Re: [PATCH] pg_bsd_indent: improve formatting of multiline comments

On Fri, Dec 12, 2025 at 11:17:01AM -0500, Tom Lane wrote:
> =?utf-8?Q?=C3=81lvaro?= Herrera <alvherre(at)kurilemu(dot)de> writes:
>> It's strange to see this thread go on about messing with the Perl script
>> because we're too afraid of pg_bsd_indent. Maybe we should take
>> ownership of that code -- improve its own indentation to our
>> conventions, add comments, rename unclear variables, and so on until we
>> have something we can work with, and fix these weird bugs and
>> idiosincratic behaviors we don't like. I just found out this code dates
>> back from 1976.
>
> I've worked with that code a little bit, and it's mostly unreadable
> spaghetti :-(. If somebody wants to make an effort to make it not
> so awful, that'd be great, but I fear it's a very nontrivial project.

Yeah, I tried to find a bug in it recently and could do little more than
trial-and-error in the areas that seemed vaguely close (with no success).
I'm generally critical of efforts to rewrite things from scratch, but this
might be a case where it's the better option.

--
nathan