Question

Is it possible to write custom C# StyleCop rules that can evaluate conditional compilation preprocessor directives like #if, #elif, #else, #endif?

We’re developing in an environment which requires us to use conditional compilation symbols, and I want to add our custom coding conventions on top of that.

Is this possible with the CsDocument.WalkDocument – method, or do I have to utilize something else?

(FxCop is not going to work here as it works on already compiled binaries).

Answer 1

Yes, it’s possible, but the CsDocument.WalkDocument overloads won’t help since pre-processor directives are represented as tokens only. They have no corresponding element, statement, or expression.

To write a rule for conditional compilation directives, you need to examine the CsDocument.Tokens collection. e.g.:

foreach (var directive in document.Tokens
                             .Where(t => t.CsTokenClass == CsTokenClass.ConditionalCompilationDirective)
                             .Cast<ConditionalCompilationDirective>())
{
    // ...
}