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---
layout: documentation
title: Query language
---
<h1>The Bazel query reference</h1>
<ul class="toc">
<li><a href="query.html#examples">Examples</a></li>
<li><a href="query.html#tokens">Tokens: The lexical syntax</a></li>
<li><a href="query.html#concepts">Bazel query language concepts</a></li>
<li><a href="query.html#expressions">Expressions: Syntax and semantics of the grammar</a></li>
<li><a href="query.html#functions">Functions</a></li>
<li><a href="query.html#output-formats">Output formats</a></li>
</ul>
<p>
When you use <code>bazel query</code> to analyze build
dependencies, you use a little language, the <em>Bazel Query
Language</em>. This document is the reference manual for that
language. This document also describes the output
formats <code>bazel query</code> supports.
</p>
<p>
If you were looking for a how-to, please see the <a href='query-how-to.md'>Bazel Query How-To</a>.
</p>
<h3> bazel cquery </h3>
<p>Traditional bazel query runs on the post-loading phase target graph and therefore
has no concept of configurations and their related concepts. Notably, this means it does not
correctly resolve <a href = "be/functions.html#select">select statements</a>
and rather returns all possible resolutions of selects. A newer query environment, cquery,
properly handles configurations but doesn't provide all of the functionality of this original
query. For more information, see the <a href="cquery.html">Bazel cquery reference</a>.
</p>
<h2 id='examples'>Examples</h2>
<p>
How do people use <code>bazel query</code>? Here are typical examples:
</p>
<p>
Why does the <code>//foo</code> tree depend on <code>//bar/baz</code>?
Show a path:</p>
<pre>somepath(foo/..., //bar/baz:all)</pre>
<p>
What C++ libraries do all the <code>foo</code> tests depend on that
the <code>foo_bin</code> target does not?</p>
<pre>kind("cc_library", deps(kind(".*test rule", foo/...)) except deps(//foo:foo_bin))</pre>
<h2 id='tokens'>Tokens: The lexical syntax</h2>
<p>
Expressions in the query language are composed of the following
tokens:</p>
<ul>
<li>
<p>
<b>Keywords</b>, such as <code>let</code>. Keywords are the reserved words of the
language, and each of them is described below. The complete set
of keywords is:
</p>
<code><!-- keep this alphabetically sorted -->
<a href="#set-operations">except</a><br/>
<a href="#variables">in</a><br/>
<a href="#set-operations">intersect</a><br/>
<a href="#variables">let</a><br/>
<a href="#set">set</a><br/>
<a href="#set-operations">union</a><br/>
</code>
</li>
<li>
<p>
<b>Words</b>, such as <code>foo/...</code> or
<code>".*test rule"</code> or <code>//bar/baz:all</code>. If a
character sequence is "quoted" (begins and ends with a single-quote
<code>'</code> or begins and ends with a double-quote
<code>&quot;</code>), it is a word. If a character sequence is not
quoted, it may still be parsed as a word. Unquoted words are sequences
of characters drawn from the alphabet characters <code>A-Za-z</code>,
the numerals <code>0-9</code>, and the special characters <code>*/@.-_:$~</code>
(asterisk, forward slash, at, period, hyphen, underscore, colon, dollar sign, tilde).
However, unquoted words may not start with a hyphen <code>-</code> or asterisk
<code>*</code> even though relative <a href="build-ref.html#name">target names</a> may
start with those characters.
</p>
<p>
Unquoted words also may not include the characters plus sign <code>+</code> or equals sign
<code>=</code>, even though those characters are permitted in target names. Thus, when
writing code that generates query expressions, target names should be quoted.
</p>
<p>
Quoting <em>is</em> necessary when writing scripts that
construct Bazel query expressions from user-supplied values.
</p>
<pre>
//foo:bar+wiz # WRONG: scanned as //foo:bar + wiz.
//foo:bar=wiz # WRONG: scanned as //foo:bar = wiz.
"//foo:bar+wiz" # OK.
"//foo:bar=wiz" # OK.
</pre>
<p>
Note that this quoting is in addition to any quoting that may
be required by your shell. e.g.
</p>
<pre>bazel query ' "//foo:bar=wiz" ' # single-quotes for shell, double-quotes for Bazel.</pre>
<p>
Keywords, when quoted, are treated as ordinary words, thus
<code>some</code> is a keyword but <code>"some"</code> is a word.
Both <code>foo</code> and <code>"foo"</code> are words.
</p>
<p>
However, be careful when using single or double quotes in target names. When quoting one or
more target names, use only one type of quotes (either all single or all double quotes).
</p>
<pre>
The following are examples of what the Java query string will be:
'a"'a' # WRONG: Error message: unclosed quotation.
"a'"a" # WRONG: Error message: unclosed quotation.
'"a" + 'a'' # WRONG: Error message: unexpected token 'a' after query expression '"a" + '
"'a' + "a"" # WRONG: Error message: unexpected token 'a' after query expression ''a' + '
"a'a" # OK.
'a"a' # OK.
'"a" + "a"' # OK
"'a' + 'a'" # OK
</pre>
<p>We chose this syntax so that quote marks aren't needed in most cases.
The (unusual) <code>".*test rule"</code> example needs quotes: it
starts with a period and contains a space.
Quoting <code>"cc_library"</code> is unnecessary but harmless.
</p>
<li><b>Punctuation</b>, such as parens <code>()</code>, period
<code>.</code> and comma <code>,</code>, etc. Words containing
punctuation (other than the exceptions listed above) must be quoted.
</ul>
<p>
Whitespace characters outside of a quoted word are ignored.
</p>
<h2 id='concepts'>Bazel query language concepts</h2>
<p>
The Bazel query language is a language of expressions. Every
expression evaluates to a <b>partially-ordered set</b> of targets,
or equivalently, a <b>graph</b> (DAG) of targets. This is the only
datatype.
</p>
<p>
In some expressions, the partial order of the graph is
not interesting; In this case, we call the values
"sets". In cases where the partial order of elements
is significant, we call values "graphs". Note
that both terms refer to the same datatype, but merely emphasize
different aspects of it.
</p>
<h3>Cycles in the dependency graph</h3>
<p>
Build dependency graphs should be acyclic.
The algorithms used by the query language are intended for use in
acyclic graphs, but are robust against cycles. The details of how
cycles are treated are not specified and should not be relied upon.
</p>
<h3 id='implicit_deps'>Implicit dependencies</h3>
<p>
In addition to build dependencies that are defined explicitly in BUILD files,
Bazel adds additional <em>implicit</em> dependencies to rules. For example
every Java rule implicitly depends on the JavaBuilder. Implicit dependencies
are established using attributes that start with <code>$</code> and they
cannot be overridden in BUILD files.
</p>
<p>
Per default <code>bazel query</code> takes implicit dependencies into account
when computing the query result. This behavior can be changed with
the <code>--[no]implicit_deps</code> option.
</p>
<h3 id='soundness'>Soundness</h3>
<p>
Bazel query language expressions operate over the build
dependency graph, which is the graph implicitly defined by all
rule declarations in all BUILD files. It is important to understand
that this graph is somewhat abstract, and does not constitute a
complete description of how to perform all the steps of a build. In
order to perform a build, a <em>configuration</em> is required too;
see the <a href='user-manual.html#configurations'>configurations</a>
section of the User's Guide for more detail.
