Formatting multiple arguments passed to a function in Java

Question

Often the number of arguments passed to a function can be large. Consider the following case:

calculate(dataManager.getLastUpdate().getNumberOfChildren(),
               


        

Answer 1

I'll put my little sand grain here, long time ago some developer named Esteban suggested me this kind of formatting, which I 1st thought it was ugly after a while no other way of doing it is enough pleasent for me:

final int result = calculate (
     dataManager.getLastUpdate().getNumberOfChildren()
     , dataManager.getLastUpdate().getNumberOfParents()
     , dataManager.getLastUpdate().getNumberOfGrandChildren()
     , long milliseconds
     , int somethingelse
     );

I find this really clear, very easy to add/delete new arguments, the # of arguments clear, only one argument per line, method call end really clear, etc...

Similar pattern for defining the method too

public int calculate(
    final int numberOfChildren
    , final int numberOfParents
    , final int numberOfGrandChildren
    , final long milliseconds
    , final int somethingelse
    ) throws CalucalteExceptio {

     // MyCode

    }

And finally same pattern for nested calls, StringBuilder typicall sequence

   StringBuilder sb = new StringBuilder()
       .append('Children #').append(numberOfChildren).append(NL)
       .append('Parents #').append(numberOfParents).append(NL)
       .append('GrandChildren #').append(numberOfGrandChildren).append(NL)
       ;

The only problem I found is that IDE formatters never allow this 'comma at the beginning' approach which is really interesting, and a lot more readable than any other I've tried.

Hope it adds something interesting