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Diffstat (limited to 'Documentation/CodingGuidelines')
| -rw-r--r-- | Documentation/CodingGuidelines | 147 |
1 files changed, 138 insertions, 9 deletions
diff --git a/Documentation/CodingGuidelines b/Documentation/CodingGuidelines index 57da6aadeb..ed432a80ca 100644 --- a/Documentation/CodingGuidelines +++ b/Documentation/CodingGuidelines @@ -1,5 +1,5 @@ Like other projects, we also have some guidelines to keep to the -code. For git in general, three rough rules are: +code. For Git in general, three rough rules are: - Most importantly, we never say "It's in POSIX; we'll happily ignore your needs should your system not conform to it." @@ -18,11 +18,12 @@ code. For git in general, three rough rules are: judgement call, the decision based more on real world constraints people face than what the paper standard says. +Make your code readable and sensible, and don't try to be clever. As for more concrete guidelines, just imitate the existing code (this is a good guideline, no matter which project you are contributing to). It is always preferable to match the _local_ -convention. New code added to git suite is expected to match +convention. New code added to Git suite is expected to match the overall style of existing code. Modifications to existing code is expected to match the style the surrounding code already uses (even if it doesn't match the overall style of existing code). @@ -112,11 +113,30 @@ For C programs: - We try to keep to at most 80 characters per line. + - We try to support a wide range of C compilers to compile Git with, + including old ones. That means that you should not use C99 + initializers, even if a lot of compilers grok it. + + - Variables have to be declared at the beginning of the block. + + - NULL pointers shall be written as NULL, not as 0. + - When declaring pointers, the star sides with the variable name, i.e. "char *string", not "char* string" or "char * string". This makes it easier to understand code like "char *string, c;". + - Use whitespace around operators and keywords, but not inside + parentheses and not around functions. So: + + while (condition) + func(bar + 1); + + and not: + + while( condition ) + func (bar+1); + - We avoid using braces unnecessarily. I.e. if (bla) { @@ -136,6 +156,14 @@ For C programs: they were describing changes. Often splitting a function into two makes the intention of the code much clearer. + - Multi-line comments include their delimiters on separate lines from + the text. E.g. + + /* + * A very long + * multi-line comment. + */ + - Double negation is often harder to understand than no negation at all. @@ -156,14 +184,14 @@ For C programs: - If you are planning a new command, consider writing it in shell or perl first, so that changes in semantics can be easily - changed and discussed. Many git commands started out like + changed and discussed. Many Git commands started out like that, and a few are still scripts. - - Avoid introducing a new dependency into git. This means you + - Avoid introducing a new dependency into Git. This means you usually should stay away from scripting languages not already - used in the git core command set (unless your command is clearly + used in the Git core command set (unless your command is clearly separate from it, such as an importer to convert random-scm-X - repositories to git). + repositories to Git). - When we pass <string, length> pair to functions, we should try to pass them in that order. @@ -171,13 +199,83 @@ For C programs: - Use Git's gettext wrappers to make the user interface translatable. See "Marking strings for translation" in po/README. +For Perl programs: + + - Most of the C guidelines above apply. + + - We try to support Perl 5.8 and later ("use Perl 5.008"). + + - use strict and use warnings are strongly preferred. + + - Don't overuse statement modifiers unless using them makes the + result easier to follow. + + ... do something ... + do_this() unless (condition); + ... do something else ... + + is more readable than: + + ... do something ... + unless (condition) { + do_this(); + } + ... do something else ... + + *only* when the condition is so rare that do_this() will be almost + always called. + + - We try to avoid assignments inside "if ()" conditions. + + - Learn and use Git.pm if you need that functionality. + + - For Emacs, it's useful to put the following in + GIT_CHECKOUT/.dir-locals.el, assuming you use cperl-mode: + + ;; note the first part is useful for C editing, too + ((nil . ((indent-tabs-mode . t) + (tab-width . 8) + (fill-column . 80))) + (cperl-mode . ((cperl-indent-level . 8) + (cperl-extra-newline-before-brace . nil) + (cperl-merge-trailing-else . t)))) + +For Python scripts: + + - We follow PEP-8 (http://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0008/). + + - As a minimum, we aim to be compatible with Python 2.6 and 2.7. + + - Where required libraries do not restrict us to Python 2, we try to + also be compatible with Python 3.1 and later. + + - When you must differentiate between Unicode literals and byte string + literals, it is OK to use the 'b' prefix. Even though the Python + documentation for version 2.6 does not mention this prefix, it has + been supported since version 2.6.0. + Writing Documentation: + Most (if not all) of the documentation pages are written in the + AsciiDoc format in *.txt files (e.g. Documentation/git.txt), and + processed into HTML and manpages (e.g. git.html and git.1 in the + same directory). + + The documentation liberally mixes US and UK English (en_US/UK) + norms for spelling and grammar, which is somewhat unfortunate. + In an ideal world, it would have been better if it consistently + used only one and not the other, and we would have picked en_US + (if you wish to correct the English of some of the existing + documentation, please see the documentation-related advice in the + Documentation/SubmittingPatches file). + Every user-visible change should be reflected in the documentation. The same general rule as for code applies -- imitate the existing - conventions. A few commented examples follow to provide reference - when writing or modifying command usage strings and synopsis sections - in the manual pages: + conventions. + + A few commented examples follow to provide reference when writing or + modifying command usage strings and synopsis sections in the manual + pages: Placeholders are spelled in lowercase and enclosed in angle brackets: <file> @@ -222,3 +320,34 @@ Writing Documentation: valid usage. "*" has its own pair of brackets, because it can (optionally) be specified only when one or more of the letters is also provided. + + A note on notation: + Use 'git' (all lowercase) when talking about commands i.e. something + the user would type into a shell and use 'Git' (uppercase first letter) + when talking about the version control system and its properties. + + A few commented examples follow to provide reference when writing or + modifying paragraphs or option/command explanations that contain options + or commands: + + Literal examples (e.g. use of command-line options, command names, and + configuration variables) are typeset in monospace, and if you can use + `backticks around word phrases`, do so. + `--pretty=oneline` + `git rev-list` + `remote.pushdefault` + + Word phrases enclosed in `backtick characters` are rendered literally + and will not be further expanded. The use of `backticks` to achieve the + previous rule means that literal examples should not use AsciiDoc + escapes. + Correct: + `--pretty=oneline` + Incorrect: + `\--pretty=oneline` + + If some place in the documentation needs to typeset a command usage + example with inline substitutions, it is fine to use +monospaced and + inline substituted text+ instead of `monospaced literal text`, and with + the former, the part that should not get substituted must be + quoted/escaped. |