NAME

Test::PerlTidy - check that all your files are tidy.

SYNOPSIS

    # In a file like 't/perltidy.t':

    use Test::PerlTidy;

    run_tests();

DESCRIPTION

This rather unflattering comment was made in a piece by Ken Arnold:

    "Perl is a vast swamp of lexical and syntactic swill and nobody
    knows how to format even their own code well, but it's the only
    major language I can think of (with the possible exception of the
    recent, yet very Java-like C#) that doesn't have at least one
    style that's good enough."
              http://www.artima.com/weblogs/viewpost.jsp?thread=74230

Hmmm... He is sort of right in a way. Then again the piece he wrote was related to Python which is somewhat strict about formatting itself.

Fear not though - now you too can have your very own formatting gestapo in the form of Test::PerlTidy! Simply add a test file as suggested above and any file ending in .pl, .pm, .t or .PL will cause a test fail unless it is exactly as perltidy would like it to be.

REASONS TO DO THIS

If the style is mandated in tests then it will be adhered to.

If perltidy decides what is a good style then there should be no quibbling.

If the style never changes then cvs diffs stop catching changes that are not really there.

Readability might even improve.

HINTS

If you want to change the default style then muck around with '.perltidyrc';

To quickly make a file work then try 'perltidy -b the_messy_file.pl'.

HOW IT WORKS

Runs perltidy on files and reports errors if any of the files differ after having been tidied. Does not permanently modify the files being tested.

By default, perltidy will be run on files under the current directory and its subdirectories with extensions matching: ".pm .pl .PL .t"

METHODS

run_tests ( [ %args ] )

This is the main entry point for running tests.

A number of options can be specified when running the tests, e.g.:

    run_tests(
              path       => $start_dir,
              perltidyrc => $path_to_config_file,
              exclude    => [ qr{\.t$}, 'inc/'],
    );

debug

Set "debug" to a true value to enable additional diagnostic output, in particular info about any processing done as a result of specifying the "exclude" option. Default is false.

exclude

"run_tests()" will look for files to test under the current directory and its subdirectories. By default, it will exclude files in the ""./blib/"" directory. Set "exclude" to a listref of exclusion criteria if you need to specify additional rules by which files will be excluded.

If an item in the "exclude" list is a string, e.g. ""./blib/"", it will be assumed to be a path prefix. Files will be excluded if that string matches their path at the beginning.

If an item in the "exclude" list is a regex object, e.g. ""qr{\.t$}"", files will be excluded if that regex matches their path.

Note that the paths of files to be tested are canonified using File::Spec"->canonpath" before any matching is attempted, which can impact how the exclusion rules apply. If your exclusion rules do not seem to be working, turn on the "debug" option to see the paths of the files that are being kept/excluded.

path

Set "path" to the path to the top-level directory which contains the files to be tested. Defaults to the current directory (i.e. ""."").

perltidyrc

By default, perltidy will attempt to read its options from the .perltidyrc file on your system. Set "perltidyrc" to the path to a custom file if you would like to control the perltidy options used during testing.

mute

By default, "run_tests()" will output diagnostics about any errors reported by perltidy, as well as any actual differences found between the pre-tidied and post-tidied files. Set "mute" to a true value to turn off that diagnostic output.

skip_all