Greetings all, In addition to thinking about modules in general, I've been thinking about coding standards. I actually think we have a somewhat consistent style that goes through our various packages, but I also know that we aren't probably as consistent as we should be.
There are various issues, but one of them is just how the code looks visually on the page, which is important. Anyway, lately I've been reading a book by Damian Conway called Perl Best Practices, which has lots of interesting ideas about how to write code, etc. and also on issues like documentation, formatting, use of perldoc, etc. etc. One tip I got from that book was about a package called perltidy, which I am rather impressed by already. http://perltidy.sourceforge.net/ I am thinking this might be pretty useful, so please do take a look at this and let me know what you think of it. Also, you can see parts of Perl Best Practices on Google Books... http://tinyurl.com/46kkc2 Anyway, I think we've done a good job over the years at arriving at a consistent and manageable style of doing things, and I guess I keep thinking about ways to do that better, and then to convey that knowledge as time goes by rather than just saying "look at this example". In fact I think good examples is a key to making this happen over time, but I also think some tools like perltidy, etc. might help too. Anyway, just wanted to share the above, and also solicit any suggestions that anyone might have about tools and ideas that will help keep our code from going off in too many different directions. Some variation is of course necessary, but it's also kind of nice when things have a similar look and feel to them as you move from package to package. Thanks! Ted -- Ted Pedersen http://www.d.umn.edu/~tpederse
