Re: [Q] Tools for Ada Quality and Style

[JP Thornley <jpt@diphi.demon.co.uk>]

Robert Dewar wrote:
> 
> Bob Crispen was looking for pretty printing tools to enforce a 
standard.
> 
Actually that was me ...

> I must say I do not like this approach. For uniform style rules to 
work,
> everyone has to buy into them, and buying into them means getting 
> completely familiar with them and not considering writing code in any
> other style. 
> 
> If you rely on pretty printing tools, then there is a danger of 
continuing
> to foster a sloppy attitude to the style rules.
> 

I have a lot of sympathy for this view, but, as an example, I also see 
the point of view of a programmer who has to re-align all the parameters 
in a procedure (declaration and all its calls) because another parameter 
with a slightly longer name has been added.

A pretty-printer also makes it feasible to introduce layout rules at an 
upgrade and not just at the beginning of a development (and many of our 
systems go through a series of planned upgrades over a number of years).

> I *do* like tools that enforce style rules, to the extent that this is
> possible. Many style rules are simply too indefinite to enforce
> mechanically.
> 
I'm really looking for something that deals with the areas that the 
Quality and Style documents say are easily handled by an automated tool 
(mainly Chapters 2 and 3).

I would be (almost) as happy with an automated conformance checker.  (I 
can't see manual conformance checking being a possibility unless the 
culture is established right at the start.)

What experience generally do people have with pretty-printers and/or 
conformance checkers?   Are the rules generally too difficult to enforce 
automatically?  (I remember being quite happy with the Rational editor 
around 88/89, but I can't remember exactly what it did.)

Phil Thornley

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| JP Thornley    EMail jpt@diphi.demon.co.uk                           |
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