Visual Basic Refactoring Tools

Anyone have any tips on refactoring tools for VB 6 code?

I'm doing some work now on a VB 6 application that "just grew" over
an extended period. Very large code base, lots of dead code from
cutting and pasting, other smelly code,

I already made a quick add-in to fix several specific recurring code
problems, so I can just select some common similar code and clean
it up, but I wondered if there is anything useful out there that might
help.

It's not a case where the app owners want to invest a lot of time and
money in it, but I want to clean up all the code I have to modify.

Another reason I'm making some changes is to support automated
testing of the stuff I'm changing. A lot of the code uses global variables
and side-effects, so to be able to test I often need to clean it up first.

Any advice appreciated.


--
Ron Ruble, r a f f l e s 2 (a t) a t t . n e t

You may want to check out Mztools (www.mztools.com) as it has some checkers
for dead code and its free.  Also AxTools (http://www.axtools.com/) may have
some tools to assist, but I don't use and am not sure of the full capability
of the product (Ken Halter in these newsgroup would know better)...


--
Chris Hanscom
MVP (Visual Basic)
http://www.veign.com
--

"Ron Ruble" <bogus@example.com> wrote in message
news:AlC2d.382934$OB3.376569@bgtnsc05-news.ops.worldnet.att.net...
>
> Anyone have any tips on refactoring tools for VB 6 code?
>
> I'm doing some work now on a VB 6 application that "just grew" over
> an extended period. Very large code base, lots of dead code from
> cutting and pasting, other smelly code,
>
> I already made a quick add-in to fix several specific recurring code
> problems, so I can just select some common similar code and clean
> it up, but I wondered if there is anything useful out there that might
> help.
>
> It's not a case where the app owners want to invest a lot of time and
> money in it, but I want to clean up all the code I have to modify.
>
> Another reason I'm making some changes is to support automated
> testing of the stuff I'm changing. A lot of the code uses global variables
> and side-effects, so to be able to test I often need to clean it up first.
>
> Any advice appreciated.
>
>
> --
> Ron Ruble, r a f f l e s 2 (a t) a t t . n e t
>
>

Veign wrote:
> You may want to check out Mztools (www.mztools.com) as it has some checker
s
> for dead code and its free.  Also AxTools (http://www.axtools.com/) may ha
ve
> some tools to assist, but I don't use and am not sure of the full capabili
ty
> of the product (Ken Halter in these newsgroup would know better)...

AxTools sells CodeSmart. While that'll do a fairly good job at finding
dead code, the absolute best (imo) is Project Analyzer from Aivosto.com.

It'll find dead code and even code that would be dead after removing the
code marked dead.. confusing... what that does is save you several 'find
dead code' passes. For example, there's a sub called SubA. SubB is
called from only SubA. SubA marked dead... which means SubB is dead if
you remove SubA... anyway... pretty .

Finding dead code is just one of its uses. It'll also show call trees,
cross reference lists, create a web site out of your project where all
variables and subs are fully hyperlinked and each procedure has a list
of procedures it calls and procedures that call it. Way .

You can also use it to enforce company standards as far as coding style
goes.

Has an option to make sure every 'Set MyObj = New MyClass' has a
matching 'Set MyObj = Nothing'

The options never end.

Project Analyzer v7.0
http://www.aivosto.com/project/project.html

--
Ken Halter - MS-MVP-VB - http://www.vbsight.com
Please keep all discussions in the groups..

"Ken Halter" <Ken_Halter@Use_Sparingly_Hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:OPJgMYMnEHA.3472@TK2MSFTNGP09.phx.gbl...
> Veign wrote: 
>
> AxTools sells CodeSmart. While that'll do a fairly good job at finding
> dead code, the absolute best (imo) is Project Analyzer from Aivosto.com.


Many thanks.

I looked at the web site, and I have to admit that Project Analyzer
looks -really- good.

I think I'll end up putting it on my Christmas list. ;>

Thanks!