</p>
<p>
The result of evaluating an expression in the Bazel query language
is true <em>for all configurations</em>, which means that it may be
a conservative over-approximation, and not exactly precise. If you
use the query tool to compute the set of all source files needed
during a build, it may report more than are actually necessary
because, for example, the query tool will include all the files
needed to support message translation, even though you don't intend
to use that feature in your build.
</p>
<h3 id='graph-order'>On the preservation of graph order</h3>
<p>
Operations preserve any ordering
constraints inherited from their subexpressions. You can think of
this as "the law of conservation of partial order". Consider an
example: if you issue a query to determine the transitive closure of
dependencies of a particular target, the resulting set is ordered
according to the dependency graph. If you filter that set to
include only the targets of <code>file</code> kind, the same
<em>transitive</em> partial ordering relation holds between every
pair of targets in the resulting subset&mdash;even though none of
these pairs is actually directly connected in the original graph.
(There are no file&ndash;file edges in the build dependency graph).
</p>
<p>
However, while all operators <em>preserve</em> order, some
operations, such as the <a href='#set-operations'>set operations</a>
don't <em>introduce</em> any ordering constraints of their own.
Consider this expression:
</p>
<pre>deps(x) union y</pre>
<p>
The order of the final result set is guaranteed to preserve all the
ordering constraints of its subexpressions, namely, that all the
transitive dependencies of <code>x</code> are correctly ordered with
respect to each other. However, the query guarantees nothing about
the ordering of the targets in <code>y</code>, nor about the
ordering of the targets in <code>deps(x)</code> relative to those in
<code>y</code> (except for those targets in
<code>y</code> that also happen to be in <code>deps(x)</code>).
</p>
<p>
Operators that introduce ordering constraints include:
<code>allpaths</code>,
<code>deps</code>,
<code>rdeps</code>,
<code>somepath</code>,
and the target pattern wildcards
<code>package:*</code>,
<code>dir/...</code>, etc.
</p>
<h3 id='sky-query'>Sky query</h3>
<p>
Query has two different implementations, with slightly different features. The alternative one is
called "Sky Query", and is activated by passing the following two flags:
<code>--universe_scope</code> and <code>--order_output=no</code>.
<code>--universe_scope=&lt;target_pattern1&gt;,...,&lt;target_patternN&gt;</code> tells query to
preload the transitive closure of the target pattern specified by the target patterns, which can
be both additive and subtractive. All queries are then evaluated in this "scope". In particular,
the <a href='#allrdeps'><code>allrdeps</code></a> and
<a href='#rbuildfiles'><code>rbuildfiles</code></a> operators only return results from this scope.
</p>
<p>
Sky Query has some advantages and disadvantages compared to the default query. The main
disadvantage is that it cannot order its output according to graph order, and thus certain
<a href='#output-formats'>output formats</a> are forbidden. Its advantages are that it provides
two operators (<a href='#allrdeps'><code>allrdeps</code></a> and
<a href='#rbuildfiles'><code>rbuildfiles</code></a>) that are not available in the default query.
As well, Sky Query does its work by introspecting the
<a href='https://bazel.build/designs/skyframe.html'>Skyframe</a> graph, rather than creating a new
graph, which is what the default implementation does. Thus, there are some circumstances in which
it is faster and uses less memory.
</p>
<h2 id='expressions'>Expressions: Syntax and semantics of the grammar</h2>
<p>
This is the grammar of the Bazel query language, expressed in EBNF
notation:
</p>
<pre>expr ::= <var>word</var>
| let <var>name</var> = <var>expr</var> in <var>expr</var>
| (<var>expr</var>)
| <var>expr</var> intersect <var>expr</var>
| <var>expr</var> ^ <var>expr</var>
| <var>expr</var> union <var>expr</var>
| <var>expr</var> + <var>expr</var>
| <var>expr</var> except <var>expr</var>
| <var>expr</var> - <var>expr</var>
| set(<var>word</var> *)
| <var>word</var> '(' <var>int</var> | <var>word</var> | <var>expr</var> ... ')'
</pre>
<p>
We will examine each of the productions of this grammar in order.
</p>
<h3 id="target-patterns">Target patterns</h3>
<pre>expr ::= <var>word</var></pre>
<p>
Syntactically, a <em>target pattern</em> is just a word. It
is interpreted as an (unordered) set of targets. The simplest
target pattern is a label,
which identifies a single target (file or rule). For example, the
target pattern <code>//foo:bar</code> evaluates to a set
containing one element, the target, the <code>bar</code>
rule.
</p>
<p>
Target patterns generalize labels to include wildcards over packages
and targets. For example, <code>foo/...:all</code> (or
just <code>foo/...</code>) is a target pattern that evaluates to a
set containing all <em>rules</em> in every package recursively
beneath the <code>foo</code> directory;
<code>bar/baz:all</code> is a target pattern that
evaluates to a set containing all the rules in the
<code>bar/baz</code> package, but not its subpackages.
</p>
<p>
Similarly, <code>foo/...:*</code> is a target pattern that evaluates
to a set containing all <em>targets</em> (rules <em>and</em> files) in
every package recursively beneath the <code>foo</code> directory;
<code>bar/baz:*</code> evaluates to a set containing
all the targets in the
<code>bar/baz</code> package, but not its subpackages.
</p>
<p>
Because the <code>:*</code> wildcard matches files as well as rules,
it is often more useful than <code>:all</code> for queries.
Conversely, the <code>:all</code> wildcard (implicit in target
patterns like <code>foo/...</code>) is typically more useful for
builds.
</p>
<p>
<code>bazel query</code> target patterns work the same as
<code>bazel build</code> build targets do;
refer to <a href='user-manual.html#target-patterns'>Target Patterns</a>
in the Bazel User Manual for further details, or type <code>bazel
help target-syntax</code>.
</p>
<p>
Target patterns may evaluate to a singleton set (in the case of a
label), to a set containing many elements (as in the case of
<code>foo/...</code>, which has thousands of elements) or to the
empty set, if the target pattern matches no targets.
</p>
<p>
All nodes in the result of a target pattern expression are correctly
ordered relative to each other according to the dependency relation.
So, the result of <code>foo:*</code> is not just the set of targets
in package <code>foo</code>, it is also the <em>graph</em> over
those targets. (No guarantees are made about the relative ordering
of the result nodes against other nodes.) See the section
on <a href='#graph-order'>graph order</a> for more details.
</p>
<h3 id="variables">Variables</h3>
<pre>expr ::= let <var>name</var> = <var>expr</var><sub>1</sub> in <var>expr</var><sub>2</sub>
| <var>$name</var></pre>
<p>
The Bazel query language allows definitions of and references to
variables. The
result of evaluation of a <code>let</code> expression is the same as
that of <var>expr</var><sub>2</sub>, with all free occurrences of
variable <var>name</var> replaced by the value of
<var>expr</var><sub>1</sub>.
</p>
<p>
For example, <code>let v = foo/... in allpaths($v, //common)
intersect $v</code> is equivalent to the <code>allpaths(foo/...,
//common) intersect foo/...</code>.
