[chirp_devel] Fwd: [CHIRP - Feature #159] (In Progress) Get pylint happy with chirp

[Zach Welch]

On 03/08/2015 07:53 AM, Dan Smith wrote:
> I'd like to get a feeling from others about how valuable they think it
> is to have a bunch of change to get pylint happy. Personally, I
> abandoned this work a while ago being ever more frustrated with pylint
> in a lot of areas. Having used it (or specifically not used it) in other
> large projects since, I think it's value is extremely limited. For
> example, it will likely be hopelessly confused by bitwise and any code
> that uses it. I've seen it employed most usefully in a situation where
> it is simply used against a specific patch to try to gauge whether it
> "makes things worse or not".

FWIW, I have patches to de-lint bitwise_grammar.py and bitwise.py, and I 
think the changes are uniformly beneficial to the code.  So far, pylint 
has had no troubles with bitwise code that weren't rooted in other 
legitimate issues.  The most widespread problem has been the lack of 
docstrings.  Maybe it has matured since you last used it?

> Unless we pick things we care about specifically for a whitelist of
> issues, I'd rather not see another hundred or so patches to try to
> trivially appease pylint.

I have already eliminated a half-dozen of its checks, because it's just 
too pedantic (or redundant/conflicting with pep8).  I am continuing to 
tweak the pylintrc file, because I heartily agree that it's far too much 
to expect 100% conformance to its stock configuration.  Nevertheless, 
pylint's complaints seem less trivial than pep8's.

It gets a solid endorsement from me, because it has already flagged some 
real errors in the code that need to be fixed.  Indeed, I was originally 
skeptical that it would be worthwhile, since we already comply with 
pep8; however, these results made me think that it can be tuned to yield 
significant ongoing value for this project.

At this point, I have almost a dozen patches in my tree, and I think 
that they add enough value (e.g. docstrings) to justify their inclusion 
(independent of the fact that they yield pylint compliance).  I am 
working to clean up my stack and post what I have for consideration.  As 
such, please reserve judgment until you see that series hit the list.

-- 
Zach Welch
Mandolin Creek Farm
www.mandolincreekfarm.com
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