[c] Can gcc output C code after preprocessing?

-save-temps

This is another good option to have in mind:

gcc -save-temps -c -o main.o main.c

main.c

#define INC 1

int myfunc(int i) {
    return i + INC;
}

and now, besides the normal output main.o, the current working directory also contains the following files:

  • main.i is the desired prepossessed file containing:

    # 1 "main.c"
    # 1 "<built-in>"
    # 1 "<command-line>"
    # 31 "<command-line>"
    # 1 "/usr/include/stdc-predef.h" 1 3 4
    # 32 "<command-line>" 2
    # 1 "main.c"
    
    
    int myfunc(int i) {
        return i + 1;
    }
    
  • main.s is a bonus :-) and contains the generated assembly:

        .file   "main.c"
        .text
        .globl  myfunc
        .type   myfunc, @function
    myfunc:
    .LFB0:
        .cfi_startproc
        pushq   %rbp
        .cfi_def_cfa_offset 16
        .cfi_offset 6, -16
        movq    %rsp, %rbp
        .cfi_def_cfa_register 6
        movl    %edi, -4(%rbp)
        movl    -4(%rbp), %eax
        addl    $1, %eax
        popq    %rbp
        .cfi_def_cfa 7, 8
        ret
        .cfi_endproc
    .LFE0:
        .size   myfunc, .-myfunc
        .ident  "GCC: (Ubuntu 8.3.0-6ubuntu1) 8.3.0"
        .section    .note.GNU-stack,"",@progbits
    

If you want to do it for a large number of files, consider using instead:

 -save-temps=obj

which saves the intermediate files to the same directory as the -o object output instead of the current working directory, thus avoiding potential basename conflicts.

The advantage of this option over -E is that it is easy to add it to any build script, without interfering much in the build itself.

Another cool thing about this option is if you add -v:

gcc -save-temps -c -o main.o -v main.c

it actually shows the explicit files being used instead of ugly temporaries under /tmp, so it is easy to know exactly what is going on, which includes the preprocessing / compilation / assembly steps:

/usr/lib/gcc/x86_64-linux-gnu/8/cc1 -E -quiet -v -imultiarch x86_64-linux-gnu main.c -mtune=generic -march=x86-64 -fpch-preprocess -fstack-protector-strong -Wformat -Wformat-security -o main.i
/usr/lib/gcc/x86_64-linux-gnu/8/cc1 -fpreprocessed main.i -quiet -dumpbase main.c -mtune=generic -march=x86-64 -auxbase-strip main.o -version -fstack-protector-strong -Wformat -Wformat-security -o main.s
as -v --64 -o main.o main.s

Tested in Ubuntu 19.04 amd64, GCC 8.3.0.

CMake predefined targets

CMake automatically provides a targets for the preprocessed file:

make help

shows us that we can do:

make main.i

and that target runs:

Preprocessing C source to CMakeFiles/main.dir/main.c.i
/usr/bin/cc    -E /home/ciro/bak/hello/main.c > CMakeFiles/main.dir/main.c.i

so the file can be seen at CMakeFiles/main.dir/main.c.i

Tested on cmake 3.16.1.

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