</p>
<p>
An occurrence of a variable reference <code>name</code> other than in
an enclosing <code>let <var>name</var> = ...</code> expression is an
error. In other words, toplevel query expressions cannot have free
variables.
</p>
<p>
In the above grammar productions, <code>name</code> is like
<em>word</em>, but with the additional constraint that it be a legal
identifier in the C programming language. References to the variable
must be prepended with the "$" character.
</p>
<p>
Each <code>let</code> expression defines only a single variable,
but you can nest them.
</p>
<p>
(Both <a
href='#target-patterns'>target patterns</a> and variable references
consist of just a single token, a word, creating a syntactic
ambiguity. However, there is no semantic ambiguity, because the
subset of words that are legal variable names is disjoint from the
subset of words that are legal target patterns.)
</p>
<p>
(Technically speaking, <code>let</code> expressions do not increase
the expressiveness of the query language: any query expressible in
the language can also be expressed without them. However, they
improve the conciseness of many queries, and may also lead to more
efficient query evaluation.)
</p>
<h3 id="parentheses">Parenthesized expressions</h3>
<pre>expr ::= (<var>expr</var>)</pre>
<p>
Parentheses associate subexpressions to force an
order of evaluation.
A parenthesized expression evaluates
to the value of its argument.
</p>
<h3 id="set-operations">Algebraic set operations:
intersection, union, set difference</h3>
<pre>expr ::= <var>expr</var> intersect <var>expr</var>
| <var>expr</var> ^ <var>expr</var>
| <var>expr</var> union <var>expr</var>
| <var>expr</var> + <var>expr</var>
| <var>expr</var> except <var>expr</var>
| <var>expr</var> - <var>expr</var>
</pre>
<p>
These three operators compute the usual set operations over their
arguments. Each operator has two forms, a nominal form such
as <code>intersect</code> and a symbolic form such
as <code>^</code>. Both forms are equivalent;
the symbolic forms are quicker to type. (For clarity, the rest of
this manual uses the nominal forms.) For example,
</p>
<pre>foo/... except foo/bar/...</pre>
evaluates to the set of targets that match
<code>foo/...</code> but not
<code>foo/bar/...</code>&nbsp;. Equivalently:
<pre>foo/... - foo/bar/...</pre>
The <code>intersect</code> (<code>^</code>)
and <code>union</code> (<code>+</code>) operations are commutative
(symmetric); <code>except</code> (<code>-</code>) is
asymmetric. The parser treats all three operators as
left-associative and of equal precedence, so you might want parentheses.
For example, the first two of these expressions are
equivalent, but the third is not:
<pre>x intersect y union z
(x intersect y) union z
x intersect (y union z)</pre>
<p>
(We strongly recommend that you use parentheses where there is
any danger of ambiguity in reading a query expression.)
</p>
<h3 id="set">Read targets from an external source: set</h3>
<pre>expr ::= set(<var>word</var> *) </pre>
<p>
The <code>set(<var>a</var> <var>b</var> <var>c</var> ...)</code>
operator computes the union of a set of zero or
more <a href='#target-patterns'>target patterns</a>, separated by
whitespace (no commas).
</p>
<p>
In conjunction with the Bourne shell's <code>$(...)</code>
feature, <code>set()</code> provides a means of saving the results
of one query in a regular text file, manipulating that text file
using other programs (e.g. standard UNIX shell tools), and then
introducing the result back into the query tool as a value for
further processing. For example:
</p>
<pre>
bazel query deps(//my:target) --output=label | grep ... | sed ... | awk ... &gt; foo
bazel query "kind(cc_binary, set($(&lt;foo)))"
</pre>
<p>
In the next example, <code>kind(cc_library,
deps(//some_dir/foo:main, 5))</code> is effectively computed
by filtering on the <code>maxrank</code> values using
an <code>awk</code> program.
</p>
<pre>
bazel query 'deps(//some_dir/foo:main)' --output maxrank |
awk '($1 &lt; 5) { print $2;} ' &gt; foo
bazel query "kind(cc_library, set($(&lt;foo)))"
</pre>
<p>
In these examples, <code>$(&lt;foo)</code> is a shorthand
for <code>$(cat foo)</code>, but shell commands other
than <code>cat</code> may be used too&mdash;such as
the previous <code>awk</code> command.
</p>
<p>
Note, <code>set()</code> introduces no graph ordering constraints,
so path information may be lost when saving and reloading sets of
nodes using it. See the <a href='#graph-order'>graph order</a>
section below for more detail.
</p>
<h2 id="functions">Functions</h2>
<pre>expr ::= <var>word</var> '(' <var>int</var> | <var>word</var> | <var>expr</var> ... ')'</pre>
<p>
The query language defines several functions. The name of the function
determines the number and type of arguments it requires. The following
functions are available:
</p>
<code><!-- keep this alphabetically sorted -->
<a href="#path-operators">allpaths</a><br/>
<a href="#attr">attr</a><br/>
<a href="#buildfiles">buildfiles</a><br/>
<a href="#rbuildfiles">rbuildfiles</a><br/>
<a href="#deps">deps</a><br/>
<a href="#filter">filter</a><br/>
<a href="#kind">kind</a><br/>
<a href="#labels">labels</a><br/>
<a href="#loadfiles">loadfiles</a><br/>
<a href="#rdeps">rdeps</a><br/>
<a href="#allrdeps">allrdeps</a><br/>
<a href="#same_pkg_direct_rdeps">same_pkg_direct_rdeps</a><br/>
<a href="#siblings">siblings</a><br/>
<a href="#some">some</a><br/>
<a href="#path-operators">somepath</a><br/>
<a href="#tests">tests</a><br/>
<a href="#visible">visible</a><br/>
</code>
<h3 id="deps">Transitive closure of dependencies: deps</h3>
<pre>expr ::= deps(<var>expr</var>)
| deps(<var>expr</var>, <var>depth</var>)</pre>
<p>
The <code>deps(<var>x</var>)</code> operator evaluates to the graph
formed by the transitive closure of dependencies of its argument set
<var>x</var>. For example, the value of <code>deps(//foo)</code> is
the dependency graph rooted at the single node <code>foo</code>,
including all its dependencies. The value of
<code>deps(foo/...)</code> is the dependency graphs whose roots are
all rules in every package beneath the <code>foo</code> directory.
Please note that 'dependencies' means only rule and file targets
in this context, therefore the BUILD and Skylark files needed to
create these targets are not included here. For that you should use the
<a href="#buildfiles"><code>buildfiles</code></a> operator.
</p>
<p>
The resulting graph is ordered according to the dependency relation.
See the section on <a href='#graph-order'>graph order</a> for more
details.
</p>
<p>
The <code>deps</code> operator accepts an optional second argument,
which is an integer literal specifying an upper bound on the depth
of the search. So <code>deps(foo:*, 1)</code> evaluates to all the
direct prerequisites of any target in the <code>foo</code> package,
and <code>deps(foo:*, 2)</code> further includes the nodes directly
reachable from the nodes in <code>deps(foo:*, 1)</code>, and so on.
(These numbers correspond to the ranks shown in
the <a href='#output-ranked'><code>minrank</code></a> output
format.) If the <var>depth</var> parameter is omitted, the search
is unbounded, i.e. it computes the reflexive transitive closure of
prerequsites.
