Description
I am very confused about CONTAINS edges. I did not find any documentation on them. However, I did find a file called EdgeTypes.java in this repo which contains this:
/** Shortcut over multiple AST edges */
public static final String CONTAINS = "CONTAINS";
Given that that's all I know about these edges, I'd assume that ... well ... CONTAINS edges are the transitive closure of AST edges. I'm assuming that the transitive closure is meant by "shortcut". However, this is not the case in the implementation.
Take the graph that is created for this code:
void calculateWinner() {
int hash = getHashOfBlock();
if(hash < 27) {
int receiver = 0;
send(15);
}
}
If we count the number of nodes connected to the method node via CONTAINS edges, we get 14:
joern> cpg.method.name("calculateWinner").outE(EdgeTypes.CONTAINS).inV.l.size
res124: Int = 14
Now lets tally up the nodes in the transitive closure of AST edges:
joern> cpg.method.name("calculateWinner").astChildren.l.size
res125: Int = 2
joern> cpg.method.name("calculateWinner").astChildren.astChildren.l.size
res126: Int = 3
joern> cpg.method.name("calculateWinner").astChildren.astChildren.astChildren.l.size
res127: Int = 4
joern>
cpg.method.name("calculateWinner").astChildren.astChildren.astChildren.astChildren.l.size
res128: Int = 5
joern>
cpg.method.name("calculateWinner").astChildren.astChildren.astChildren.astChildren.astChildren.l.size
res129: Int = 3
joern>
cpg.method.name("calculateWinner").astChildren.astChildren.astChildren.astChildren.astChildren.astChildren.l.size
res130: Int = 0
They sum up to 17, not 14.
This is not because of duplicate nodes (not that that would make sense in an abstract syntax tree) because after deduplication, we're still at 17:
joern>
Traversal(cpg.method.name("calculateWinner").astChildren.astChildren.astChildren.astChildren.astChildren.l.concat(cpg.method.name("calculateWinner").astChildren.astChildren.astChildren.astChildren.l).concat(cpg.method.name("calculateWinner").astChildren.astChildren.astChildren.l).concat(cpg.method.name("calculateWinner").astChildren.astChildren.l).concat(cpg.method.name("calculateWinner").astChildren.l)).dedup.size
res139: Int = 17
I have no idea how to best diff traversals in Joern, so I diffed them externally. In this particular case, the METHOD_RETURN node and the LOCAL nodes are missing. But I have no idea what nodes are missing in general.