[cfe-dev] clang-format custom format specification

[Kyle Knoepfel via cfe-dev]

Forgive me if this has already been discussed.  

I work on projects with different formatting guidelines.  For simple cases, it is simple to embed the .clang-format file in the correct (parent) directory, run `clang-format -style=file ...` and everyone's happy.  However, it is easy to get into a situation where the wrong format is applied, especially if you accidentally invoke the command from the wrong directory.

Would Clang be opposed to a command line invocation such as:

clang-format -style=custom:my-projects-format ...

where a field in the .clang-format file would have the value 'my-projects-format', thus attributing the file to the format name?  If a user specified something like -style=custom:my-unsupported-format, and such a format name could not be discovered in the .clang-format file, then it would be a hard failure, not letting a silent error slip by.

Thanks for your input.  If it is favorable, then I'm happy to explore implementing it.

Kyle Knoepfel

Software framework group leader, Fermilab