Task: Find Warnings That Match Specific Criteria

Search functionality can always be accessed through the search widget that appears on every page in the CodeSonar GUI. The following annotated screenshot fragment shows the different parts of the search widget.

What do you want to do?

All of these methods will list the matching warnings on a Warning Search Result Page.

Full-Text Search

This is the simplest way to search for warnings. Given one or more strings, the CodeSonar full-text search will list all warnings whose reports contain the string or strings, regardless of where in the report they occur.

General Method

1. Make sure the domain/scope menu selection specifies that you are searching for warnings. If not, make a new selection.
   • Searches for warnings in last analyses and warnings in all projects are always possible.
   • If you are currently viewing information about a particular analysis, you will have the additional option of searching for warnings in this analysis.
2. Type your search term(s) into the search field.
3. Click Search.
4. Choose a Visible Warnings setting to apply to the search results, if appropriate.

Full-Text Search Example 1: Find Warning With Instance ID 365

So long as there is a warning with Instance ID 365, this is the most straightforward method for finding it.

1. Select warnings in all projects from the domain/scope menu.
2. Type 365 into the search field.
3. Click Search.
4. Select all from the Visible Warnings selector to see all instances.

Note that this search will also find any other warnings that contain the string "365", such as

• any warnings that occur on line 365 of some source file
• any warnings whose comments include string "365"

Full-Text Search Example 2: Find Null Pointer Dereference Warnings in the Most Recent Analyses of All Projects

1. Select warnings in last analyses from the domain/scope menu.
2. Type Null Pointer Dereference into the search field.
3. Click Search.
4. Select all from the Visible Warnings selector to see all instances.

Note that this search will also find any other warnings that contain all of the strings "Null", "Pointer" and "Dereference" together or separately but are not themselves Null Pointer Dereference warnings. For example, if a user had added the comment "Fix null pointer dereferences before fixing this" to the report for a Unused Code warning, that warning will be found. There are two ways to address this.

• To group all the Null Pointer Dereferences together in the Search Results page, click on the Class heading in the results table to get a table menu, then select Sort Ascending or Sort Descending from the menu to sort the table by warning class.
• If the additional warnings are not wanted at all, use an advanced or search-language search to specify the search criteria more precisely.

Advanced Search for Warnings

The CodeSonar advanced search allows you to specify searches more precisely than full-text search. It is useful when the search criteria are complex and when full-text search would match a broader set of warnings than is actually desired.

General Method

1. Click the Advanced Search link in the search widget.
2. Make sure the Warnings tab is selected.
3. Enter your desired search criteria into the relevant field or fields on the Advanced Search page.
4. Click Search Warnings.

Advanced Search Example 1: Find Warning With Instance ID 365

This process is slightly more involved than that for finding warning 365 with full-text search, but has the advantage of only finding warnings whose Instance ID is "365", and not ones where "365" occurs only in some other field.

1. Go to the Advanced Search page.
2. Make sure the Warnings tab is selected.
3. Type .365 into the ID field (in the Details section). The dot at the beginning indicates that you want to match Instance IDs only - not Group IDs.
4. Click Search Warnings.

This search will find the warning with Instance ID 365 (if any).

Advanced Search Example 2: Find Null Pointer Dereference Warnings in the Most Recent Analyses of All Projects

This search will find only Null Pointer Dereference warnings.

1. Go to the Advanced Search page.
2. Enter Null Pointer Dereference in the Class field (in the Details section).
3. Select all projects, most recent analyses from the scope menu at the top of the Warnings tab.
4. Click Search Warnings.

Search Language Search

The search language search combines the precision of the advanced search with the simple interface of the full-text search.

General Method

1. Choose an appropriate setting in the domain/scope menu (the scope should be warnings).
2. Choose a Visible Warnings filter to apply to the results of your search, if desired.
3. Determine a suitable warning search language expression for your search.
4. Type your search language expression into the search field that is present at the top of every CodeSonar GUI page.
5. Click Search.

Search Language Example 1: Find Warning with Instance ID 365

This search will find the warning with Instance ID 365 (provided it exists), and only that warning.

1. Select warnings in all projects from the domain/scope menu.
2. Type iid:365 into the search field.
3. Click Search.
4. Select all from the Visible Warnings selector to see all instances.

Search Language Example 2: Find Null Pointer Dereference Warnings in the Most Recent Analyses of All Projects

This search has exactly the same results as the advanced search version but has the advantage that it can be executed from any screen in the CodeSonar GUI.

1. Select warnings in last analyses from the domain/scope menu.
2. Type class:"null pointer dereference" into the search field.
3. Click Search.
4. Select all from the Visible Warnings selector to see all instances.

Links

Related tasks

• Sort a warning table
• Show full file paths in a warning table
• Refine a search
• Save a named search
• Show all warnings on the hub
• View a warning report

Using CodeSonar

• Typical CodeSonar Tasks
• CodeSonar GUI Reference