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Hooks

Hooks are a way to enhance linting via user provided code.

API

Hooks are interpreted using the Small Clojure Interpreter.

Hooks receive Clojure code as rewrite-clj nodes, not only for performance reasons, but also because rewrite-clj nodes carry the line and row numbers for every Clojure element. Note that when we refer to a "rewrite-clj node", we are referring to clj-kondo's version of rewrite-clj node. Clj-kondo's version of rewrite-clj is catered to its use case, includes some bug fixes, but most notably: strips away all whitespace.

A hook can leverage the clj-kondo.hooks-api namespace for transformation and analysis of rewrite-clj nodes.

API functions for producing nodes:

list-node: produce a new list node from a seqable of nodes.
vector-node: produce a new vector node from a seqable of nodes.
map-node: produce a new map node from a seqable of nodes
keyword-node: produce a new keyword. Use (api/keyword-node :foo) for a normal keyword and (api/keyword-node :foo true) to produce a node for ::foo.
string-node: produce a new node for a single string or multiple strings (passed as seq)
token-node: produce a new token node. Used for all remaining tokens (mainly used for symbols or nil).
tag: return the tag keyword for a node

Each producing function has a predicate counterpart for checking a type of node:

list-node?: returns true if given node is a list node
etc.

Other API functions:

sexpr: turns a node into a Clojure s-expression. Useful for analyzing concrete values.
reg-keyword!: indicates that a keyword's analysis should be marked as a definition. Expects the keyword node and either true or the fully-qualified function that registered it. This can be used to implement keyword navigation for clojure-lsp.
tag: returns node's tag, can be used as a dispatch function for multimethods, if you want your hook to be opened for extension.
reg-finding!: registers a finding. Expects a map with:
- :message: the lint message
- :row, :col, :end-row and :end-col: the location of the finding. These values can be derived from the metadata of a node.
- :type: the type of lint warning. A level must be set for this type in the clj-kondo config under :linters. If the level is not set, the lint warning is ignored.
ns-analysis: Return any cached analysis for the namespace identified by the ns-sym arg. Returns a map keyed by language keyword with values being maps of var definitions keyed by defined symbol. The value for each symbol is a subset of the values provide by the top level :analysis option." Arglists: [ns-sym], [ns-sym {:keys [lang]}].
resolve: Takes a map of :name, a symbol (including the namespace if present) and :call, an optional boolean indicating if the symbol was used in a function call. Returns a map with :ns, the resolved namespace of the symbol, if it referred to a var, and :name, the name of the var without the namespace. See corpus/issue-1996 for a test case that demonstrates the usage of api/resolve

The namespaces clojure.core, clojure.set and clojure.string are also available. Use println or prn for debugging and time to measure performance.

Hooks must be configured in clj-kondo's config.edn under :hooks, e.g.:

{:hooks {:analyze-call {foo.weird-macro hooks.foo/weird-macro}}}

analyze-call

The analyze-call hook offers a way to lint macros that are unrecognized by clj-kondo and cannot be supported by :lint-as.

It receives Clojure macro (or function) call code as input in the form of a rewrite-clj node, and can:

Transform the code to teach clj-kondo about its effect.
Inspect call arguments and emit findings about them.

Clojure code as rewrite-clj nodes

If you develop a hook you will likely need some familiarity with rewrite-clj node structure. A couple of examples might help:

(my-macro 1 2 3) becomes:

a list node with :children:
- token node my-macro
- token node 1
- token node 2
- token node 3

(my-lib/with-bound [a 1 {:with-bound/setting true}] (inc a)) becomes:

a list node with :children
- token node my-lib/with-bound
- vector node with :children
  - token-node a
  - token-node 1
  - map node with :children
    - keyword node :with-bound/setting
    - token node true
- list node
  - token node inc
  - token node a

Clj-kondo uses a different approach to metadata than the original rewrite-clj library. Metadata nodes are stored in the :meta key on nodes correponding to the values carrying the metadata:

^:foo ^:bar [] becomes:

a vector node with :meta
- a seq of nodes with:
  - keyword node :foo
  - keyword node :bar

Transformation

As an example, let's take this macro:

(ns mylib)
(defmacro with-bound [binding-vector & body] ,,,)

Users can call this macro like so:

(require '[my-lib])
(my-lib/with-bound [a 1 {:with-bound/setting true}] (inc a))

Clj-kondo does not recognize this syntax and will report the symbol a as unresolved. If the macro didn't expect an option map in the third position of the binding vector, we could have used :lint-as {my-lib.with-bound clojure.core/let}, but unfortunately that doesn't work for this macro. We will now write a hook that transforms the call into:

(let [a 1] {:with-bound/setting true} (inc a))

It is not important that the code is rewritten exactly according to the macroexpansion. What counts is that the transformation rewrites into code that clj-kondo can understand.