</p>
<h3 id="rdeps">Transitive closure of reverse dependencies: rdeps</h3>
<pre>expr ::= rdeps(<var>expr</var>, <var>expr</var>)
| rdeps(<var>expr</var>, <var>expr</var>, <var>depth</var>)</pre>
<p>
The <code>rdeps(<var>u</var>, <var>x</var>)</code> operator evaluates
to the reverse dependencies of the argument set <var>x</var> within the
transitive closure of the universe set <var>u</var>.
</p>
<p>
The resulting graph is ordered according to the dependency relation. See the
section on <a href='#graph-order'>graph order</a> for more details.
</p>
<p>
The <code>rdeps</code> operator accepts an optional third argument,
which is an integer literal specifying an upper bound on the depth of the
search. The resulting graph will only include nodes within a distance of the
specified depth from any node in the argument set. So
<code>rdeps(//foo, //common, 1)</code> evaluates to all nodes in the
transitive closure of <code>//foo</code> that directly depend on
<code>//common</code>. (These numbers correspond to the ranks shown in the
<a href='#output-ranked'><code>minrank</code></a> output format.) If the
<var>depth</var> parameter is omitted, the search is unbounded.
</p>
<h3 id="allrdeps">Transitive closure of all reverse dependencies: allrdeps</h3>
<pre>expr ::= allrdeps(<var>expr</var>)
| allrdeps(<var>expr</var>, <var>depth</var>)</pre>
<b>Only available with <a href='#sky-query'>Sky Query</a></b><br/>
<p>
The <code>allrdeps</code> operator behaves just like the <a href='#rdeps'><code>rdeps</code></a>
operator, except that the "universe set" is whatever the <code>--universe_scope</code> flag
evaluated to, instead of being separately specified. Thus, if
<code>--universe_scope=//foo/...</code> was passed, then <code>allrdeps(//bar)</code> is
equivalent to <code>rdeps(//foo/..., //bar)</code>.
</p>
<h3 id="same_pkg_direct_rdeps">Direct reverse dependencies in the same package: same_pkg_direct_rdeps</h3>
<pre>expr ::= same_pkg_direct_rdeps(<var>expr</var>)</pre>
<p>
The <code>same_pkg_direct_rdeps(<var>x</var>)</code> operator evalutes to the full set of targets
that are in the same package as a target in the argument set, and which directly depend on it.
</p>
<h3 id="siblings">Dealing with a target's package: siblings</h3>
<pre>expr ::= siblings(<var>expr</var>)</pre>
<p>
The <code>siblings(<var>x</var>)</code> operator evalutes to the full set of targets that are in
the same package as a target in the argument set.
</p>
<h3 id="some">Arbitrary choice: some</h3>
<pre>expr ::= some(<var>expr</var>)</pre>
<p>
The <code>some(<var>x</var>)</code> operator selects one target
arbitrarily from its argument set <var>x</var>, and evaluates to a
singleton set containing only that target. For example, the
expression <code>some(//foo:main union //bar:baz)</code>
evaluates to a set containing either <code>//foo:main</code> or
<code>//bar:baz</code>&mdash;though which one is not defined.
</p>
<p>
If the argument is a singleton, then <code>some</code>
computes the identity function: <code>some(//foo:main)</code> is
equivalent to <code>//foo:main</code>.
It is an error if the specified argument set is empty, as in the
expression <code>some(//foo:main intersect //bar:baz)</code>.
</p>
<h3 id="path-operators">Path operators: somepath, allpaths</h3>
<pre>expr ::= somepath(<var>expr</var>, <var>expr</var>)
| allpaths(<var>expr</var>, <var>expr</var>)</pre>
<p>
The <code>somepath(<var>S</var>, <var>E</var>)</code> and
<code>allpaths(<var>S</var>, <var>E</var>)</code> operators compute
paths between two sets of targets. Both queries accept two
arguments, a set <var>S</var> of starting points and a set
<var>E</var> of ending points. <code>somepath</code> returns the
graph of nodes on <em>some</em> arbitrary path from a target in
<var>S</var> to a target in <var>E</var>; <code>allpaths</code>
returns the graph of nodes on <em>all</em> paths from any target in
<var>S</var> to any target in <var>E</var>.
</p>
<p>
The resulting graphs are ordered according to the dependency relation.
See the section on <a href='#graph-order'>graph order</a> for more
details.
</p>
<table style='margin: auto'><tr>
<td style='text-align: center'>
<!-- digraph somepath1 {
graph [size="4,4"]
node [label="",shape=circle];
n1;
n2 [fillcolor="pink",style=filled];
n3 [fillcolor="pink",style=filled];
n4 [fillcolor="pink",style=filled,label="E"];
n5; n6;
n7 [fillcolor="pink",style=filled,label="S1"];
n8 [label="S2"];
n9;
n10 [fillcolor="pink",style=filled];
n1 -> n2;
n2 -> n3;
n7 -> n5;
n7 -> n2;
n5 -> n6;
n6 -> n4;
n8 -> n6;
n6 -> n9;
n2 -> n10;
n3 -> n10;
n10 -> n4;
n10 -> n11;
} -->
<img src="images/somepath1.svg" alt="somepath1.svg" style="margin-left=10;" />
<p><code>somepath(S1 + S2, E)</code>,<br/>one possible result.</p>
</td>
<td style='padding: 40px; text-align: center'>
<!-- digraph somepath2 {
graph [size="4,4"]
node [label="",shape=circle];
n1; n2; n3;
n4 [fillcolor="pink",style=filled,label="E"];
n5;
n6 [fillcolor="pink",style=filled];
n7 [label="S1"];
n8 [fillcolor="pink",style=filled,label="S2"];
n9; n10;
n1 -> n2;
n2 -> n3;
n7 -> n5;
n7 -> n2;
n5 -> n6;
n6 -> n4;
n8 -> n6;
n6 -> n9;
n2 -> n10;
n3 -> n10;
n10 -> n4;
n10 -> n11;
} -->
<img src="images/somepath2.svg" alt="somepath2.svg" style="margin-left=10;" />
<p><code>somepath(S1 + S2, E)</code>,<br/>another possible result.</p>
</td>
<td style='text-align: center'>
<!-- digraph allpaths {
graph [size="4,4"]
node [label="",shape=circle];
n1;
n2 [fillcolor="pink",style=filled];
n3 [fillcolor="pink",style=filled];
n4 [fillcolor="pink",style=filled,label="E"];
n5 [fillcolor="pink",style=filled];
n6 [fillcolor="pink",style=filled];
n7 [fillcolor="pink",style=filled, label="S1"];
n8 [fillcolor="pink",style=filled, label="S2"];
n9;
n10 [fillcolor="pink",style=filled];
n1 -> n2;
n2 -> n3;
n7 -> n5;
n7 -> n2;
n5 -> n6;
n6 -> n4;
n8 -> n6;
n6 -> n9;
n2 -> n10;
n3 -> n10;
n10 -> n4;
n10 -> n11;
} -->
<img src="images/allpaths.svg" alt="allpaths.svg" style="margin-left=10;" />
<p><code>allpaths(S1 + S2, E)</code>.</p>
</td>
</tr></table>
<h3 id="kind">Target kind filtering: kind</h3>
<pre>expr ::= kind(<var>word</var>, <var>expr</var>) </pre>
<p>
The <code>kind(<var>pattern</var>, <var>input</var>)</code> operator
applies a filter to a set of targets, and discards those targets
that are not of the expected kind. The <var>pattern</var> parameter specifies
what kind of target to match.
