ABILINT(1)

NAME
abilint - validate an abigail ABI representation

abilint parses the native XML representation of an ABI as emitted by abidw <>. Once it has parsed the XML representation of the ABI, abilint builds and in-memory model from it. It then tries to save it back to an XML form, to standard output. If that read-write operation succeeds chances are the input XML ABI representation is meaningful.

Note that the main intent of this tool to help debugging issues in the underlying Libabigail library.

Note also that abilint can also read an ELF <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Executable_and_Linkable_Format> input file, build the in-memory model for its ABI, and serialize that model back into XML to standard output. In that case, the ELF <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Executable_and_Linkable_Format> input file must be accompanied with its debug information in the DWARF <http://www.dwarfstd.org> format.

INVOCATION

            abilint [options] [<abi-file1>]

OPTIONS

            •   --annotate

                Annotate the ABIXML output with comments above most elements. The comments are made of the pretty-printed form of types, declaration or even ELF symbols. The purpose is to make the ABIXML output more human-readable for debugging or documenting purposes.

            •   --ctf

                Extract ABI information from CTF debug information, if present in the given object.

            •   --debug-info-dir <path>

                When reading an ELF <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Executable_and_Linkable_Format> input file which debug information is split out into a separate file, this options tells abilint where to find that separate debug information file.

                Note that path must point to the root directory under which the debug information is arranged in a tree-like manner. Under Red Hat based systems, that directory is usually <root>/usr/lib/debug.

                Note also that this option is not mandatory for split debug information installed by your system’s package manager because then abidiff knows where to find it.

            •   --diff

                For XML inputs, perform a text diff between the input and the memory model saved back to disk. This can help to spot issues in the handling of the XML format by the underlying Libabigail library.

            •   --header-file | --hf <header-file-path>

                Specifies where to find one of the public headers of the abi file that the tool has to consider. The tool will thus filter out types that are not defined in public headers.

            •   --headers-dir | --hd <headers-directory-path-1>

                Specifies where to find the public headers of the first shared library that the tool has to consider. The tool will thus filter out types that are not defined in public headers.

            •   --help

                Display a short help message and exits.

            •   --noout

                Do not display anything on standard output. The return code of the command is the only way to know if the command succeeded.

            •   --suppressions | suppr <path-to-suppression-specifications-file>

                Use a suppression specification <#suppr-spec-label> file located at path-to-suppression-specifications-file. Note that this option can appear multiple times on the command line. In that case, all of the provided suppression specification files are taken into account. ABI artifacts matched by the suppression specifications are suppressed from the output of this tool.

            •   --stdin | --

                Read the input content from standard input.

            •   --tu

                Expect the input XML to represent a single translation unit.

            •   –verbose

                Shows verbose messages about internal stuff. This is used to debug the tool and its underlying library.

            •   –version | -v

                Display the version of the program and exit.

Author
Dodji Seketeli

Copyright
2014-2025, Red Hat, Inc.