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Code Navigation

mxcli provides a suite of cross-reference navigation commands that let you explore relationships between elements in a Mendix project. These commands answer questions like “what calls this microflow?”, “what would break if I change this entity?”, and “what does this element depend on?”

Prerequisites

Cross-reference navigation commands require a full catalog refresh before use:

REFRESH CATALOG FULL;

This populates the reference data needed for callers, callees, references, impact, and context queries. A basic REFRESH CATALOG only builds metadata tables and is not sufficient for cross-reference navigation.

Available Commands

CommandPurpose
LIST CALLERS OFFind what calls a given element
LIST CALLEES OFFind what a given element calls
LIST REFERENCES TOFind all references to and from an element
LIST IMPACT OFAnalyze the impact of changing an element
DESCRIBE CONTEXT OFShow the surrounding context of an element
SEARCHFull-text search across all strings and source

CLI Subcommands

These commands are also available as CLI subcommands for scripting and piping:

mxcli callers -p app.mpr Module.MyMicroflow
mxcli callees -p app.mpr Module.MyMicroflow
mxcli refs -p app.mpr Module.Customer
mxcli impact -p app.mpr Module.Customer
mxcli context -p app.mpr Module.MyMicroflow --depth 3
mxcli search -p app.mpr "validation"

Typical Workflow

  1. Refresh the catalog to ensure cross-reference data is current
  2. Explore references to understand how elements are connected
  3. Analyze impact before making changes
  4. Use context to gather surrounding information for AI-assisted development
-- Step 1: Build the catalog
REFRESH CATALOG FULL;

-- Step 2: Understand what uses a microflow
LIST CALLERS OF Sales.ACT_ProcessOrder;

-- Step 3: Check impact before renaming an entity
LIST IMPACT OF Sales.Customer;

-- Step 4: Gather context for AI consumption
DESCRIBE CONTEXT OF Sales.SubmitOrder;

How AI Assistants Use This

When you ask an AI assistant to modify an element, it uses these commands to:

  1. Discover dependencies with LIST CALLERS and LIST REFERENCES
  2. Assess risk with LIST IMPACT before making changes
  3. Gather context with DESCRIBE CONTEXT for informed code generation
  4. Find related elements with SEARCH to understand patterns