Coding Conventions

From WalaWiki

1. Normal Sun-style Java coding conventions, with 2-space indenting and 132 columns. Please indent with two spaces and don't use tabs. If using Eclipse, you can import the following coding styles codeTemplates.xml and formatter.xml from the dat/ directory of com.ibm.wala.core.
2. Be extremely liberal with comments and javadoc.
3. All code must compile against JDK 5.0.
4. No code should ever write to System.out or System.err. Use the com.ibm.wala.util.debug.Trace facility to write debugging and trace messages.
5. Use the com.ibm.wala.util.debug.Assertions class liberally. All calls to assert() must be guarded by Assertions.verifyAssertions. Use the productionAssert entrypoints for assertions that should be enabled in production, and thus not guarded.
6. Do not explicitly throw exceptions or errors ... any such conditions should be redirected through the Assertions class .. such as Assertions.UNREACHABLE().
7. All Eclipse code should work with Eclipse 3.3.
8. All code should be deterministic if possible ... avoid System.identityHashCode and finalizers.
9. Any shortcuts, assumptions, or analysis problems should be recorded in the static Warnings dictionary.
10. Assertions.verifyAssertions should be true in HEAD until further notice.
11. Each Java file should have a header similar to the one below. You do not have to assign the copyright to IBM. However if you want to, feel free.

Template for Java file header

/*******************************************************************************
 * Copyright (c) 2002 - 2006 IBM Corporation
 * [Or Copyright(c) 200x Your name]
 * All rights reserved. This program and the accompanying materials
 * are made available under the terms of the Eclipse Public License v1.0
 * which accompanies this distribution, and is available at
 * http://www.eclipse.org/legal/epl-v10.html
 *
 * Contributors:
 *     IBM Corporation - initial API and implementation
 *     OR your name.
 *******************************************************************************/