Rule categories
A rule category is a collection of code review rules that focus on a particular aspect of quality. You can enable or disable a rule category or individual rules in it, depending on your code review needs.
The following screen capture shows a partial list of rule categories that are included in the Complete code review. One of the categories in the code review, Performance, is expanded to show three subcategories: Memory, Profiling, and Speed. Finally, the Speed subcategory is expanded to show the rules in it. Notice how the rules are grouped into categories, and that all rules and categories are enabled.
List of categories and descriptions
The following table lists all of the categories and subcategories in the various code reviews and describes the rules included. Categories are in bold text and subcategories are in plain text.
| Category or subcategory | Description |
|---|---|
| Design Principles | Contains rules for the design principles of object-oriented programming |
| Complexities | Contains rules to prevent unnecessarily complex code |
| Globalization | Contains rules that are based on globalization coding best practices, helping to ensure that code runs correctly in localized environments. |
| Cultural Formatting | Contains rules that address data formatting options used in different parts of the world |
| Encoding | Contains rules that validate encoding for globalization |
| Locale Handling | Contains rules that validate locales for globalization |
| String Handling | Contains rules that validate string operations for globalization |
| Translation | Contains rules that validate code for translation |
| UI Specific | Contains rules that validate user-interface layout and content for globalization |
| J2EE Best Practices | Contains rules based on the best J2EE development practices and supports Web projects targeted to WebSphere servers |
| Correctness | Contains rules to detect incorrect method calls |
| Data Race | Contains rules to detect method invocations that can cause data race conditions in J2EE applications |
| Garbage Collection | Contains rules to detect method invocations that can delay garbage collection |
| Maintainability | Contains rules to detect code that may be hard to maintain in J2EE applications |
| Performance and Scalability | Contains rules to detect method invocations that hinder the performance or limit the scalability of a J2EE application |
| Resource Management | Contains J2EE best practice rules for using resources in J2EE applications |
| J2SE Best Practices | Contains rules that validate code for compliance with J2SE best practices for Java development |
| AWT | Contains rules that detect issues related to using the Abstract Window Toolkit library |
| Casting | Contains rules that detect issues related to casting and coercion |
| Cloneable | Contains rules that detect issues related to object cloning |
| Comparison | Contains rules that detect issues related to comparing objects and testing object equality |
| Conditional | Contains rules that detect issues related to the usage of conditionals |
| Constructors | Contains rules that detect issues related to defining and implementing constructors |
| Declaration | Contains rules that detect issues related to declaring constants, variables, and fields |
| Exceptions | Contains rules that detect issues related to exception handling |
| Initialization | Contains rules that detect issues related to the initialization of primitives and objects |
| Null | Contains rules that detect issues related to using null |
| Portability | Contains rules that detect issues related to portability |
| Reflection | Contains rules that detect issues related to using reflection |
| Serialization | Contains rules that detect issues related to serialization |
| Statement | Contains rules that detect general issues in statements |
| Switch | Contains rules that detect issues related to using switch statements |
| Threads | Contains rules that detect issues related to using threads |
| Naming Conventions | Contains rules for naming conventions of elements in the Java code |
| Conflicts | Contains rules to ensure that elements are named consistently in the Java code |
| Performance | Contains rules that enforce suggestions for improving performance and reducing the memory footprint in Java applications |
| Memory | Contains rules that detect performance issues related to memory usage |
| Profiling | Contains rules that detect potential performance issues related to profiling activities |
| Speed | Contains rules that suggest ways to improve the speed of Java code execution |
| Private API | Contains rules that locate APIs that do not belong in Java code |
| Eclipse | Contains rules that locate APIs that do not belong in Java code |
| Sun | Contains rules that locate APIs that do not belong in Java code |
| WebSphere | Contains rules that locate APIs that do not belong in Java code |