Show HN: Anyone interested in a tool helps to explore C++ ASTs

https://uvic-aurora.github.io/acav-manual/index.html
I built this software to help users who need to do static code analysis for C/C++ codebase. This can help you to explore the ASTs interactively. It can replace the Clang ast dump completely and also you can search the code/ASTs in a structual way. For example you can search a function which matches specific name or number of paremeters.

Comments

enoentMay 24, 2026, 6:10 AM
Nice to see another static analysis tool.

It looks like the compilation database is only used for discovering source files, without any additional cross translation unit analysis [1]. Even if you don't plan on implementing data flow tracking or other passes, it can still be interesting to know on which translation unit a function declaration is defined on.

Also, it seems we always have to recompile each unit when switching between source files. Consider pre-compiling and caching so it's only done once. That should also enable users to search across files/ASTs.

[1]: https://clang.llvm.org/docs/analyzer/user-docs/CrossTranslat...

mohamedkoubaaMay 24, 2026, 1:24 AM
Is this based on or otherwise related to kythe?
ranger_dangerMay 26, 2026, 1:46 AM
Nice, you don't see many new Qt projects that use QDockWidget anymore.
leomicvMay 21, 2026, 11:26 PM
This is the repo: https://github.com/uvic-aurora/acav

Feel free to leave a comment if you have any questions. Thanks!

rohanuclaMay 24, 2026, 6:36 AM
[dead]
dundunUpMay 24, 2026, 1:14 AM
[flagged]