This is the code for the hook:

(ns hooks.with-bound
  (:require [clj-kondo.hooks-api :as api]))

(defn with-bound [{:keys [node]}]
  (let [[binding-vec & body] (rest (:children node))
        [sym val opts] (:children binding-vec)]
    (when-not (and sym val)
      (throw (ex-info "No sym and val provided" {})))
    (let [new-node (api/list-node
                    (list*
                     (api/token-node 'let)
                     (api/vector-node [sym val])
                     opts
                     body))]
      {:node new-node})))

This code will be placed in a file hooks/with_bound.clj in your .clj-kondo directory.

To register the hook, use this configuration:

{:hooks {:analyze-call {my-lib/with-bound hooks.with-bound/with-bound}}}

The symbol hooks.with-bound/with-bound corresponds to the file .clj-kondo/hooks/with_bound.clj and the with-bound function defined in it. Note that the file has to declare a namespace corresponding to its directory structure and file name, just like in normal Clojure.

An analyze-call hook function receives a :node in its argument map. This is a rewrite-clj node representing the hooked Clojure macro (or function) call code clj-kondo has found in the source code it is linting. The hook uses the clj-kondo.hooks-api namespace to validate then rewrite this node into a new rewrite-clj node:

The with-bound hook function checks if the call has at least a sym and val node. If not, it will throw an exception, which will result in a clj-kondo warning.
As a last step, the hook function constructs a new node using api/list-node, api/token-node and api/vector-node. This new node is returned in a map under the :node key.

Now clj-kondo fully understands the my-lib/with-bound macro and you will no longer get false positives when using it. Moreover, it will report unused bindings and will give warnings customized to this macro.

Custom lint warnings

Analyze-call hooks can also be used to create custom lint warnings, without transforming the original rewrite-clj node.

This is done either by simply throwing an error within the hook, or instead calling reg-finding!. They are similar, but the latter allows for defining precise details, including naming the linter type and defining the range to report the diagnostics for (eg where to render "squigglies").

This is an example for re-frame's dispatch function which checks if the dispatched event used a qualified keyword.

(ns hooks.re-frame
  (:require [clj-kondo.hooks-api :as api]))

(defn dispatch [{:keys [node]}]
  (let [sexpr (api/sexpr node)
        event (second sexpr)
        kw (first event)]
    (when (and (vector? event)
               (keyword? kw)
               (not (qualified-keyword? kw)))
      (let [m (some-> node :children second :children first meta)]
        (api/reg-finding! (assoc m :message "keyword should be fully qualified!"
                                 :type :re-frame/keyword))))))

The hook uses the api/sexpr function to convert the rewrite-clj node into a Clojure s-expression, which is easier to analyze. In case of an unqualified keyword we register a finding with api/reg-finding! which has a :message, and :type. The :type should also occur in the clj-kondo configuration with a level set to :info, :warning or :error in order to appear in the output:

{:linters {:re-frame/keyword {:level :warning}}
 :hooks {:analyze-call {re-frame.core/dispatch hooks.re-frame/dispatch}}}

The hook can access config to check if a warning should be emitted.

{:linters {:foo/lint-bar {:level :warning
                          :lint [:a :b]}}
 :hooks {:analyze-call {foo/bar hooks.foo/bar}}}

The configuration is supplied as a key in the hook argument:

(ns hooks.foo
  (:require [clj-kondo.hooks-api :as api]))

(defn warn? [linter-params]
  ...)

(defn bar [{:keys [node config]}]
  (let [linter-params (-> config :linters :foo/lint-bar :lint)]
    (when (warn? linter-params)
      (api/reg-finding! (assoc (meta node)
                               :message "warning message!"
                               :type :re-frame/keyword)))))

Additionally, the finding has :row, :col, :end-row and :end-col, derived from the node's metadata to show the finding at the appropriate location.

