--- title: Implementing a performance boosting algorithm in Coccinelle description: A developer describes implementing a performance optimization algorithm for Coccinelle, a C source code refactoring tool used in Linux Kernel development. The... canonical: https://daily.dev/posts/implementing-a-performance-boosting-algorithm-in-coccinelle-5wviw86sl twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:site: @dailydotdev og:type: website og:site_name: daily.dev og:title: Implementing a performance boosting algorithm in Coccinelle | daily.dev og:description: A developer describes implementing a performance optimization algorithm for Coccinelle, a C source code refactoring tool used in Linux Kernel development. The... og:url: https://daily.dev/posts/implementing-a-performance-boosting-algorithm-in-coccinelle-5wviw86sl og:image: https://api.daily.dev/og/posts/5WvIw86sL.png og:image:alt: Implementing a performance boosting algorithm in Coccinelle og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 630 og:locale: en --- > ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://daily.dev/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # Implementing a performance boosting algorithm in Coccinelle **[Collabora Blog](https://daily.dev/sources/collabora)** · 3 min read · 0 upvotes · 0 comments ## Summary A developer describes implementing a performance optimization algorithm for Coccinelle, a C source code refactoring tool used in Linux Kernel development. The specific improvement targeted recursive header file parsing: reducing the time to parse the entire Linux Kernel from approximately 7 hours down to 45 minutes. The post briefly explains how Coccinelle works (semantic patches, AST comparison) and notes remaining opportunities like multiprocessing or conditional parsing. ## Full article daily.dev links to this article rather than hosting it. Read it at the original source: ## Questions this post answers ### How long does Coccinelle take to recursively parse header files across the entire Linux Kernel? With a performance-boosting algorithm applied to recursive header parsing, Coccinelle processes the entire Linux Kernel in approximately 45 minutes. Before the optimization, the same operation took close to 7 hours. Further improvements such as multiprocessing or conditional parsing based on semantic patch matches remain possible but unimplemented. _Developers working on Linux kernel tooling track Coccinelle improvements and similar optimizations on daily.dev._ ### Why does Coccinelle need to recursively parse header files in the Linux Kernel? Coccinelle can only analyze one C file at a time, so it must recursively parse included header files to resolve types for C constructs such as struct fields and typedefs. Without this recursive parsing, it cannot determine the types needed to correctly match and transform code across the kernel tree. _Kernel developers following Coccinelle's evolution find related tooling discussions on daily.dev._ ## Similar posts on daily.dev - [coccinelle/coccinelle: Source code of the Coccinelle project \(mirror of the main Coccinelle repository located at Inria\)](https://daily.dev/posts/coccinelle-coccinelle-source-code-of-the-coccinelle-project-mirror-of-the-main-coccinelle-reposito-6g4qtjsen) · Hacker News · 0 upvotes · 0 comments - [AI Made A Lot Of "Hideous" Code But Found Major Bottlenecks For Faster Linux Compilation](https://daily.dev/posts/ai-made-a-lot-of-hideous-code-but-found-major-bottlenecks-for-faster-linux-compilation-c9ex1mqlu) · Phoronix · 0 upvotes · 0 comments - [vittorio romeo's website](https://daily.dev/posts/vittorio-romeo-s-website-0p40ygjv1) · C\+\+ · 0 upvotes · 0 comments - [How to speed up the Rust compiler in July 2026](https://daily.dev/posts/how-to-speed-up-the-rust-compiler-in-july-2026-rsrjhr5xg) · Lobsters · 2 upvotes · 0 comments --- Tags: [#linux](https://daily.dev/tags/linux), [#performance](https://daily.dev/tags/performance), [#c](https://daily.dev/tags/c) [View this post on daily.dev](https://daily.dev/posts/implementing-a-performance-boosting-algorithm-in-coccinelle-5wviw86sl) ```json {"@context":"https://schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization","name":"daily.dev","url":"https://daily.dev","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://daily.dev/apple-touch-icon.png","width":180,"height":180},"sameAs":["https://twitter.com/dailydotdev","https://github.com/dailydotdev","https://www.linkedin.com/company/daily-dev-ltd"]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https://daily.dev/#website","url":"https://daily.dev","name":"daily.dev","publisher":{"@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization"},"potentialAction":{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https://daily.dev/search?q={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}}]} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"TechArticle","headline":"Implementing a performance boosting algorithm in Coccinelle","url":"https://daily.dev/posts/implementing-a-performance-boosting-algorithm-in-coccinelle-5wviw86sl","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://daily.dev/posts/implementing-a-performance-boosting-algorithm-in-coccinelle-5wviw86sl"},"datePublished":"2026-08-11T08:56:17.886Z","dateModified":"2026-08-11T09:33:08.066Z","description":"A developer describes implementing a performance optimization algorithm for Coccinelle, a C source code refactoring tool used in Linux Kernel development. 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