AST parsing fails primarily due to installation issues, not syntax errors in your code.
TheAuditor uses a sandboxed environment (.auditor_venv/) to avoid polluting your system. When Tree-sitter
isn't properly installed in that sandbox, we fall back to regex patterns. Common causes:
1. Missing C compiler - Tree-sitter needs to compile language grammars
2. Incomplete setup - User didn't run aud setup-claude --target . which installs the AST tools
3. Old installation - Before we fixed the [ast] dependency inclusion
If your code had syntax errors, you'd get different errors entirely (and your code probably wouldn't run). The
"AST parsing fails" message specifically means Tree-sitter isn't available, so we're using the fallback regex patterns instead.
Just pushed clearer docs about this today actually. Run aud setup-claude --target . in your project and
Tree-sitter should work properly.
TheAuditor uses a sandboxed environment (.auditor_venv/) to avoid polluting your system. When Tree-sitter isn't properly installed in that sandbox, we fall back to regex patterns. Common causes:
1. Missing C compiler - Tree-sitter needs to compile language grammars 2. Incomplete setup - User didn't run aud setup-claude --target . which installs the AST tools 3. Old installation - Before we fixed the [ast] dependency inclusion
If your code had syntax errors, you'd get different errors entirely (and your code probably wouldn't run). The "AST parsing fails" message specifically means Tree-sitter isn't available, so we're using the fallback regex patterns instead.
Just pushed clearer docs about this today actually. Run aud setup-claude --target . in your project and Tree-sitter should work properly.