A Critical Look at the Coding Standards Landscape
summary
Many public C and C++ standards exist but they often mismatch project context: MISRA C++ 2008 targets C++03 and freestanding implementations and is not appropriate for modern C++ projects. Static analysis of an old GDB snapshot finds 202,000 violations across 335k LOC — about 0.6 defects per LOC — producing huge remediation cost (each MISRA deviation record ≈2.5 pages), estimated hundreds to thousands of hours. Use precise context, automate trivial rules in IDE/CI, review rules regularly, and prefer forking a guideline to fit the codebase.
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chapters (11)
- 0:00Introduction to coding standards
- 1:18Context and conference recommendations
- 2:18Personal background and vendetta
- 5:16Defining coding guidelines and standards
- 8:50Purpose and goals of coding guidelines
- 13:53Techniques for writing effective rules
- 23:50Q&A on static analysis feedback
- 25:07Problems with coding standards
- 37:29Over-reliance and productivity issues
- 49:21Conclusions and best practices
- 55:11Final Q&A session
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