python - Invoking Pylint programmatically

Question

I'd like to invoke the Pylint checker, limited to the error signalling part, as part of my unit testing. So I checked the Pylint executable script, got to the pylint.lint.Run helper class and there I got lost in a quite long __init__ function, ending with a call to sys.exit().

Anybody ever tried and managed to do so?

The dream-plan would be this:

if __name__ == '__main__':
  import pylint.lint
  pylint.lint.something(__file__, justerrors=True)
  # now continue with unit testing

Any hints? Other than "copy the __init__ method and skip the sys.exit()", I mean?

I don't need the tests to be run by Pylint, it might as well be pyflakes or other software: feel free to suggest alternatives.

Answer 1

Take a look at the pylint/epylint.py file which contains two different ways to start Pylint programmatically.

You can also simply call

from pylint.lint import Run
Run(['--errors-only', 'myfile.py'])

for instance.