Expert Talk: Zig Programming Language & Linters

This conversation between Jeroen Engels, a software engineer at CrowdStrike, and Andrew Kelley, the president and lead software developer of the Zig Software Foundation, discusses the use of linters in programming languages. They talk about the challenges of refactoring code with custom macros and the need for improved refactoring tools and integration with compilers for programming languages. The conversation also covers the importance of error codes versus warning codes in linters, handling potentially null values, and the tradeoffs of having linting errors. Although the Zig compiler does not have a separate linter, they agree that a separate linter step from the compilation step is a viable option. The conversation highlighted the importance of enforcing linting in the continuous integration (CI) process and the need for programmers to cooperate to make functions work without side effects.