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Custom tools

Posted: Fri Nov 02, 2007 1:45 am
by alex.barylski
I typically use the following little hack tools to allow me to perform more tasks faster or automate certain tasks completely.

I had a php script which scanned the project directory and generated a list of TODO's extracted from my source. I have since just switched to using grep. Still damn handy if your like me and place TODO comments throughout your code.

What kind of tools have you hammered out in the past or present to assist you in making your coding experience more plesant...

try and avoid third party tools like lint, etc...I'm more curious to hear about tools you hacked out to help solve re-occuring problems in a particular project or all projects you work on.

What the heck, mention all the lints you use too...I just wanna know what adhoc type tools you use to make development easier...

No IDE's or their extensions, like source browsers, etc don't count.

Posted: Fri Nov 02, 2007 7:01 am
by Maugrim_The_Reaper
Well, I'm writing a behaviour specification suite - does that count ;).

You probably pegged it best - most of the tiny tasks I write (often as Phing plugins) are for recursively scanning source code files and directories hunting for metrics. So I may want to compile a list of @todo notes (I think annotations are the cleanest form of marking), or maybe compile a list of files a specific test requires from the source code under test, or just to allow a quick scan of a class for its method names (so I don't need to go open and read the file to remember them all!). Nearly all run from the command line.

Posted: Fri Nov 02, 2007 3:02 pm
by alex.barylski
or just to allow a quick scan of a class for its method names (so I don't need to go open and read the file to remember them all!).
Thats a good idea. Quick, realtime docs. I wonder if this could easily be accomplished using reflection, to simply list the class name and their methods and parameters.

Posted: Fri Nov 02, 2007 3:21 pm
by feyd
Not only can reflection give you method and parameter data for classes, it can also give you phpDoc comment blocks associated with them.

Posted: Fri Nov 02, 2007 6:51 pm
by Maugrim_The_Reaper
Reflection knows all ;). A simple class details lookup script is very small using Reflection.

Posted: Fri Nov 02, 2007 6:57 pm
by Kieran Huggins
...with the single exception, sadly, of the Vampire class.

Posted: Fri Nov 02, 2007 7:51 pm
by alex.barylski
Kieran Huggins wrote:...with the single exception, sadly, of the Vampire class.
For a second there...I was like Vampire class??? WTF...then it clicked...and I laughed... :lol:

How fitting to, being only a few days after halloween. 8)