Core should bundle a code formatter for contributors.

[bmeck]

Is your feature request related to a problem? Please describe.
Please describe the problem you are trying to solve.

When writing PRs to Node core I spend too much time dealing with code formatting. There should be some command that I can run that automatically formats code so I can get features done rather than spending sometimes an hour or more fiddling with whitespace rules and line lengths to make the linter happy.

Describe the solution you'd like
Please describe the desired behavior.

I should be able to run some command such as make fmt that automatically deals w/ line lengths, whitespace, etc. so I don't hear about it from these stylistic choices from the linter when I run make lint.

Describe alternatives you've considered
Please describe alternative solutions or features you have considered.

Continuing to just bear this linter anger in my PRs.

[bmeck]

I'd note that when/if we do this, likely a large portion of lib/ will face major churn if we are not careful.

[richardlau]

FWIW There are already

node/Makefile

Lines 1256 to 1258 in f41893e

	.PHONY: lint-js-fix
	lint-js-fix:
	@$(call available-node,$(run-lint-js-fix))

for things that eslint can automatically fix and

node/Makefile

Lines 1335 to 1353 in f41893e

	.PHONY: format-cpp
	# To format staged changes:
	# $ make format-cpp
	# To format HEAD~1...HEAD (latest commit):
	# $ CLANG_FORMAT_START=`git rev-parse HEAD~1` make format-cpp
	# To format diff between master and current branch head (master...HEAD):
	# $ CLANG_FORMAT_START=master make format-cpp
	format-cpp: ## Format C++ diff from $CLANG_FORMAT_START to current changes
	ifneq ("","$(wildcard tools/clang-format/node_modules/)")
	$(info Formatting C++ diff from $(CLANG_FORMAT_START)..)
	@$(PYTHON) tools/clang-format/node_modules/.bin/git-clang-format \
	--binary=tools/clang-format/node_modules/.bin/clang-format \
	--style=file \
	$(CLANG_FORMAT_START) -- \
	$(LINT_CPP_FILES)
	else
	$(info clang-format is not installed.)
	$(info To install (requires internet access) run: $$ make format-cpp-build)
	endif

for formatting C++.

[bmeck]

@richardlau good to know, this wasn't ever in my knowledge so i doubt others know about it as well; perhaps this should be more visible when linting fails?

[sagitsofan]

I think this can be added to the The process of making changes on the pull-requests.md.
WDYT?

[mhdawson]

@sagitsofan I think that makes sense, right under the For contributing C++ code, you may want to look at the part where the style guide is introduced. Di you want to submit a PR?