C# check or force naming conventions

Question

I have inherited a few programs from a previous developer who was a little sloppy with naming variables, methods and classes with different capitalization and sometimes underscores.

Is there a program or a way in visual studio to validate the naming of each variable, method, property, constant, class.... I would be fine with the standard C# conventions.

Answer 1

You could look at Microsoft StyleCop and FXCop

Answer 2

FXCop has that and much more.

Answer 3

What you're looking for is StyleCop.

It reads source code to ensure that certain rules are obeyed.

FxCop is used to read the compiled code and generally is not used for this sort of stylistic checking.

Answer 4

FxCop will do the job (or more up-to-date Code Analysis).

Answer 5

Have a look at StyleCop / CodeStyleEnforcer

They'll highlight the bogies but you'll hvae to fix them yourself

http://code.msdn.microsoft.com/sourceanalysis

http://joel.fjorden.se/static.php?page=CodeStyleEnforcer

Answer 6

FXCop and StyleCop can be used to check for conformance to best practices and standards.

Answer 7

This sounds like a job for:

StyleCop

From the website:

StyleCop analyzes C# source code to enforce a set of style and consistency rules. It can be run from inside of Visual Studio or integrated into an MSBuild project

Answer 8

I use ReSharper 4.5 for that, which has this advantage, that it allows you to see non-comforming code as you write it.

You also can use NDepend and CQL to check your conventions in a very granular and flexible way. It's great as part of your build script.

Both tools cost money, both are worth it.

Answer 9

As the others have said: FxCop and StyleCop. ReSharper 4.5 also has configurable naming conventions. The beauty of this is that it'll highlight misnamed items and give you a popup with a suggested name. I'm not 100% sure, but I think this can also be run during ReSharper's 'Code Cleanup' functionality (if it's not, it'd be great if it could be!)

Of course, once you edit and and correct the names, they'll only be correct at that very point time in time. To ensure they're correct now and forever more, integrate FxCop/StyleCop into your Continuous Integration environment. This'll catch the naughty anti-social developers who flaunt the rules and regulations (what community service you give them is up to you, but it often involves being the doughnut and/or coffee purchaser 'till someone else screws up!)