</p>
<ul>
<li><b>file</b> patterns can be one of:
<ul>
<li><code>source file</code>
<li><code>generated file</code>
</ul>
<li><b>rule</b> patterns can be one of:
<ul>
<li><code><var>ruletype</var> rule</code>
<li><code><var>ruletype</var></code><br>
Where <var>ruletype</var> is a build rule. The difference between these
forms is that including "rule" causes the <a href="#regex">regular expression</a> match for
<var>ruletype</var> to be anchored.
</ul>
<li><b>package group</b> patterns should simply be:
<ul>
<li><code>package group</code>
</ul>
</ul>
<p>
For example, the kinds for the four targets defined by the BUILD file
(for package <code>p</code>) shown below are illustrated in the
table:
</p>
<table style='margin: auto'><tr><td style='padding-right:10px'>
<pre style='margin-left: 0em;'>
genrule(
name = "a",
srcs = ["a.in"],
outs = ["a.out"],
cmd = "...",
)
</pre>
</td><td>
<table class="grid">
<tr><th>Target</th><th>Kind</th></tr>
<tr class='tt'><td>//p:a</td><td>genrule rule</td></tr>
<tr class='tt'><td>//p:a.in</td><td>source file</td></tr>
<tr class='tt'><td>//p:a.out</td><td>generated file</td></tr>
<tr class='tt'><td>//p:BUILD</td><td>source file</td></tr>
</table>
</td></tr></table>
<p>
Thus, <code>kind("cc_.* rule", foo/...)</code> evaluates to the set
of all <code>cc_library</code>, <code>cc_binary</code>, etc,
rule targets beneath
<code>foo</code>, and <code>kind("source file", deps(//foo))</code>
evaluates to the set of all source files in the transitive closure
of dependencies of the <code>//foo</code> target.
</p>
<p>
Quotation of the <var>pattern</var> argument is often required
because without it, many <a href="#regex">regular expressions</a>, such as <code>source
file</code> and <code>.*_test</code>, are not considered words by
the parser.
</p>
<p>
When matching for <code>package group</code>, targets ending in
<code>:all</code> may not yield any results.
Use <code>:all-targets</code> instead.
</p>
<h3 id="filter">Target name filtering: filter</h3>
<pre>expr ::= filter(<var>word</var>, <var>expr</var>) </pre>
<p>
The <code>filter(<var>pattern</var>, <var>input</var>)</code> operator
applies a filter to a set of targets, and discards targets whose
labels (in absolute form) do not match the pattern; it
evaluates to a subset of its input.
</p>
<p>
The first argument, <var>pattern</var> is a word containing a
<a href="#regex">regular expression</a> over target names. A <code>filter</code> expression
evaluates to the set containing all targets <var>x</var> such that
<var>x</var> is a member of the set <var>input</var> and the
label (in absolute form, e.g. <code>//foo:bar</code>)
of <var>x</var> contains an (unanchored) match
for the regular expression <var>pattern</var>. Since all
target names start with <code>//</code>, it may be used as an alternative
to the <code>^</code> regular expression anchor.
</p>
<p>
This operator often provides a much faster and more robust alternative to the
<code>intersect</code> operator. For example, in order to see all
<code>bar</code> dependencies of the <code>//foo:foo</code> target, one could
evaluate
</p>
<pre>deps(//foo) intersect //bar/...</pre>
<p>
This statement, however, will require parsing of all BUILD files in the
<code>bar</code> tree, which will be slow and prone to errors in
irrelevant BUILD files. An alternative would be:
</p>
<pre>filter(//bar, deps(//foo))</pre>
<p>
which would first calculate the set of <code>//foo</code> dependencies and
then would filter only targets matching the provided pattern&mdash;in other
words, targets with names containing <code>//bar</code> as a
substring.
</p>
<p>
Another common use of the <code>filter(<var>pattern</var>,
<var>expr</var>)</code> operator is to filter specific files by their
name or extension. For example,
</p>
<pre>filter("\.cc$", deps(//foo))</pre>
<p>
will provide a list of all <code>.cc</code> files used to build
<code>//foo</code>.
</p>
<h3 id="attr">Rule attribute filtering: attr</h3>
<pre>expr ::= attr(<var>word</var>, <var>word</var>, <var>expr</var>) </pre>
<p>
The <code>attr(<var>name</var>, <var>pattern</var>, <var>input</var>)</code>
operator applies a filter to a set of targets, and discards targets that
are not rules, rule targets that do not have attribute <var>name</var>
defined or rule targets where the attribute value does not match the provided
<a href="#regex">regular expression</a> <var>pattern</var>; it evaluates to a subset of its input.
</p>
<p>
The first argument, <var>name</var> is the name of the rule attribute that
should be matched against the provided <a href="#regex">regular expression</a> pattern. The second
argument, <var>pattern</var> is a regular expression over the attribute
values. An <code>attr</code> expression evaluates to the set containing all
targets <var>x</var> such that <var>x</var> is a member of the set
<var>input</var>, is a rule with the defined attribute <var>name</var> and
the attribute value contains an (unanchored) match for the regular expression
<var>pattern</var>. Please note, that if <var>name</var> is an optional
attribute and rule does not specify it explicitly then default attribute
value will be used for comparison. For example,
</p>
<pre>attr(linkshared, 0, deps(//foo))</pre>
<p>
will select all <code>//foo</code> dependencies that are allowed to have a
linkshared attribute (e.g., <code>cc_binary</code> rule) and have it either
explicitly set to 0 or do not set it at all but default value is 0 (e.g. for
<code>cc_binary</code> rules).
</p>
<p>
List-type attributes (such as <code>srcs</code>, <code>data</code>, etc) are
converted to strings of the form <code>[value<sub>1</sub>, ..., value<sub>n</sub>]</code>,
starting with a <code>[</code> bracket, ending with a <code>]</code> bracket
and using "<code>, </code>" (comma, space) to delimit multiple values.
Labels are converted to strings by using the absolute form of the
label. For example, an attribute <code>deps=[":foo",
"//otherpkg:bar", "wiz"]</code> would be converted to the
string <code>[//thispkg:foo, //otherpkg:bar, //thispkg:wiz]</code>.
Brackets
are always present, so the empty list would use string value <code>[]</code>
for matching purposes. For example,
</p>
<pre>attr("srcs", "\[\]", deps(//foo))</pre>
<p>
will select all rules among <code>//foo</code> dependencies that have an
empty <code>srcs</code> attribute, while
</p>
<pre>attr("data", ".{3,}", deps(//foo))</pre>
<p>
will select all rules among <code>//foo</code> dependencies that specify at
least one value in the <code>data</code> attribute (every label is at least
3 characters long due to the <code>//</code> and <code>:</code>).
