What is a Linter?

Linters have a long history in software development. Stephen C. Johnson (writings) developed Lint while debugging Yacc (Yet Another Compiler-Compiler), which was written in the C programming language at Bell Labs in 1978.

Much like the way a lint roller will go over your clothes, removing unwanted dust, hairs and other assorted undesirables (like legos), a software linter will go over and analyze your source code for possible errors, best practices and stylistic issues. Configuration options allow you to choose which bugs to identify, flag, and if desired, act on.

The linter can auto-“fix” code, flag the offending code for inspection or do nothing.The linter I’ll be using is ESLint which is an open source Javascript linting tool. It’s used by a long list of companies and organizations. You can learn more about ESLint and their philosophy on their homepage.

#eslint-config #programming #beginner #eslint