Macroexpand

The :macroexpand hook can be used to expand the s-expression representation of the rewrite-clj nodes using a macro in the configuration. After macroexpansion, clj-kondo coerces the s-expression back into rewrite-clj nodes. That makes this feature easier to use than :analyze-call, but comes at the cost of loss of precision with respect to locations: some lint warnings will be reported at a parent node location. Similar rules to :analyze-hook apply to this feature: the macro in the config doesn't have to be the same as the original macro, as long as it expands in syntactically sane expressions. The config macros, like :analyze-call hooks, are running in SCI and have a subset of Clojure available.

Let's illustrate the :macroexpand hook using an example. Consider this script with a macro that causes unresolved symbols:

(ns script)
(def sh (js/require "shelljs"))

(defmacro $ [op & args]
  (list* (symbol (str "." op)) 'sh args))

(prn (str ($ which "git"))) ;; which is unresolved
(prn (str ($ pwd))) ;; pwd is unresolved
($ cd  "..") ;; cd is unresolved
(-> ($ ls) prn) ;; ls is unresolved

Place the macro in a similar named namespace in your config directory:

.clj-kondo/script.clj

(ns script)

(defmacro $ [op & args]
  (list* (symbol (str "." op)) 'sh args))

Note: the namespace in .clj-kondo doesn't have to have the same name but in general this will work better for the macro expansion.

Configure the macro to be used for expansion. On the left hand side of the map you use the fully qualified names of the original macros. On the right hand side you use the fully qualified names of the macros in the config. In this example they are the same.

.clj-kondo/config.edn:

{:hooks {:macroexpand {script/$ script/$}}}

This should get rid of the unresolved symbols.

Subtleties of `:macroexpand`

There are several special cases to watch out for when using the :macroexpand feature.

It is recommended to put your macroexpansion code into a file / namespace with the same name as the original macro. E.g., if your macro foo is defined in a namespace named bar then the (defmacro foo ...) must sit in the file .clj-kondo/bar.clj. Furthermore, if the namespace is my-app.bar, then the macro must be defined in the file .clj-kondo/my_app/bar.clj.
- If the macro depends on aliases in the original namespace, it is recommended to fully qualify those aliases in the config macro: instead of writing
```
`(set/union ...)
```
  where set is an alias for clojure.set, write
```
`(clojure.set/union ...)
```

Tips and tricks

Here are some tips and tricks for developing hooks.

Debugging

For debugging the output of a hook function, you can use println or prn. To get a sense of what a newly generated node looks like, you can use (prn (api/sexpr node)).

Also pass --debug to the command line or :debug true to clj-kondo/run! for additional debug checks. Do not use --debug in production because it affects performance.

Developing hooks in the REPL

For developing hooks in a JVM REPL, clj-kondo exposes the clj-kondo.hooks-api namespace:

$ clj -Sdeps '{:deps {clj-kondo/clj-kondo {:mvn/version "LATEST"}}}'
Clojure 1.11.0
user=> (require '[clj-kondo.hooks-api :as api])
nil
user=> (defn my-hook [{:keys [node]}] {:node (api/list-node (list* (rest (:children node))))})
#'user/my-hook

The JVM namespace exposes additional functions for development:

parse-string: parses an s-expression to a node

user=> (def node (api/parse-string "(+ 1 2 3)"))
#'user/node
user=> (str (:node (my-hook {:node node})))
"(1 2 3)"

To load hook code that is in a .clj-kondo directory, not on the classpath, you can use load-file and then test the hook function. Suppose there is a file .clj-kondo/hooks/one_of.clj:

(ns hooks.one-of
  (:require [clj-kondo.hooks-api :as api]))

(defn one-of [{:keys [node]}]
  (let [[matchee matches] (rest (:children node))
        new-node (api/list-node
                  [(api/token-node 'case)
                   matchee
                   (with-meta (api/list-node (:children matches))
                     (meta matches))
                   matchee])]
    {:node new-node}))

Load this file in the JVM repl:

user=> (load-file ".clj-kondo/hooks/one_of.clj")
#'hooks.one-of/one-of

and then call the hook function:

user=> (hooks.one-of/one-of {:node (api/parse-string "(one-of x [1 2 3])")})
{:node <list: (case x (1 2 3) x)>}

To run clj-kondo on the hook code, use the clj-kondo.core namespace:

user=> (require '[clj-kondo.core :as clj-kondo])
nil
user=> (def code "(require '[clj-kondo.impl.utils :as u]) (u/one-of 1 [1 2 3])")
nil
user=> (:findings (with-in-str code (clj-kondo/run! {:lint ["-"]})))
[]

When clj-kondo runs hooks, they are executed in a SCI context. Once a hook namespace is loaded in the SCI context, it will not be reloaded, for performance reasons. To facilitate reloading, the JVM hooks API exposes the dynamic var *reload* which can be set to true:

user=> (binding [api/*reload* true]
         (:findings (with-in-str code (clj-kondo/run! {:lint ["-"]}))))
[]

The dynamic var should not be set to true in production usage.