</p>
<h3 id="visible">Rule visibility filtering: visible</h3>
<pre>expr ::= visible(<var>expr</var>, <var>expr</var>) </pre>
<p>
The <code>visible(<var>predicate</var>, <var>input</var>)</code> operator
applies a filter to a set of targets, and discards targets without the
required visibility.
</p>
<p>
The first argument, <var>predicate</var>, is a set of targets that all targets
in the output must be visible to. A <var>visible</var> expression
evaluates to the set containing all targets <var>x</var> such that <var>x</var>
is a member of the set <var>input</var>, and for all targets <var>y</var> in
<var>predicate</var> <var>x</var> is visible to <var>y</var>. For example:
</p>
<pre>visible(//foo, //bar:*)</pre>
<p>
will select all targets in the package <code>//bar</code> that <code>//foo</code>
can depend on without violating visibility restrictions.
</p>
<h3 id="labels">Evaluation of rule attributes of type label: labels</h3>
<pre>expr ::= labels(<var>word</var>, <var>expr</var>) </pre>
<p>
The <code>labels(<var>attr_name</var>, <var>inputs</var>)</code>
operator returns the set of targets specified in the
attribute <var>attr_name</var> of type "label" or "list of label" in
some rule in set <var>inputs</var>.
</p>
<p>
For example, <code>labels(srcs, //foo)</code> returns the set of
targets appearing in the <code>srcs</code> attribute of
the <code>//foo</code> rule. If there are multiple rules
with <code>srcs</code> attributes in the <var>inputs</var> set, the
union of their <code>srcs</code> is returned.
</p>
<h3 id="tests">Expand and filter test_suites: tests</h3>
<pre>expr ::= tests(<var>expr</var>)</pre>
<p>
The <code>tests(<var>x</var>)</code> operator returns the set of all test
rules in set <var>x</var>, expanding any <code>test_suite</code> rules into
the set of individual tests that they refer to, and applying filtering by
<code>tag</code> and <code>size</code>.
By default, query evaluation
ignores any non-test targets in all <code>test_suite</code> rules. This can be
changed to errors with the <code>--strict_test_suite</code> option.
</p>
<p>
For example, the query <code>kind(test, foo:*)</code> lists all
the <code>*_test</code> and <code>test_suite</code> rules
in the <code>foo</code> package. All the results are (by
definition) members of the <code>foo</code> package. In contrast,
the query <code>tests(foo:*)</code> will return all of the
individual tests that would be executed by <code>bazel test
foo:*</code>: this may include tests belonging to other packages,
that are referenced directly or indirectly
via <code>test_suite</code> rules.
</p>
<h3 id="buildfiles">Package definition files: buildfiles</h3>
<pre>expr ::= buildfiles(<var>expr</var>)</pre>
<p>
The <code>buildfiles(<var>x</var>)</code> operator returns the set
of files that define the packages of each target in
set <var>x</var>; in other words, for each package, its BUILD file,
plus any files it references via <code>load</code>. Note that this also returns the BUILD files
of the packages containing these <code>load</code>ed files.
</p>
<p>
This operator is typically used when determining what files or
packages are required to build a specified target, often in conjunction with
the <a href='#output-package'><code>--output package</code></a>
option, below). For example,
</p>
<pre>bazel query 'buildfiles(deps(//foo))' --output package</pre>
<p>
returns the set of all packages on which <code>//foo</code> transitively
depends.
</p>
<p>
(Note: a naive attempt at the above query would omit
the <code>buildfiles</code> operator and use only <code>deps</code>,
but this yields an incorrect result: while the result contains the
majority of needed packages, those packages that contain only files
that are <code>load()</code>'ed will be missing.
</p>
<h3 id="rbuildfiles">Package definition files: rbuildfiles</h3>
<pre>expr ::= rbuildfiles(<var>word</var>, ...)</pre>
<b>Only available with <a href='#sky-query'>Sky Query</a></b><br/>
<p>
The <code>rbuildfiles</code> operator takes a comma-separated list of path fragments and returns
the set of BUILD files that transitively depend on these path fragments. For instance, if
<code>//foo</code> is a package, then <code>rbuildfiles(foo/BUILD)</code> will return the
<code>//foo:BUILD</code> target. If the <code>foo/BUILD</code> file has
<code>load('//bar:file.bzl'...</code> in it, then <code>rbuildfiles(bar/file.bzl)</code> will
return the <code>//foo:BUILD</code> target, as well as the targets for any other BUILD files that
load <code>//bar:file.bzl</code>
</p>
<p>
The scope of the <scope>rbuildfiles</scope> operator is the universe specified by the
<code>--universe_scope</code> flag. Files that do not correspond directly to BUILD files and .bzl
files do not affect the results. For instance, source files (like <code>foo.cc</code>) are ignored,
even if they are explicitly mentioned in the BUILD file. Symlinks, however, are respected, so that
if <code>foo/BUILD</code> is a symlink to <code>bar/BUILD</code>, then
<code>rbuildfiles(bar/BUILD)</code> will include <code>//foo:BUILD</code> in its results.
</p>
<p>
The <code>rbuildfiles</code> operator is almost morally the inverse of the
<a href='#buildfiles'><code>buildfiles</code></a> operator. However, this moral inversion
holds more strongly in one direction: the outputs of <code>rbuildfiles</code> are just like the
inputs of <code>buildfiles</code>; the former will only contain BUILD file targets in packages,
and the latter may contain such targets. In the other direction, the correspondence is weaker. The
outputs of the <code>buildfiles</code> operator are targets corresponding to all packages and .bzl
files needed by a given input. However, the inputs of the <code>rbuildfiles</code> operator are
not those targets, but rather the path fragments that correspond to those targets.
</p>
<h3 id="loadfiles">Package definition files: loadfiles</h3>
<pre>expr ::= loadfiles(<var>expr</var>)</pre>
<p>
The <code>loadfiles(<var>x</var>)</code> operator returns the set of
Skylark files that are needed to load the packages of each target in
set <var>x</var>. In other words, for each package, it returns the
.bzl files that are referenced from its BUILD files.
</p>
<h2 id='output-formats'>Output formats</h2>
<p>
<code>bazel query</code> generates a graph.
You specify the content, format, and ordering by which
<code>bazel query</code> presents this graph
by means of the <code>--output</code>
command-line option.
</p>
<p>
When running with <a href='#sky-query'>Sky Query</a>, only output formats that are compatible with
unordered output are allowed. Specifically, <code>graph</code>, <code>minrank</code>, and
<code>maxrank</code> output formats are forbidden.
</p>
<p>
Some of the output formats accept additional options. The name of
each output option is prefixed with the output format to which it
applies, so <code>--graph:factored</code> applies only
when <code>--output=graph</code> is being used; it has no effect if
an output format other than <code>graph</code> is used. Similarly,
<code>--xml:line_numbers</code> applies only when <code>--output=xml</code>
is being used.
</p>
<h3 id='result-order'>On the ordering of results</h3>
<p>
Although query expressions always follow the "<a href='#graph-order'>law of
conservation of graph order</a>", <i>presenting</i> the results may be done
in either a dependency-ordered or unordered manner. This does <b>not</b>
influence the targets in the result set or how the query is computed. It only
affects how the results are printed to stdout. Moreover, nodes that are
equivalent in the dependency order may or may not be ordered alphabetically.
