Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!sdd.hp.com!swrinde!ucsd!telesoft!rlk From: rlk@telesoft.com (Bob Kitzberger @sation) Newsgroups: comp.software-eng Subject: Re: What does lint do? Keywords: lint Message-ID: <1991May31.001113.12282@telesoft.com> Date: 31 May 91 00:11:13 GMT References: <91-05-108@comp.compilers> <1991May29.173713.7058@netcom.COM> <35026@mimsy.umd.edu> Organization: TeleSoft, San Diego, CA, USA Lines: 36 In <35026@mimsy.umd.edu> cml@cs.umd.edu (Christopher Lott) writes: >I do wish to throw in my $.02 to say that I convinced an old boss of mine >to purchase Gimpel Lint for use on the PC - we were using MS C at the time - >and once he saw early results, he happily took the time to run all of his code >as well as all of the code in the project through that beast. Founds lots of >stuff, wish I could remember juicy examples, but can't. Anyhow, they soon >swore by it, at least most of them did. But naturally there were some who >didn't see the use. I had unpleasant experiences with one, who when shown >the deficiencies in his code, still refused to make changes, etc, etc. I'm glad that you got your company to use it... it's a step up. Do folks use it EVERY TIME they compile? Or is it 'once every ten bug fixes' or 'once before we ship it'? I'm not insinuating that this is the way your shop does it, merely pointing out that I've yet to see someone that uses lint (anywhere near) each time they make a source change. I've spent too much time tracking down bugs that lint (if I had it) or a better language than C would have caught earlier on in the development process. On a personal level, debugging obscure problems introduced due to the lack of compile-time checks grew old after a year or two. On a professional level, it's insane and negligent to check for bugs later in the development cycle than it is, within reason, possible to detect them. Trying to catch bugs at design time rather than compile time, at compile time rather than unit test, at unit test rather than at integration, at integration rather than customer time, I remain, .Bob. -- Bob Kitzberger Internet : rlk@telesoft.com TeleSoft uucp : ...!ucsd.ucsd.edu!telesoft!rlk 5959 Cornerstone Court West, San Diego, CA 92121-9891 (619) 457-2700 x163 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ "Wretches, utter wretches, keep your hands from beans!" -- Empedocles