For :macroexpand hooks, the JVM api offers the api/macroexpand function. Suppose we have a file .clj-kondo/hooks/one_of.clj with a macro:

(ns hooks.one-of
  (:require [clj-kondo.hooks-api :as api]))

(defmacro one-of [elt coll]
  `(case ~elt ~(seq coll) ~elt nil))

You can call api/macroexpand like this:

user=> (str (api/macroexpand #'hooks.one-of/one-of* (api/parse-string "(one-of 1 [1 2 3])") {}))
"(clojure.core/case 1 (1 2 3) 1 nil)"

So, provide the macro var as the first argument, a node as the second argument and bindings (local variables in scope of the macro call) as the third argument. The return value from the macro call is a node that has been reconstructed from the s-expression that the macro returned.

Ignore warnings in nodes

To ignore warnings in generated nodes, you can apply :clj-kondo/ignore metadata to them, similar to how you would write it here.

For example, when your lint configuration has {:linters {:discouraged-var {clojure.core/println {:message "Don't print!"}}}}, the following generated code would trigger a warning:

(ns hooks
  (:require [clj-kondo.hooks-api :as api]))

(defn my-print [{:keys [node]}]
  {:node (api/list-node (list* (api/token-node 'clojure.core/println) (rest (:children node))))})

You can prevent that using:

(defn my-print [{:keys [node]}]
  {:node (vary-meta (api/list-node (list* (api/token-node 'clojure.core/println) (rest (:children node))))
           assoc :clj-kondo/ignore [:discouraged-var])})

Performance

Less code to process will result in faster linting. If only one hook is used in certain files and another hook is used in other files, divide them up into multiple files and namespaces. If the hooks use common code, you can put that in a library namespace and use require to load it from each hook's namespace.

To test performance of a hook, you can write code which triggers the hook and repeat that expression n times (where n is a large number like 1000000). Then lint the file with clj-kondo --lint and measure timing. The time macro is also available within hooks code.

Refreshing with tools.namespace

Note: the following refers to v2022.04.25 and earlier. Newer versions support the .clj_kondo extension for hooks which won't cause any confusion with tools that try to load .clj files.

Out of the box, tools.namespace/refresh(-all) will attempt to reload all namespaces that are in Clojure source files (.clj etc.) in directories (i.e. not jars) on the classpath. As clj-kondo allows defining hooks in .clj files, these will be attempted to be also loaded. This can be problematic as a) these hooks are normally not intended to be loaded in the project, only in the clj-kondo process b) they are normally placed in a location different to where Clojure would expect them based on their namespace name.

Example:

clj -Srepro -Sdeps \
 '{:deps {org.clojure/tools.namespace {:mvn/version "1.2.0"} seancorfield/next.jdbc {:git/url "https://github.com/seancorfield/next-jdbc/" :git/sha "24bf1dbaa441d62461f980e9f880df5013f295dd"}}}' \
 -M -e "((requiring-resolve 'clojure.tools.namespace.repl/refresh-all))"

The above will result in a loading error although the configuration loaded from the referenced lib is valid according to clj-kondo.

Could not locate
  hooks/com/github/seancorfield/next_jdbc__init.class,
  hooks/com/github/seancorfield/next_jdbc.clj or
  hooks/com/github/seancorfield/next_jdbc.cljc on classpath.
Please check that namespaces with dashes use underscores in the Clojure file name.

There is an existing ask.clojure question about this.

A workaround is to explicitly set the directories tools.namespace will search for Clojure namespaces using clojure.tools.namespace.repl/set-refresh-dirs.

