[Asterisk-Dev] [Rant] [long] - code style and quality

[Jean-Hugues ROBERT]

At 09:12 10/05/2005 +0200, steve at daviesfam.org wrote:

>Heh - I used to contribute to mplayer; once upon a time they wouldn't
>accept patches that changed indentation...
>Steve

This is very unfortunate.

Fact is, the Coding Guidelines explicitly advices about avoiding
whitespace changes.

This is an issue.

Over the last few years a new notion appeared, called "Refactoring".
See http://www.c2.com/cgi/wiki?WhatIsRefactoring

It's about internal changes that don't change the external behavior
of the system. Basically: you clean the mess.

To make it easier (or even possible) to refactor Asterisk's code, I
think that a few tools are missing:

   1) A non regression test platform.
   Who would dare breaking code to make it look prettier?
   With a test platform (and a test suite), you can make changes,
   including big ones, with at least some safety.

   2) A computerized "styliser". Basically, if there is no tool to
   enforce the style, don't expect it to be respected. Maybe some
   variations around "indent" could do the job.

   3) A semantically rich "diff/patch" solution. Where one can focus
   on the meaning of changes instead of presentation. Maybe some
   "indent+diff/patch" scheme could work.

For style, an incremental solution is possible:
   When a patch is accepted, the impacted files get "indent" processed
   and it is the new indented file that is committed. Over time, all active
   parts of the system will migrate.
   To smooth the transition, the indenting tool should be released so
   that "private" patches can migrate easily too (especially if there
   is a backlog of them).

I have to say that some recent comments about difficulties to have
patches accepted are worrying. But the very pragmatic approach of
Asterisk makes me feel that solutions will emerge as Asterisk keeps
growing successful.

Yours,

   JeanHuguesRobert



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