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Diagram filters

Diagram filters are at the core of generating diagrams with clang-uml, as they allow to fine tune the scope of each diagram, and thus provide you with a several small, but readable diagrams instead of a single huge diagram that cannot be effectively browsed, printed or included in an online documentation of your project.

Filters can be specified separate for each diagram, and they can be added as either include or exclude filters, depending on which is more appropriate for a given diagram.

For instance to include only C++ entities from a namespace ns1::ns2 but not ns1::ns2::detail add the following to your diagram configuration:

  include:
    namespaces:
      - ns1::ns2
  exclude:
    namespaces:
      - ns1::ns2::detail

Some filters accept either specified exact values, some support regular expressions while some accept glob patterns.

For filters which accept regular expressions, the regular expression has to be provided as a map r: 'pattern' due to the fact the pointer (*) otherwise would have to be escaped in situations such as mycontainer<char*>, so for instance to specify that the diagram should exclude all classes containing the word test simply add the following filter:

exclude:
  elements:
    - r: '.*test.*'

The following table specifies the values allowed in each filter:

Filter name Possible values Example values
namespaces Qualified name or regex ns1::ns2::ClassA, r: '.*detail.*'
modules Qualified name or regex mod1.mod2:par1, r: '.*impl.*'
elements Qualified name or regex ns1::ns2::ClassA, r: '.*detail.*'
element_types Types of diagram elements class, enum, concept
paths File or dir path src/dir1, src/dir2/a.cpp, src/dir3/*.cpp
context Qualified name or regex ns1::ns2::ClassA, r: 'ns1::ns2::ClassA.+'
relationships Type of relationship inheritance, composition, aggregation, ownership, association, instantiation, friendship, dependency
subclasses Qualified name or regex ns1::ns2::ClassA, r: 'ns1::ns2::ClassA.+'
parents Qualified name or regex ns1::ns2::ClassA, r: 'ns1::ns2::ClassA.+'
specializations Qualified name or regex ns1::ns2::ClassA, r: 'ns1::ns2::ClassA.+'
access Method or member access scope public, protected, private
module_access Module access scope public, private
method_types Type of class method constructor, destructor, assignment, operator, defaulted, deleted, static
dependants Qualified name or regex ns1::ns2::ClassA, r: 'ns1::ns2::ClassA.+'
dependencies Qualified name or regex ns1::ns2::ClassA, r: 'ns1::ns2::ClassA.+'
callee_types Callee types in sequence diagrams constructor, assignment, operator, defaulted, static, method, function, function_template, lambda
anyof Match any of the nested filters Logical operator, which returns true if any of its nested filters match (requires filter_mode: advanced option)
allof Match all of the nested filters Logical operator, which returns true if all of its nested filters match (requires filter_mode: advanced option)

The following filters are available:

namespaces

Allows to include or exclude entities from specific namespaces.

  include:
    namespaces:
      - ns1::ns2
  exclude:
    namespaces:
      - ns1::ns2::detail

modules

Allows to include or exclude entities from specific C++20 module.

  include:
    modules:
      - mod1.mod2
  exclude:
    modules:
      - r: ".*impl.*"

elements

Allows to directly include or exclude specific entities from the diagrams, for instance to exclude a specific class from an included namespace:

  include:
    namespaces:
      - ns1::ns2
  exclude:
    elements:
      - ns1::ns2::MyClass

element_types

Allows to include or exclude elements of specific type from the diagram, for instance to remove all enums from a diagram add the following:

  exclude:
    element_types:
      - enum

paths

This filter allows to include or exclude from the diagram elements declared in specific files.

diagrams:
  t00061_class:
    type: class
    glob: 
      - t00061.cc
    include:
      paths:
        - include/t00061_a.h
    using_namespace:
      - clanguml::t00061

Currently, this filter does not allow any globbing or wildcards, however paths to directories can be specified.

context

This filter allows to limit the diagram elements only to classes which are in direct relationship (of any kind) with the specified class, enum or concept:

  include:
    context:
      - ns1::ns2::MyClass

context radius

By default, the filter will only include or exclude items in direct relationship (radius 1). It is however possible to define the context filter and provide a custom radius:

  include:
    context:
      - match:
          radius: 3
          pattern: ns1::ns2::MyClass
      - match:
          radius: 2
          pattern: ns1::ns2::MyOtherClass

Please note that you can specify multiple context filters in a single diagram with different radius. Radius set to 0 will match only the given element.

context direction

Sometimes we may be interested only in relationships pointing outward from a specific element, or inward. For instance we may want to see which elements depend through any relationship on a specified element. For this purpose the context filter has a direction option, which can have one of 3 values:

  • any (default)
  • inward - only relationships pointing toward the specified class are considered in calculating the context
  • outward - only relationships pointing toward the specified class are considered in calculating the context

For example, the following filter:

      context:
        - match:
            radius: 2
            pattern: clanguml::t00076::B
            direction: inward

will include all elements related to class B through relationships pointing toward B within a radius of maximum 2 relationships (see test case t00076).

context relationships

Another way to customize the context of a specified element is to declare which relationships should be considered when calculating the elements' context.