To try and still be as broad as possible with the search (as is the default), the following could be an option:

(defn remove-clj-kondo-exports-from-tools-ns-refresh-dirs
  "A potential issue from using this is that if the directory containing the clj-kondo.exports folder
  also directly contains to-be-reloaded clojure source files, those will no longer be reloaded."
  []
  (->> (clojure.java.classpath/classpath-directories)
       (mapcat
        (fn [^File classpath-directory]
          (let [children   (.listFiles classpath-directory)
                directory? #(.isDirectory ^File %)
                clj-kondo-exports?
                           #(= "clj-kondo.exports" (.getName ^File %))
                has-clj-kondo-exports
                           (some (every-pred clj-kondo-exports? directory?) children)]
            (if has-clj-kondo-exports
              (->> children
                   (filter directory?)
                   (remove clj-kondo-exports?))
              [classpath-directory]))))
       (apply clojure.tools.namespace.repl/set-refresh-dirs)))

;; call in user.clj
(remove-clj-kondo-exports-from-tools-ns-refresh-dirs)

Compatibility with tools.build compilation

Note: the following refers to v2022.04.25 and earlier. Newer versions support the .clj_kondo extension for hooks which won't cause any confusion with tools that try to load .clj files.

Similar to the previous point about tools.namespace, compiling a project that has hooks defined in .clj files on its classpath with tools.build might run into issues if one wants to let tools.build find as many namespaces to compile as possible (by setting :src-dirs (:classpath-roots basis)). See some discussion about this in this Clojurians thread.

cat <<EOF > deps.edn
{:deps {seancorfield/next.jdbc
        {:git/url "https://github.com/seancorfield/next-jdbc/"
         :git/sha "24bf1dbaa441d62461f980e9f880df5013f295dd"}}
 :aliases
 {:build
  {:paths []
   :deps
   {io.github.clojure/tools.build {:git/tag "v0.8.2" :git/sha "ba1a2bf"}}}}}
EOF

clj -Srepro -M:build -e \
 "(let [basis ((requiring-resolve 'clojure.tools.build.api/create-basis))] ((requiring-resolve 'clojure.tools.build.api/compile-clj) {:basis basis :src-dirs (:classpath-roots basis) :class-dir \"classes\"}))"

Results in:

Execution error (FileNotFoundException) at user/eval136$fn (compile.clj:17).
Could not locate hooks/com/github/seancorfield/next_jdbc__init.class,
hooks/com/github/seancorfield/next_jdbc.clj or
hooks/com/github/seancorfield/next_jdbc.cljc on classpath.
Please check that namespaces with dashes use underscores in the Clojure file name.

A workaround is to copy and tweak namespace discovery from tools.build:

(require
 '[clojure.tools.build.api :as b]
 '[clojure.tools.build.tasks.compile-clj :as compile-clj])

(defn with-safe-ns-compile
  "Attempts to obtain a collection of namespaces that are safe to call
  (compile) on and associates it under :ns-compile"
  [{:keys [basis sort] :or {sort :topo} :as compile-clj-opts}]
  (let [clj-paths (mapv b/resolve-path (:classpath-roots basis))]
    (->> (case sort
           :topo (#'compile-clj/nses-in-topo clj-paths)
           :bfs (#'compile-clj/nses-in-bfs clj-paths)
           (throw (ex-info "Invalid :sort in compile-clj task" {:sort sort})))

         ;; Adjust pred to your own needs
         (filterv #(re-find #"^(my-namespace-prefix|other-safe-prefix)\." (name %)))
         (assoc compile-clj-opts :ns-compile))))

Refer to exported config within project

To refer to the exported config for a project within that same project, you can use:

{:config-paths ["../resources/clj-kondo.exports/org.your/your.lib"]}

Example Hooks

Libraries

Here are some example hooks from libraries.

coffi: defcfn

More examples of hooks can be found in the config project.

Disrecommend usage of function or macro

.clj-kondo/config.edn:

{:hooks {:analyze-call {clojure.core/eval org.acme.not-recommended/hook}}
 :linters {:org.acme/not-recommended {:level :error}}}

.clj-kondo/org/acme/not_recommended.clj:

(ns org.acme.not-recommended
  (:require [clj-kondo.hooks-api :as api]))

(defn hook [{:keys [node]}]
  (let [name (str (first (:children node)))]
    (api/reg-finding!
     (assoc (meta node)
            :message (format "Please don't use %s" name)
            :type :org.acme/not-recommended))))

Output when linting:

(ns app.core)

(eval '(+ 1 2 3))

src/app/core.clj:3:1: error: Please don't use eval

Finding unused and undefined re-frame subscriptions

See this repo.

Also see this gist.

Clojurists Together

The initial work on hooks was sponsored by Clojurists Together as part of their Summer of Bugs program.

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