The <code>--order_output</code> flag can be used to control this behavior.
(The <code>--[no]order_results</code> flag has a subset of the functionality
of the <code>--order_output</code> flag and is deprecated.)
</p>
<p>
The default value of this flag is <code>auto</code>, which is equivalent to
<code>full</code> for every output format except for <code>proto</code>,
<code>graph</code>, <code>minrank</code>, and <code>maxrank</code>, for which
it is equivalent to <code>deps</code>.
</p>
<p>
When this flag is <code>no</code> and <code>--output</code> is one of
<code>build</code>, <code>label</code>, <code>label_kind</code>,
<code>location</code>, <code>package</code>, <code>proto</code>,
<code>record</code> or <code>xml</code>, the outputs will be printed in
arbitrary order. <b>This is generally the fastest option</b>. It is not
supported though when <code>--output</code> is one of <code>graph</code>,
<code>minrank</code> or <code>maxrank</code>: with these formats, bazel will
always print results ordered by the dependency order or rank.
</p>
<p>
When this flag is <code>deps</code>, bazel will print results ordered by the
dependency order. However, nodes that are unordered by the dependency order
(because there is no path from either one to the other) may be printed in any
order.
</p>
<p>
When this flag is <code>full</code>, bazel will print results ordered by the
dependency order, with unordered nodes ordered alphabetically or reverse
alphabetically, depending on the output format. This may be slower than the
other options, and so should only be used when deterministic results are
important &mdash; it is guaranteed with this option that running the same query
multiple times will always produce the same output.
</p>
<h3 id="output-build">Print the source form of targets as they would appear in BUILD</h3>
<pre>--output build</pre>
<p>
With this option, the representation of each target is as if it were
hand-written in the BUILD language. All variables and function calls
(e.g. glob, macros) are expanded, which is useful for seeing the effect
of Skylark macros. Additionally, each effective rule is annotated with
the name of the macro (if any, see <code>generator_name</code> and
<code>generator_function</code>) that produced it.
</p>
<p>
Although the output uses the same syntax as BUILD files, it is not
guaranteed to produce a valid BUILD file.
</p>
<h3 id="output-label">Print the label of each target</h3>
<pre>--output label</pre>
<p>
With this option, the set of names (or <em>labels</em>) of each target
in the resulting graph is printed, one label per line, in
topological order (unless <code>--noorder_results</code> is specified, see
<a href='#result-order'>notes on the ordering of results</a>).
(A topological ordering is one in which a graph
node appears earlier than all of its successors.) Of course there
are many possible topological orderings of a graph (<em>reverse
postorder</em> is just one); which one is chosen is not specified.
When printing the output of a <code>somepath</code> query, the order
in which the nodes are printed is the order of the path.
</p>
<p>
Caveat: in some corner cases, there may be two distinct targets with
the same label; for example, a <code>sh_binary</code> rule and its
sole (implicit) <code>srcs</code> file may both be called
<code>foo.sh</code>. If the result of a query contains both of
these targets, the output (in <code>label</code> format) will appear
to contain a duplicate. When using the <code>label_kind</code> (see
below) format, the distinction becomes clear: the two targets have
the same name, but one has kind <code>sh_binary rule</code> and the
other kind <code>source file</code>.
</p>
<h3 id="output-label_kind">Print the label and kind of each target</h3>
<pre>--output label_kind</pre>
<p>
Like <code>label</code>, this output format prints the labels of
each target in the resulting graph, in topological order, but it
additionally precedes the label by
the <a href='#kind'><em>kind</em></a> of the target.
</p>
<h3 id="output-ranked">Print the label of each target, in rank order</h3>
<pre>--output minrank
--output maxrank</pre>
<p>
Like <code>label</code>, the <code>minrank</code>
and <code>maxrank</code> output formats print the labels of each
target in the resulting graph, but instead of appearing in
topological order, they appear in rank order, preceded by their
rank number. These are unaffected by the result ordering
<code>--[no]order_results</code> flag (see <a href='#result-order'>notes on
the ordering of results</a>).
</p>
<p>
There are two variants of this format: <code>minrank</code> ranks
each node by the length of the shortest path from a root node to it.
"Root" nodes (those which have no incoming edges) are of rank 0,
their successors are of rank 1, etc. (As always, edges point from a
target to its prerequisites: the targets it depends upon.)
</p>
<p>
<code>maxrank</code> ranks each node by the length of the longest
path from a root node to it. Again, "roots" have rank 0, all other
nodes have a rank which is one greater than the maximum rank of all
their predecessors.
</p>
<p>
All nodes in a cycle are considered of equal rank. (Most graphs are
acyclic, but cycles do occur
simply because BUILD files contain erroneous cycles.)
</p>
<p>
These output formats are useful for discovering how deep a graph is.
If used for the result of a <code>deps(x)</code>, <code>rdeps(x)</code>,
or <code>allpaths</code> query, then the rank number is equal to the
length of the shortest (with <code>minrank</code>) or longest
(with <code>maxrank</code>) path from <code>x</code> to a node in
that rank. <code>maxrank</code> can be used to determine the
longest sequence of build steps required to build a target.
</p>
<p>
Please note, the ranked output of a <code>somepath</code> query is
basically meaningless because <code>somepath</code> doesn't
guarantee to return either a shortest or a longest path, and it may
include "transitive" edges from one path node to another that are
not direct edges in original graph.
</p>
<p>
For example, the graph on the left yields the outputs on the right
when <code>--output minrank</code> and <code>--output maxrank</code>
are specified, respectively.
</p>
<table style='margin: auto'><tr><td>
<!-- digraph mygraph {
node [shape=box];
"//a:a" -> "//a:a.cc"
"//b:b" -> "//a:a"
"//b:b" -> "//b:b.cc"
"//c:c" -> "//b:b"
"//c:c" -> "//a:a"
} -->
<img src="images/out-ranked.svg" alt="out-ranked.svg" style="margin-left=10;" />
</td><td>
<pre>
minrank
0 //c:c
1 //b:b
1 //a:a
2 //b:b.cc
2 //a:a.cc
</pre>
</td><td>
<pre>
maxrank
0 //c:c
1 //b:b
2 //a:a
2 //b:b.cc
3 //a:a.cc
</pre>
</td></tr></table>
<h3 id="output-location">Print the location of each target</h3>
<pre>--output location</pre>
<p>
Like <code>label_kind</code>, this option prints out, for each
target in the result, the target's kind and label, but it is
prefixed by a string describing the location of that target, as a
filename and line number. The format resembles the output of
<code>grep</code>. Thus, tools that can parse the latter (such as Emacs
or vi) can also use the query output to step through a series of
matches, allowing the Bazel query tool to be used as a
dependency-graph-aware "grep for BUILD files".
</p>
<p>
The location information varies by target kind (see the <a
href='#kind'>kind</a> operator). For rules, the
location of the rule's declaration within the BUILD file is printed.
For source files, the location of line 1 of the actual file is
printed. For a generated file, the location of the rule that
generates it is printed. (The query tool does not have sufficient
information to find the actual location of the generated file, and
in any case, it might not exist if a build has not yet been
performed.)
