Library for interpreting G# macro-programming CNC language into plain G-code lines
Version 1.0
The library provides a line-by-line interpreter of the G# program. G# is a macro-programming language for CNC control which extends traditional G-code programming by allowing to use variables, conditions, loop executions and subroutine calls. The G# program can contain both plain G-code lines as well as the extended commands.
G# syntax is a subset of LinuxCNC and RS274/NGC and was designed to provide high level of compatibility to these de-facto standards of the open-source CNC macro-programming. The differences are stated below, in all other cases the syntax should match.
The library does not control any machine directly, but generates plain G-code command lines one-by one after issuing the corresponding calls. As such the output may be used by any CNC controller which understands plain G-codes (GRBL, Shapeoko, TinyG, etc.). These G-code lines can be either fed directly into a CNC controller or used for reviewing or visulisation of the job by control software.
Major differences to the LinuxCNC control language syntax:
Limitations
- does NOT support named_parameters and correspondingly no EXIST[arg] funcion.
- as a result O-endsub and O-return commands can NOT store return value into the '_value' parameter. These commands can still return a value, but it will be stored in the parameter #5000.
- O-call can NOT be issued to a subroutine located in a separate file.
- in the current version all numbered parameters are volatile (persistence is planned for future releases).
- (PROBE) comments are ignored as not relevant for interpreting (should be managed by the machine control system).
Improvements
- % demarcation lines can appear anywhere in the program. The first % marks the start, the second - stop of the execution.
- O-subs can be located anywhere in the code: they are executed only if called and jumped over in all other cases.
- comments can be anywhere in any line (except for % lines, where they can appear only after % character), they get processed accordingly and removed before parsing.
- comments can contain pairs of brackets "()" inside, but not a non-matched single bracket.
- several active comments can be present in the same line, if they are of different types, they all will be reported.
Current version uses CMake v3.1+ to build the library, generate the usage example and run the unit tests. The repository also contains Code::Blocks project files. To build the library you will need a C++11 compatible compiler (e.g. G++ v4.8 or higher). There are no external dependencies if the goal is to produce the release version of the library.
To compile the library using CMake navigate to the top directory and run:
cmake .
make
The generated library will be located under the 'lib' sub-directory. The header files are under the 'include' sub-directory.
The top directory contains the 'example.cpp' file, which demonstrates how to use the library.
It opens a G# program from a file, interpretes it line-by-line and stores the output
(plain G-code lines) into another file. As such it can be used as a stand-alone converter.
The make command will generate 'gs2g' binary from the 'example.cpp', which can be executed in command line as following:
./gs2g <input_file> <output_file>
Unit tests are also provided, they use googletest
as the testing platform. For linking consistency the source code of googletest v1.7 is also provided.
Running the make command will automatically generate required gtest libraries.
Alternatively you can use corresponding Code::Blocks project file in 'external/gtest' directory to build the libraries
(select target "All" and recompile).
To run unit tests:
make test
Alternatively you can run them directly as gtest bianry:
./gsharp_test
The library has been tested on Linux and Windows machines only. Please let us know if there are any issues compiling and running it on other OS platforms.
Follow the instruction in the win/README.md to build the library and GSharp converter in Windows environment.
The program is distributed under BSD license. See LICENSE file for details.
Please report any bugs or incompatibilities with LinuxCNC syntax directly to the issue tracker of this project.