Only this! How to prevent forgetting code format in team development

Introduction

** "Code format is not applied." ** The person who pointed out this, the person who was. Isn't he there? This time, I will introduce a mechanism to execute the code format with ** CI tool ** and prevent the developer from executing the formatter.

Motivation to write this article

** A product with a code style specified by the customer ** faced the following problems, resulting in increased man-hours.

: star: ** Case 1. A case where "Code Formatter" is not applied locally and a Pull Request is issued **

: star: ** Case 2. After modifying based on the slip-through code and applying the code formatter, the differences other than the repaired part were extracted **

: star: ** Case 3. Increase man-hours by creating a system for "cross-checking" **

** [Why code formatter is not applied] **

--The code formatter is not described in the development environment construction procedure manual / development flow. (Ambiguous document)

--There is no transfer of flow between development members (development members are in flux)

Even if you prepare a configuration file for the code formatter, it is meaningless if it is not in operation **. Even if you write the documentation well, there is a limit to making sure that all project members have the same development preferences **. Therefore, I wanted to introduce how to apply the code formatter on the CI tool side for code owners who have similar problems.

Run code formatter with CI tools

** Solution idea **: Rather than relying on the development environment, the formatter should be applied automatically before the review is conducted.

Premise

The following requirements must be met in order for CI tools to work with code formatters.

1. Mechanism for detecting Push and Pull Request (Merge Request) to version control tools
2. There must be a code formatter that supports the following:

• Must be a tool that can be run from the command line and can operate standalone
• Must be a tool compatible with CI tools

For the method described below, we have selected tools that meet the above requirements, but if they do not exist (especially [1.]), please consider making your own.

Code format automatic application example

This sample shall be created under the following specifications.

Run code formatter automatically with CI tools

Code for CI (GitHub Action)

: star: Point: Since the branch acquired by on pull_reqest is different from the branch that made the Pull Request, it is necessary to explicitly acquire the branch that made the Pull Request at checkout.

name: Reformat Java source code

on:
  pull_request:

jobs:
  format:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    steps:
      #Check out the pull requested branch(★ ref is the point)
      - uses: actions/checkout@v2
        with:
          ref: ${{ github.head_ref }}
      #Java setup
      - name: Set up JDK 11
        uses: actions/setup-java@v1
        with:
          java-version: 11
      #Git settings
      - name: Git settings
        run: |
          #Git repository settings
          git config --local user.name "User name"
          git config --local user.email "E-Mail address"
      #Executing code format
      - name: Code format
        run: |
          wget -q -O google-java-format.jar \
            https://github.com/google/google-java-format/releases/download/google-java-format-1.9/google-java-format-1.9-all-deps.jar
          java -jar google-java-format.jar -replace $(git ls-files src/**/*.java)
      #Change confirmation
      - name: Check for modified files
        id: git-check
        run: echo ::set-output name=modified::$(if git diff-index --quiet HEAD --; then echo "false"; else echo "true"; fi)
      #If it has changed, do a commit push
      - name: Push
        if: steps.git-check.outputs.modified == 'true'
        run: |
          git commit -am "Automated :Reformat Java source code."
          git push

Execution result

** PullRequst implemented, new commit with code formatter applied at the time of change is added **

** Change difference **

Sample repository

The above is realized in the following repositories. (Branch: feature/format-action) https://github.com/yukiusa/github-action-auto-java-format-sample/tree/feature/format-action

at the end

How was that? This time, I introduced "a mechanism to comply with the rules without depending on the development environment" using CI tools. By implementing this initiative

--Reduce the trouble of creating a development environment --Reduce check man-hours --Reduce the load of reviewers and reviewers

I think that you can expect such effects. We hope that you will find it useful as one of the future business improvement plans.

Thank you for reading to the end.