</p>
<h3 id="output-package">Print the set of packages</h3>
<pre>--output package</pre>
<p>
This option prints the name of all packages to which
some target in the result set belongs. The names are printed in
lexicographical order; duplicates are excluded. Formally, this
is a <em>projection</em> from the set of labels (package, target) onto
packages.
</p>
<p>
Packages in external repositories are formatted as
<code>@repo//foo/bar</code> while packages in the main repository are
formatted as <code>foo/bar</code>.
</p>
<p>
In conjunction with the <code>deps(...)</code> query, this output
option can be used to find the set of packages that must be checked
out in order to build a given set of targets.
</p>
<h3 id="output-graph">Display a graph of the result</h3>
<pre>--output graph</pre>
<p>
This option causes the query result to be printed as a directed
graph in the popular AT&amp;T GraphViz format. Typically the
result is saved to a file, such as <code>.png</code> or <code>.svg</code>.
(If the <code>dot</code> program is not installed on your workstation, you
can install it using the command <code>sudo apt-get install graphviz</code>.)
See the example section below for a sample invocation.
</p>
<p>
This output format is particularly useful for <code>allpaths</code>,
<code>deps</code>, or <code>rdeps</code> queries, where the result
includes a <em>set of paths</em> that cannot be easily visualized when
rendered in a linear form, such as with <code>--output label</code>.
</p>
<p>
By default, the graph is rendered in a <em>factored</em> form. That is,
topologically-equivalent nodes are merged together into a single
node with multiple labels. This makes the graph more compact
and readable, because typical result graphs contain highly
repetitive patterns. For example, a <code>java_library</code> rule
may depend on hundreds of Java source files all generated by the
same <code>genrule</code>; in the factored graph, all these files
are represented by a single node. This behavior may be disabled
with the <code>--nograph:factored</code> option.
</p>
<h4><code>--graph:node_limit <var>n</var></code></h4>
<p>
The option specifies the maximum length of the label string for a
graph node in the output. Longer labels will be truncated; -1
disables truncation. Due to the factored form in which graphs are
usually printed, the node labels may be very long. GraphViz cannot
handle labels exceeding 1024 characters, which is the default value
of this option. This option has no effect unless
<code>--output=graph</code> is being used.
</p>
<h4><code>--[no]graph:factored</code></h4>
<p>
By default, graphs are displayed in factored form, as explained
<a href='#output-graph'>above</a>.
When <code>--nograph:factored</code> is specified, graphs are
printed without factoring. This makes visualization using GraphViz
impractical, but the simpler format may ease processing by other
tools (e.g. grep). This option has no effect
unless <code>--output=graph</code> is being used.
</p>
<h3 id="output-xml">XML</h3>
<pre>--output xml</pre>
<p>
This option causes the resulting targets to be printed in an XML
form. The output starts with an XML header such as this
</p>
<pre>
&lt;?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?&gt;
&lt;query version="2"&gt;
</pre>
<!-- The docs should continue to document version 2 into perpetuity,
even if we add new formats, to handle clients synced to old CLs. -->
<p>
and then continues with an XML element for each target
in the result graph, in topological order (unless
<a href='#result-order'>unordered results</a> are requested),
and then finishes with a terminating
</p>
<pre>
&lt;/query&gt;
</pre>
<p>
Simple entries are emitted for targets of <code>file</code>
kind:
</p>
<pre>
&lt;source-file name='//foo:foo_main.cc' .../&gt;
&lt;generated-file name='//foo:libfoo.so' .../&gt;
</pre>
<p>
But for rules, the XML is structured and contains definitions of all
the attributes of the rule, including those whose value was not
explicitly specified in the rule's BUILD file.
</p>
<p>
Additionally, the result includes <code>rule-input</code> and
<code>rule-output</code> elements so that the topology of the
dependency graph can be reconstructed without having to know that,
for example, the elements of the <code>srcs</code> attribute are
forward dependencies (prerequisites) and the contents of the
<code>outs</code> attribute are backward dependencies (consumers).
<code>rule-input</code> elements for <a
href='#implicit_deps'>implicit dependencies</a> are suppressed if
<code>--noimplicit_deps</code> is specified.
</p>
<pre>
&lt;rule class='cc_binary rule' name='//foo:foo' ...&gt;
&lt;list name='srcs'&gt;
&lt;label value='//foo:foo_main.cc'/&gt;
&lt;label value='//foo:bar.cc'/&gt;
...
&lt;/list&gt;
&lt;list name='deps'&gt;
&lt;label value='//common:common'/&gt;
&lt;label value='//collections:collections'/&gt;
...
&lt;/list&gt;
&lt;list name='data'&gt;
...
&lt;/list&gt;
&lt;int name='linkstatic' value='0'/&gt;
&lt;int name='linkshared' value='0'/&gt;
&lt;list name='licenses'/&gt;
&lt;list name='distribs'&gt;
&lt;distribution value="INTERNAL" /&gt;
&lt;/list&gt;
&lt;rule-input name="//common:common" /&gt;
&lt;rule-input name="//collections:collections" /&gt;
&lt;rule-input name="//foo:foo_main.cc" /&gt;
&lt;rule-input name="//foo:bar.cc" /&gt;
...
&lt;/rule&gt;
</pre>
<p>
Every XML element for a target contains a <code>name</code>
attribute, whose value is the target's label, and
a <code>location</code> attribute, whose value is the target's
location as printed by the <a href='output-location'><code>--output
location</code></a>.
</p>
<h4><code>--[no]xml:line_numbers</code></h4>
<p>
By default, the locations displayed in the XML output contain line numbers.
When <code>--noxml:line_numbers</code> is specified, line numbers are not
printed.
</p>
<h4><code>--[no]xml:default_values</code></h4>
<p>
By default, XML output does not include rule attribute whose value
is the default value for that kind of attribute (e.g. because it
were not specified in the BUILD file, or the default value was
provided explicitly). This option causes such attribute values to
be included in the XML output.
</p>
<h3 id="regex">Regular expressions</h3>
Regular expressions in the query language are implemented using the Java
regex library, so they support the full syntax documented
for <a href="https://docs.oracle.com/javase/8/docs/api/java/util/regex/Pattern.html"><code>java.util.regex.Pattern</code></a>.
<h3 id="external-repos">Querying with external repositories</h3>
<p>
If the build depends on rules from external repositories (defined in the
WORKSPACE file) then query results will include these dependencies. For
example, if <code>//foo:bar</code> depends on <code>//external:some-lib</code>
and <code>//external:some-lib</code> is bound to
<code>@other-repo//baz:lib</code>, then
<code>bazel query 'deps(//foo:bar)'</code>
will list both <code>@other-repo//baz:lib</code> and
<code>//external:some-lib</code> as dependencies.
</p>
<p>
External repositories themselves are not dependencies of a build. That is, in
the example above, <code>//external:other-repo</code> is not a dependency. It
can be queried for as a member of the <code>//external</code> package, though,
for example:
<p>
<pre>
# Querying over all members of //external returns the repository.
bazel query 'kind(maven_jar, //external:*)'
//external:other-repo
# ...but the repository is not a dependency.
bazel query 'kind(maven_jar, deps(//foo:bar))'
INFO: Empty results
</pre>