For example, the following filter:

      context:
        - match:
            radius: 1
            pattern: clanguml::t00078::A
            relationships:
              - inheritance
              - aggregation

will only include elements related to class A through inheritance or aggregation relationship (see test case t00076).

relationships

This filter allows to include or exclude specific types of relationships from the diagram, for instance to only include inheritance and template specialization/instantiation relationships add the following to the diagram:

  include:
    relationships:
      - inheritance
      - instantiation

The following relationships can be used in this filter:

  • inheritance
  • composition
  • aggregation
  • ownership
  • association
  • instantiation
  • friendship
  • dependency

subclasses

This filter allows to include or exclude all subclasses of a given class in the diagram.

parents

This filter allows to include or exclude all parents (base classes) of a given class in the diagram.

specializations

This filter allows to include or exclude specializations and instantiations of a specific template from the diagram.

access

This filter allows to include or exclude class methods and members based on their access scope, allowed values are:

  • public
  • protected
  • private

module_access

This filter allows to include or exclude diagram elements based on the module in which they are declared, allowed values are:

  • public
  • private

method_types

This filter allows to include or exclude various method types from the class diagram, allowed values are:

  • constructor
  • destructor
  • assignment
  • operator
  • defaulted
  • deleted
  • static

This filter is independent of the access filter, which controls which methods are included based on access scope (e.g. public).

callee_types

This filter is specific for sequence diagrams and allows to control, which types of callees should be included/excluded from the diagram. In a sequence diagram, a callee is the receiver of a message, and this filter specifies which types of receivers should match.

The following callee types are supported:

  • constructor
  • assignment
  • operator
  • defaulted
  • static
  • method
  • function
  • function_template
  • lambda
  • cuda_kernel
  • cuda_device

dependants and dependencies

These filters allow to specify that only dependants or dependencies of a given class should be included in the diagram. This can be useful for analyzing what classes in your project depend on some other class, which could have impact for instance on refactoring.

For instance the following code:

namespace dependants {
struct A {
};

struct B {
    void b(A *a) { }
};

struct BB {
    void bb(A *a) { }
};

struct C {
    void c(B *b) { }
};

struct D {
    void d(C *c) { }
    void dd(BB *bb) { }
};

struct E {
    void e(D *d) { }
};

struct F {
};
} // namespace dependants

namespace dependencies {

struct G {
};

struct GG {
};

struct H {
    void h(G *g) { }
    void hh(GG *gg) { }
};

struct HH {
    void hh(G *g) { }
};

struct I {
    void i(H *h) { }
};

struct J {
    void i(I *i) { }
};

and the following filter:

    include:
      dependants:
        - clanguml::t00043::dependants::A
      dependencies:
        - clanguml::t00043::dependencies::J
      relationships:
        - dependency

results in the following diagram:

t00043_class

anyof

Requires setting filter_mode: advanced in diagram config

This filter is in fact a logical operator, which allows to gain more control over how the specific diagram filters are combined. Consider for instance a case where you want to include all elements from a specific namespace, as well as some other elements from another namespace. With basic filter this is not possible, as the namespaces filter will only allow elements from the namespaces lister. However when using anyof it's possible to specify them as an alternative, i.e. any element matching any of the anyof subfilters will be included. For example:

    include:
      anyof:
        subclasses:
          - ns1::nsA::A1
        namespaces:
          - ns2::nsB
        context:
          - ns3::nsC::B3

will include all subclasses of ns1::nsA::A1, all elements in the ns2::nsB namespace as well as all elements in the context of element ns3::nsC::B3.

For more examples of this checkout test cases t00082 and t00083.

allof

Requires setting filter_mode: advanced in diagram config

This filter logical operator is complementary to the anyof. It matches all diagram elements, which match all of it's subfilters. For instance the following filter:

    include:
      allof:
        namespaces:
          - clanguml
          - std
        context:
          - match:
              radius: 2
              pattern: clanguml::A

which will include all elements that are in the context of element clanguml::A not farther than 2 relationships away and also they belong to either clanguml or std namespace.