C/C++ Linter Action _{^{| clang-format & clang-tidy}}¶

GitHub release (latest SemVer)

A Github Action for linting C/C++ code integrating clang-tidy and clang-format to collect feedback provided in the form of file-annotations, thread-comments, workflow step-summary, and Pull Request reviews (with tidy-review or format-review).

Usage¶

Create a new GitHub Actions workflow in your project, e.g. at .github/workflows/cpp-linter.yml

The content of the file should be in the following format.

    steps:
      - uses: actions/checkout@v5
      - uses: cpp-linter/cpp-linter-action@v2
        id: linter
        env:
          GITHUB_TOKEN: ${{ secrets.GITHUB_TOKEN }}
        with:
          style: 'file'  # Use .clang-format config file
          tidy-checks: '' # Use .clang-tidy config file
          # only 'update' a single comment in a pull request thread.
          thread-comments: ${{ github.event_name == 'pull_request' && 'update' }}
      - name: Fail fast?!
        if: steps.linter.outputs.checks-failed > 0
        run: exit 1

For all explanations of our available input parameters and output variables, see our Inputs and Outputs document.

Used By¶

Microsoft Apache NASA Samsung TheAlgorithms CachyOS
Nextcloud Jupyter NNStreamer imgproxy Zondax AppNeta
Chocolate Doom and many more.

Example¶

Annotations¶

Using --file-annotations:

clang-format annotations¶

format-annotation-dark format-annotation-light

clang-tidy annotations¶

tidy-annotation-dark tidy-annotation-light

Thread Comment¶

Using --thread-comments:

thread-comment-dark thread-comment-light

Expanded

thread-comment-expanded-dark thread-comment-expanded-light

Step Summary¶

Using --step-summary:

step-summary-dark step-summary-light

Pull Request Review¶

review-summary-dark review-summary-light

clang-tidy suggestion¶

Using --tidy-review:

tidy-review-dark tidy-review-light

clang-format suggestion¶

Using --format-review:

format-review-dark format-review-light

Add C/C++ Linter Action badge in README¶

You can show C/C++ Linter Action status with a badge in your repository README

Example

[![cpp-linter](https://github.com/cpp-linter/cpp-linter-action/actions/workflows/cpp-linter.yml/badge.svg)](https://github.com/cpp-linter/cpp-linter-action/actions/workflows/cpp-linter.yml)

Have question or feedback?¶

To provide feedback (requesting a feature or reporting a bug) please post to issues.

Required tools installed¶

As of v2.16.0, this action uses

nushell for cross-platform compatible scripting
uv for driving a Python virtual environment

This action installs nushell and uv automatically. Only nushell is added to the PATH environment variable. uv, and any standalone Python distribution it downloads, are not added to the PATH environment variable.

On Linux runners¶

We only support Linux runners using a Debian-based Linux OS (like Ubuntu and many others). This is because we first try to use the apt package manager to install clang tools.

Linux workflows that use a specific container should ensure that the following are installed:

GLIBC (v2.32 or later)
wget or curl
lsb-release (required by LLVM-provided install script)
software-properties-common (required by LLVM-provided install script)
gnupg (required by LLVM-provided install script)

apt-get update
apt-get install -y libc6 wget lsb-release software-properties-common gnupg

Otherwise, nushell and/or the LLVM-provided bash script will fail to run.

On macOS runners¶

The specified version of clang-format and clang-tidy is installed via Homebrew. Failing that, we attempt to use static binaries that we built ourselves; see cpp-linter/clang-tools-pip and cpp-linter/clang-tools-static-binaries projects for more detail.

On Windows runners¶

For Windows runners, we only use clang tools built as static binaries. See cpp-linter/clang-tools-pip and cpp-linter/clang-tools-static-binaries projects for more detail.

License¶

The scripts and documentation in this project are released under the MIT License

C/C++ Linter Action | clang-format & clang-tidy¶