Tread lightly! The appearance of code is a "religeous war" issue to some people. Until the code becomes *yours* (i.e., you're the primary maintainer), change the code as little as possible. I'd definitely add "use strict" and "use warnings" statements to the top, and fix errors as they appear. But you should use the same style as you find in the (ugly...to you!) file.

(It never ceases to amaze me how much time can be pissed away by people reformatting each others code.)

Once the code becomes yours, however, then you can start on structural and stylistic improvements. (As your schedule allows....)

Also, there are politics involved: At one place, I was maintaining some code that I thought ugly. In a couple of places, it was particularly bad, so I was complaining about it to my boss. About a month later, I found that my boss was the one who wrote that code. It took me several months to fully extract my foot from my mouth...... 8^P

It's also possible that you may come to appreciate the style in use. (I've changed styles more times than I care to count. It's amazing what you can get used to quickly.)

Of course, the code *could* just be a hideous mess with no style. Even then, I'd restrict myself to bug fixes until I inherited it. And never badmouth code until you know who wrote it! ;^)

--roboticus