hypersrc - a freeware source code browser

Mirror: http://www.home.earthlink.net/~jebrooks1/hypersrc/

Screenshot #1 Screenshot #2 (old)

Version 5.3.12 (2003/10/01)

MD5:
1ae9a71dc06008525c29ded0a9615119  hypersrc-5.3.12.tar.gz
437b7bb3e4c410f8438002ae05f80b7a  hypersrc-5.3.12-1.i386.rpm
d2b8eb0f1c609c7b507eba053870b507  hypersrc-5.3.11.tar.gz
ebb5e0ff2c43bf80a9a1bb677efcd25e  hypersrc-5.3.11-1.i386.rpm
cc9098f5c951b48d7260f4c0f94d23c4  hypersrc-5.3.10.tar.gz
5e1a8368d9849f57749c2e80d0f2314a  hypersrc-5.3.10-1.i386.rpm

About hypersrc

hypersrc is a freeware (GNU GPL) GUI program for browsing source code.
It displays a list of sorted source code tags and a tree view of functions.
You can click a tag to hyperlink to its line in a source code file.
hypersrc uses Exuberant ctags which supports 33 programming languages
though hypersrc additionally supports FORTH and M4.
hypersrc is released under the terms of the GNU Public License (GPL)

What hypersrc requires

All Linux and FreeBSD distros made in 2000 or later should satisfy these requirements.

• A UNIX system with GNU development tools, GTK+ 1.2.6 (or newer), and GNOME.

hypersrc works on Linux and FreeBSD. It is developed and tested on:

• Red Hat 6.0, 7.2, 8.0
• Mandrake 8.1
• Debian 3.0 (woody)
• FreeBSD 4.6.2

• "Exuberant ctags" 3.2 (or newer) by Darren Hiebert.

You probably already have it.
The ctags package provided by recent Linux distributions is actually Exuberant ctags.
Old Linux distributions only provided GNU ctags which lacks required functionality.
Link to Exuberant ctags webpage (src/RPM)
Link to www.rpmfind.net
Download Exuberant ctags from my site

To install from source code

tar xvfz hypersrc*tar.gz
cd hypersrc
./configure.sh
make install

Speeding hypersrc

If you want the program to be faster (and forfeit extra stability checks),
download the source and type:
make speed; make install

To speed startup and reduce memory consumption (but forfeit tree views), use:
Hypersrc.pl -no-functree.

Known problems/issues

• hypersrc quits silently while trying to jump to a tag.

Upgrade to GTK+ 1.2.8 if you are using an older version.
GTK+ 1.2.3 definitely has a bug which hypersrc encounters.
Other old versions might have this bug also.

If this problem still persists, as a last resort, try deselecting the preference:
"Misc / process GTK+ events while busy".
However, be advised the program won't redraw itself while it is busy.

• Sometimes, pressing Enter in a find dialog triggers two searches.

Keyboard rate too fast?

• Sometimes, parser fails to recognize some function calls/blocks, resulting in an empty tree view.

• Cases of mistaken-identity appearing in the "called by" tree:

• Caller really calls a function in another module.

• All functions with the same name as a caller will be shown as other callers, even if some don't really call this function.

Unfortunately, such mistaken-identity problems are inherent in a source code browser, because of the unavailability of compile-time info.

• Rarely, the scrollbar beside a tree will stop working if the tree tries to show too many nodes/leafs.

• To browse everything in a humongous source tree, such as the Linux 2.4 kernel,
  hypersrc takes a long time to start and lots of memory.

Yes.

Try: Hypersrc.pl -no-functree

• Some versions of SunOS or Solaris can't compile or run hypersrc.

Sorry, I can't fix this since I don't have access to SunOS/Solaris.

Trouble-shooting

First, compile hypersrc with GDB support, pedantic checking, and verbose warnings:
make debug; make install

Then, run hypersrc under gdb:
Hypersrc.pl -gdb

Bug reports

You are welcome to email bug reports to: (write "hypersrc" in subject to avoid spam-filter)
hypersrc -AT- sabalsoftware -DOT- com
But please don't send email about suggestions nor if hypersrc fails to compile/run
on any OS other than Linux or FreeBSD (they are the only UNIXs I have access to).
If you have a patch to make hypersrc compile/run on another OS then please do send email.

© 2003 Jim Brooks