extracting-code-structure

Extracting code structure

ts-pack process <file> runs the code-intelligence pipeline over a source file and prints JSON. Use it when the user wants structured metadata — "list the functions", "what does this file import", "find the exported symbols", "pull the docstrings" — rather than a raw syntax tree.

Quick recipe

# Default features: structure + imports + exports
ts-pack process src/app.ts

# Pick features explicitly (only what you ask for is computed)
ts-pack process src/app.ts --structure --imports --symbols --docstrings

# Everything
ts-pack process src/app.ts --all

When no feature flags are given, process defaults to --structure --imports --exports. Passing any single feature flag turns off that default set, so list every feature you want.

Feature flags

Flag	Extracts
--structure	Functions, classes, methods, modules (spans, parent, visibility).
--imports	Import statements and their sources.
--exports	Exported symbols and their kinds.
--comments	Inline and block comments.
--docstrings	Docstrings attached to definitions.
--symbols	All identifiers (for search/indexing).
--diagnostics	Syntax errors and error nodes with positions.
--all	Enable every feature above.
--chunk-size <bytes>	Syntax-aware chunks — see chunking-for-llms.
--language <name> (-l)	Override language (auto-detected from extension otherwise).

Result shape

process always prints JSON. Top-level keys:

{
  "language": "python",
  "metrics": { "total_lines": 0, "code_lines": 0, "comment_lines": 0, "blank_lines": 0, "total_bytes": 0, "error_count": 0 },
  "structure": [],
  "imports": [],
  "exports": [],
  "comments": [],
  "docstrings": [],
  "symbols": [],
  "diagnostics": [],
  "chunks": []
}

metrics is populated whenever any processing runs. chunks appears only when --chunk-size is set.

Structure items

Each structure entry has kind ("function", "class", "method", "module", ...), name, start_line/end_line (1-indexed), start_byte/end_byte, parent (enclosing class/module or null), docstring (when --docstrings), and visibility.

Examples

# Function and class names with line numbers
ts-pack process src/service.py --structure \
  | jq '.structure[] | {kind, name, line: .start_line}'

# Import sources only
ts-pack process src/app.ts --imports \
  | jq '.imports[].source'

# Syntax error count (also available via metrics.error_count)
ts-pack process broken.go --diagnostics \
  | jq '.diagnostics | length'

# Build a symbol index across a tree of files
for f in $(git ls-files '*.rs'); do
  ts-pack process "$f" --symbols | jq -c --arg f "$f" '{file: $f, symbols: .symbols}'
done

SDK equivalent

from tree_sitter_language_pack import process, ProcessConfig

config = ProcessConfig("python").all()        # or set fields via the constructor
result = process(source_code, config)
for item in result["structure"]:
    print(item["kind"], item["name"], item["start_line"])

The SDK additionally supports custom tree-sitter query patterns via the extractions config field — not exposed on the CLI.

When to reach for parse instead

If the user wants the raw syntax tree rather than extracted metadata, use ts-pack parse — see the parsing-source skill.