So I was trying to use perltidy programmatically, that means using Perl::Tidy. Basically I wanted to use an existing .perltidyrc along with the backup option. That is, instead of making a new file with .tdy at the end, replace the original and back it up to .bak. So after reading the docs I figured that this should work:

Unfortunately that just doesn’t work. Here’s how I got it to work:

I also had to modify the .perltidyrc file some as apparently Perl::Tidy doesn’t have a way to choose who wins when there are conflicts in the switches and the config file. One way or another, it was annoying.

Maybe I was doing it wrong?

So I am working on a new way to use perlcritic, and one of the things I’d like perlcritic to check for is a correctly formatted file. Unfortunately the integration between perlcritic and perltidy goes something like this:

Tidy the file with perltidy

Give vague error if tidy file != original file

That’s fine until you discover that = signs get aligned and apparently you cannot turn that feature off. That means that my code gets marked sketch if I don’t align my = signs. That is terrible. So I figured I’d make it easy to tidy up source files.

First off you have to install perltidy (I think it’s Acme::Tidy.) This also assumes Win32. On Mac and Linux the commandline isn’t so painful so this isn’t necessary. Next run this code:

That will allow for you to drag files onto .pl files and put the file list into @ARGV.

Then you just make a script with this in it:

And drag perl files into it. It will create new files with the .tdy extension in the same dir as the original files. If you create a .perltidyrc and put it in your home it will use those settings. Here’s our .perltidyrc:

Enjoy!