AppCode 2023.1 Help

Reformat and rearrange code

AppCode lets you reformat your code according to the requirements you've specified in your current code style scheme.

You can reformat a part of code, the whole file, group of files, a directory, and a module. You can also exclude part of code or some files from the reformatting.

Reformat a code fragment

  1. In the editor, select a code fragment you want to reformat.

    Before reformatting, you can take a look at the code style settings that are applied to the selected code: press Alt+Enter and click Adjust code style settings.

  2. From the main menu, select Code | Reformat Code or press Ctrl+Alt+L.

Reformat a file

  1. In the Project tool window, right-click the file and select Reformat Code.

  2. In the Reformat File dialog that opens, if you need, select the following reformatting options:

    • Optimize imports: select this option if you want to remove unused imports, add missing ones, or organize import statements.

      For more information, refer to the Optimize imports section.

    • Rearrange entries: select this option if you need to rearrange your code based on the arrangement rules specified in the code style settings.

    • Code cleanup: select this option to run the code cleanup inspections.

    • Do not keep line breaks: reformat line breaks according to the code style settings. This option overrides the Keep when reformatting | Line breaks setting.

  3. Click Run.

    If you want to see the exact changes made to your code during the reformatting, use the Local History feature.

Reformat code in a directory

  1. In the project view, right-click a directory and from the context menu, select Reformat Code or press Ctrl+Alt+L.

  2. In the dialog that opens, specify the necessary options and click OK.

Reformat line indents

You can reformat line indents based on the specified settings.

  1. While in the editor, select the necessary code fragment and press Ctrl+Alt+I.

  2. If you need to adjust indentation settings, in the Preferences dialog (Ctrl+Alt+S), go to Editor | Code Style.

  3. On the appropriate language page, on the Tabs and Indents tab, specify the appropriate indents options and click OK.

Automatically reformat code on save

You can configure the IDE to reformat code in modified files automatically when your changes are saved.

  1. Press Ctrl+Alt+S to open the IDE settings and select Tools | Actions on Save.

  2. Enable the Reformat code option.

    Reformat on save
  3. Additionally, you can configure the way the IDE will reformat your code:

    • Click Configure scope to specify the patterns of filenames and directories that you want to exclude from reformatting.

    • From the All file types list, select the types of files in which you want to reformat code.

    • Select Whole file or Changed lines if your project is under version control.

      If you select Changed lines, reformatting will apply only to the lines of code that have been changed locally, but not yet checked in to the repository.

Exclude files from reformatting

You can exclude a group of files and directories from reformatting , code arrangement, and import optimization.

  1. In the Preferences dialog (Ctrl+Alt+S), go to Editor | Code Style.

  2. Switch to the Formatter tab and in the Do not format field, enter the files and directories that you want to exclude using a glob pattern.

    You can specify several glob patterns separated with a semicolon ;. If you click the Expand icon, the field will expand, and each pattern will be shown on a separate line.

  3. Apply the changes and close the dialog.

    Specifying a glob pattern for excluding files from reformatting

Exclude code fragments from reformatting in the editor

  1. In the Preferences dialog (Ctrl+Alt+S), go to Editor | Code Style.

  2. Switch to the Formatter tab and enable the Turn formatter on/off with markers in code comments option.

  3. In the editor, at the beginning of a region that you want to exclude, create a line comment Ctrl+/ and type @formatter:off. At the end of the region, create another line comment and type @formatter:on.

    The code between the markers won't be reformatted.

    Formatting markers

Keep existing formatting

You can select formatting rules which will be ignored when you reformat the code. For example, you can adjust the IDE to keep simple methods and functions in one line, whereas normally they are expanded into multiple lines after code reformatting.

  1. Go to Preferences | Editor | Code Style, select your programming language, and open the Wrapping and Braces tab.

  2. In the Keep when reformatting section, select the formatting rules which you want to ignore and deselect those which should be applied.

  3. Reformat your code (Ctrl+Alt+L).

AppCode will reformat your code in accordance with the current style settings, keeping existing formatting for the rules which you've selected.

Rearrange code

You can rearrange your code according to the arrangement rules set in the Code Style page of the Preferences dialog.

Code Style settings
Matching rules example

Rearrange code entries

  1. In the Preferences dialog (Ctrl+Alt+S), go to Editor | Code Style.

  2. Select a language for which you want to create arrangement rules.

  3. On the Arrangement tab, specify the appropriate options such as grouping and matching rules.

  4. Click OK to save the changes.

  5. In the editor, select the code entries you want to rearrange and from the main menu, select Code | Rearrange Code.

Comments formatting

In AppCode, you can adjust the way the generated line Ctrl+/ and block Ctrl+Shift+/ comments look like.

Configure comments position

  • To place the comment characters at the first column, in Settings | Editor | Code Style | C/C++/Objective-C (or Swift), open the Code Generation tab and select Line comment at first column or Block comment at first column.

  • To align the comment characters with the next code line, deselect these checkboxes.

Comments at first column: ON

Comments at first column: OFF

Comments at first column: OFF
Comments at first column: OFF

To have block comment characters above and below a code block, select the block as a code construct using Ctrl+W and Ctrl+Shift+W:

Block comments

Configure leading spaces in line comments

  • To add a leading space in line comments, in Settings | Editor | Code Style | C/C++/Objective-C (or Swift), open the Code Generation tab, and select Add a space at line comment start.

Add a space at line comment start: ON

Add a space at line comment start: OFF

// comment your code // with spaces
//comment your code //without spaces

For Swift, you can enable the Enforce on reformat option to add missing spaces after // every time code reformatting (Ctrl+Alt+L) is invoked.

Last modified: 20 March 2023