---
title: Why not X?
description: How Curb relates to the formatters and tools you probably already use.
url: https://docs-v3-preview.elastic.dev/why-not
---

# Why not X?
The short answer: you probably do not have to choose.
Curb is built around the `.editorconfig` you already have and the defaults Roslyn already ships. It is a fixed point of `dotnet format whitespace` — run `dotnet format` over its output and nothing changes. When IDE analysers fire in a build with `EnforceCodeStyleInBuild`, Curb has already fixed everything it can see before the compiler read the file. It works *with* the tools on this page, not instead of them.
What is different is what each tool covers:

|                                                  | Curb | `dotnet format`            | Rider/ReSharper cleanup |
|--------------------------------------------------|------|----------------------------|-------------------------|
| Layout + reflow                                  | ✅    | ❌ (whitespace only)        | ✅                       |
| All 39 IDE0055 formatting options                | ✅    | ✅                          | ✅                       |
| No build needed                                  | ✅    | ✅ (whitespace) / ❌ (style) | ❌                       |
| Runs inside `dotnet build`                       | ✅    | ❌                          | ❌                       |
| Reads ReSharper `.editorconfig` keys             | ✅    | ❌                          | ✅                       |
| MSBuild incremental (no-op when nothing changed) | ✅    | ❌                          | ❌                       |

The four pages below go into each comparison in detail.