#5 exclude unreachable constructors

[Vlad Roubtsov]

I have an idea that it will be easy to exclude
unreachable (private at the bytecode, not source code,
level) constructors when they can be proven to be
unreachable. Specifically, if the class is abstract.

This already matches my own coding style for "static"
APIs and will get rid of an annoying edge case (private
methods that are never meant to be executed). If this
works, it could done in the next build on 2.0 branch.

A new instr.* prop should govern whether this exclusion
is done.

[Ryan Bloom]

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I have a patch for this, but I couldn't figure out how to
attach it to this bug, so I have posted it on-line at:

http://rkbloom.net/rbb/megapatch

Ryan

[Justin Knowlden]

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What is the status of this request? I was about to submit a
feature request regarding the exclusion of
unreachable/unused constructors of "static" classes.

By static classes I mean classes where all methods are
static; a utility or helper class. In these classes, I only
ever call the methods; therefore, I never create an instance
of the class.

I have a few of these in my project, which generates a
"false negative" in my coverage; the coverage shows that
some code was not covered, but I never intended for it to
be. The code that is not covered is the implied constructor;
I never define a constructor in these types of classes.

Side note: EMMA is not the only coverage tool that acts this
way. JCoverage (the crappy product that it is), performs in
the same way. Therefore, I will not be dissapointed if this
feature request cannot or should not be implemented. I will
simply have to learn Zen and satisfy myself with 97%
coverage ... hmmmmmmmmmmmmm

[Vlad Roubtsov]

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This feature can be implemented. The most detailed
description of what I was planning to do can be found here:
http://sourceforge.net/mailarchive/forum.php?thread_id=5244259&forum_id=40481

I did not receive any feedback to my post above. If you have
some, don't bother doing so via the mailing list (it will be
deactivated in near future because the forum seems to be
where the "action" is), but you can do so via this RFE or
the forum.

This feature is in the list that will be implemented in the
next minor version. No actual work has been done towards it
specifically yet. The problem is with how many RFEs there
are and how few spare hours I have...