions
3. Building and installing ASIS-for-GNAT
4. ASIS application examples
5. Related information
===========================================================================
1. Structure of the ASIS-for-GNAT Distribution
-------------------------------------------
ASIS-for-GNAT is distributed as a set of text files in ASCII format with
UNIX-style line breaks. It includes all the sources of the ASIS-for-GNAT
components.
The ASIS-for-GNAT distribution is packaged as a UNIX tape archive file
named asis-[version#]-src.tgz where [version#] is the number of the GNAT version
for which ASIS-for-GNAT is distributed, for example asis-7.1.1-src.tgz.
When you extract the content of this archive, you obtain the following
directory structure:
asis-[version#]-src <-- the top of the ASIS source distribution hierarchy
/asis <-- the sources of the ASIS implementation components
/gnat <--- sources of the GNAT compiler needed by ASIS
/lib <-- the directory to place the ASIS library into
/obj <-- the directory to be used for object and ALI files when
installing ASIS. Originally it contains only the
Makefile and the file install_asis.adb containing the
source of a dummy Ada unit.
/doc <-- the directory containing the ASIS-for-GNAT
documentation
/tools <-- ASIS-based tools
/asistant <-- an interactive interpreter of ASIS queries and ASIS tree
browser
/gnatcheck <-- a tool which checks its argument sources against a
given set of code style rules
/gnatelim <-- a tool which analyzes a full Ada program and detects
subprograms which are declared, but which are never
called in this program
/gnatmetric <-- a tool which counts various metrics for its argument
sources
/gnatpp <-- a pretty-printing tool
/gnatstub <-- a tool which can create an "empty", but compilable
body for an library unit declaration.
/gnattest <-- a tool which can create a test infrastructure for the
test suites based on AUNIT testing framework.
/gnat2xml <-- a tool that translates Ada source code into XML
/tool_utils <-- an ASIS Utility Library, it contains various resources
that can be useful for ASIS application development,
some of these resources are used for the ASIS tools
listed above
/tutorial <-- Hands-On ASIS tutorials
/templates <-- A set of Ada source components which may be used for fast
development of simple ASIS-based tools or which can be reused
in the code of ASIS applications
2. Coordination between ASIS-for-GNAT and GNAT Versions
----------------------------------------------------
The implementation of ASIS is always based on some persistent data structure
produced by the underlying Ada compiler. ASIS-for-GNAT uses the tree output
files produced by GNAT, and it incorporates some compiler components to work
with these tree files.
Each distribution of ASIS-for-GNAT corresponds to a specific version of GNAT.
The version number is a part of the name of the archive file of the
ASIS-for-GNAT distribution, as well as the name of the top catalog of the
directory structure you will get when you unpack the archive.
To use a given distribution of ASIS-for-GNAT, you must have the proper version
of GNAT installed on your system. Make sure that when you update
ASIS-for-GNAT, you also update GNAT accordingly, and vice versa.
To check that your GNAT/ASIS configuration is consistent, do the following:
- Get the version number and the build date for the GNAT compiler installed in
your environment. To do this, run the gnatls tool with -v option
$ gnatls -v
The first line of the output produced in stdout will start with:
GNATLS <compiler_version> (<date[-<backend suffix>]>)
e.g. GNATLS Pro 7.1.1 (20130109-47)
- Compare this to the version and the build date embedded in the name of
the ASIS source distribution.
If the version numbers in the <compiler-version> parts and dates are exactly
the same, your configuration is consistent.
3. Building and installing ASIS-for-GNAT
-------------------------------------
After unpacking the ASIS-for-GNAT archive, go to the resulting
asis-[version#]-src directory.
3.1 Installing under Unix systems
-----------------------------
If you are under a Unix system (e.g. GNU/Linux, Solaris), or
under Windows with cygwin or msys environment, use:
make all install prefix=<install_dir>
This will create the required Ada sources from the templates present in
the gnat subdirectory, build and install the ASIS library in the
specified location. <install_dir> is the root directory of your GNAT
installation (this is the recommended way to install ASIS).
If you run in the root directory of the ASIS source distribution
asis-[version#]-src:
make install-asistant prefix=<install_dir>
this installs the ASIS interactive interpreter asistant (see
the ASIS User's guide for more details).
Then in order to be able to build your own ASIS tools with the project
files, add:
with "asis";
to a project file used by your ASIS application.
3.2 Installing under Windows
------------------------
If you do not have a possibility to use the 'make' utility, the process of
ASIS installation requires a few more steps.
First, you have to create two needed GNAT sources from the templates. In the
root directory of the ASIS source distribution asis-[version#]-src do:
cd gnat
gprbuild -p -XBLD=prod snames.gpr
xsnamest.exe
move snames.ns snames.ads
move snames.nb snames.adb
cd ..
Now you can build ASIS. The recommended way is:
gprbuild -p -j0 -XBLD=prod -vl -XASIS_COMPONENTS=lib build_asis.gpr
The recommended way to install ASIS is:
gprinstall -p -f --prefix=<install_dir> --sources-subdir=include/asis --lib-subdir=lib/asis --project-subdir=lib/gnat -XBLD=prod -XASIS_COMPONENTS=lib build_asis.gpr
These steps build and install ASIS and asistant tool.
Then in order to be able to build your own ASIS tools with the project
files, add:
with "asis";
to a project file used by your ASIS application.
You can build the ASIS tools executables. To build an
ASIS tool, go into the corresponding tool sources directory
tools\<toolname> and do:
gprbuild -j0 -P<toolname>
This creates the executable for <toolname> in the tools\<toolname>
directory.
4. ASIS application examples
-------------------------
The ASIS-for-GNAT does not contain any special directory with ASIS application
examples. Instead, you may consider the directories with ASIS tools included
in the distribution as examples of real-life ASIS applications. Note that the
corresponding tool project files can be used as templates for creating project
files for your own ASIS application. A good starting point as a full-size ASIS
application example is the gnatstub tool.
The solutions provided for the ASIS tutorial (asis-[version#]-src/tutorial)
can be viewed as simple (introductory) ASIS application examples. The directory
asis-[version#]-src/tutorial/using_templates/metrics contains a simple
solution for the metric tool development problem (the full-size solution is
given in asis-[version#]-src/tools/gnatmetric), the directory
asis-[version#]-src/tutorial/using_templates/style_checker provides a simple
solution for the style checking tool problem (the full-size solution is given
in asis-[version#]-src/tools/gnatcheck).
5. Related information
-------------------
For more information about ASIS-for-GNAT see the following documents:
- The ASIS-for-GNAT User's Guide explains how to build tools with
ASIS-for-GNAT and describes how to create and maintain an ASIS Context
to be used with ASIS-for-GNAT, as well as other efficiency issues. It
also contains a general introduction to ASIS 95.
- The ASIS-for-GNAT Reference Manual describes in full the implementation
choices taken on all ASIS implementation-specific issues, and lists the
current implementation limitations.