CppCheck crashing with specific template syntax

Question

in our project (VS c++17) we have a template causing CppCheck (version 1.89 but also some earlier versions) to crash no Windows.

It crashes if called from command line or via GUI. Unfortunately the tool exits in a way I cannot get clear idea why it crashes. Via the GUI I tried forcing the c++ version to 14, 17 and 20 but no effect.

After following up on the file causing the crash I identified the following syntax in header is "the guilty" one:

// Header file

template <
    class obj_type,
    template<class> class allocator = SmartPointerAllocator,
    template<class, class> class data_container = std::list>

class EXPORT_OBJECT GenericConfigurationHandler 
{
protected:
    typedef typename allocator<obj_type>::ClientData ClientData;
    typedef data_container<ClientData, std::allocator<ClientData>> TargetConfigurations;
private:
    mutable TargetConfigurations m_target_configurations;

protected:
    TargetConfigurations& get_target_configurations() const { return m_target_configurations; }

public:
    /**
    *   \brief constructor
    */
    GenericConfigurationHandler() = default;

    /**
    *   \brief destructor
    */
    virtual ~GenericConfigurationHandler() {
        std::for_each(m_target_configurations.begin(), m_target_configurations.end(),
            [](ClientData& data) {
            allocator<obj_type>::destroy(data);
        });
    }

    /**
    *   \brief regist a new configuration
    *   \param target_config new target configuration
    */
    template <class src_obj>
    void regist_configuration(const src_obj& target_config) {
        m_target_configurations.push_back(allocator<obj_type>::create(target_config));
    }

    /**
    *   \brief generates target configuration values
    */
    virtual TargetConfigurations build_configurators() const {
        return m_target_configurations;
    }
};

The SmartPointerAllocator itself is:

// Header file
template<class T>
struct SmartPointerAllocator {
    //variable type
    typedef typename std::remove_pointer<T>::type var_type;
    //conatiner type
    typedef std::shared_ptr<var_type> ClientData;

    //creator
    template<class obj_type>
    static ClientData create(const obj_type& src_obj) {
        typedef typename std::remove_pointer<obj_type>::type src_obj_type;
        return ClientData(new src_obj_type(src_obj));
    }

    //deallocator
    static void destroy(ClientData& src_obj) {
    }

    static void commit(const ClientData& src_obj) {
        src_obj->commit_configuration();
    }
};

What I further notice is the crash appears on loading the .cpp files and reading/parcing the .h files. Not during the analysis!

If I comment the template definition and leave "not compilable code" like this the analysis passes:

// Header file

//template <
//  class obj_type,
//  template<class> class allocator = SmartPointerAllocator,
//  template<class, class> class data_container = std::list>

class EXPORT_OBJECT GenericConfigurationHandler 
{
protected:
    typedef typename allocator<obj_type>::ClientData ClientData;
    typedef data_container<ClientData, std::allocator<ClientData>> TargetConfigurations;
private:
    mutable TargetConfigurations m_target_configurations;

protected:
    TargetConfigurations& get_target_configurations() const { return m_target_configurations; }

public:
    /**
    *   \brief constructor
    */
    GenericConfigurationHandler() = default;

    ...
};

The difference between first and third code is only the commented template lines at the beginning.

I tried to escape the particular header file but the tool does not allow (only cpp files)

Any suggestions how to overcome this?

Answer 1

You can define MACRO to cppcheck (include guard of the header file for example).

Or something more specific:

#if !defined(CPP_CHECK)
template <
  class obj_type,
  template<class> class allocator = SmartPointerAllocator,
  template<class, class> class data_container = std::list>
#endif
class EXPORT_OBJECT GenericConfigurationHandler
{
    // ...
};

and then

cppcheck -DCPP_CHECK file.cpp