Die Welt ist meine Vorstellung

How to setup ac-clang-complete-async

22 September 2015

1 Introduction

ac-clang-complete-async is an emacs extension to complete C and C++ code, it uses libclang to parse the source code on the fly and provides completion candidates to auto-complete (http://cx4a.org/software/auto-complete).1

This extension is deployed in two parts: server application clang-complete and client application written in elisp auto-complete-clang-async.el.

If it is enabled, whenever you open a C/C++ file, emacs will fork a clang-complete server for that file. Then it will send whole buffer to the server for automatic completion candidates.

ac-clang

2 Installation

2.1 lazy man's way

Install clang-complete server with brew: 

kimi.im$ brew install emacs-clang-complete-async

It will help you fetch the code and compile. clang-complete is installed in /usr/local/bin.

Install ac-clang-complete-async.el with emacs package system: 

M-x package-install<RET>
Install package: auto-complete-clang-async
auto-complete-clang-async

2.2 manual installation

Clone from https://github.com/Golevka/emacs-clang-complete-async, and compile clang-complete by yourself: 

kimi.im$ git clone https://github.com/Golevka/emacs-clang-complete-async.git
Cloning into 'emacs-clang-complete-async'...
remote: Counting objects: 310, done.
remote: Total 310 (delta 0), reused 0 (delta 0), pack-reused 310
Receiving objects: 100% (310/310), 4.15 MiB | 925.00 KiB/s, done.
Resolving deltas: 100% (157/157), done.
Checking connectivity... done.

kimi.im$ cd emacs-clang-complete-async

kimi.im$ make
make: llvm-config: Command not found
make: llvm-config: Command not found
./src/parse_results.c:1:10: fatal error: 'clang-c/Index.h' file not found
#include <clang-c/Index.h>
         ^
1 error generated.

The fatal error indicates that llvm-config is not in your PATH, add llvm-config to your PATH or just remove $(shell $(LLVM_CONFIG) from Makefile, and run make again.

3 Configuration

My configuration is to define a hook function and add it to c-common-hook: 

(require 'auto-complete-clang-async)

(defun kimim/c-mode-ac-complete()
  (global-auto-complete-mode t)
  (setq ac-clang-complete-executable "clang-complete")
  (add-to-list 'ac-sources 'ac-source-clang-async)
  (if ac-clang-cflags
      (setq ac-clang-cflags (cons ac-clang-cflags '("-I../inc" "-I../include")))
    (setq ac-clang-cflags '("-I../inc" "-I../include")))
  (ac-clang-launch-completion-process)
  (ac-clang-update-cmdlineargs))

(add-hook 'c-mode-common-hook
          (lambda ()
            (kimim/c-mode-ac-complete)))

4 Some Tips

  1. clang-complete should be in PATH
  2. By default, buffer variable ac-clang-cflags is nil, set some common used inlcude folder.
  3. ac-clang-update-cmdlineargs is used to tell clang-complete to update cflags.

If clang-complete doesn't work, you can try:

  • M-x ac-clang-set-cflags to set include folder such as -I../inc" "-I../include, and then tell it to update M-x ac-clang-update-cmdlineargs.
  • you can also set clfags with dir local file, for example: 
    ((nil . ((indent-tabs-mode . t)
       (tab-width . 8)
       (fill-column . 80)))
(c-mode . ((c-file-style . "BSD")
          (ac-clang-cflags .
                           ("-I/Users/kimim/Workspace/kimix/include"
                            "-I/Users/kimim/Workspace/kimix/sys/include"
                            "-I/Users/kimim/Workspace/kimix/usr/include"
                            "-I../include"))
          )))