Feature/Microsoft Visual Studio Tasks

[markmaker]

Microsoft Visual Studio Build Tasks

Adds simple Build tasks to Microsoft Visual Studio "Open Folder" development. This is the new cool way to edit almost any type of cross platform project:

In Visual Studio 2017, you can open code from nearly any type of directory-based project into Visual Studio without the need for a solution or project file. This means you can, for example, clone a repo on GitHub, open it directly into Visual Studio, and begin developing, without having to create a solution or project. If needed, you can specify custom build tasks and launch parameters through simple JSON files.

After you open your code files in Visual Studio, Solution Explorer displays all the files in the folder. You can click on any file to begin editing it. In the background, Visual Studio starts indexing the files to enable IntelliSense, navigation, and refactoring features. As you edit, create, move, or delete files, Visual Studio tracks the changes automatically and continuously updates its IntelliSense index. Code will appear with syntax colorization and, in many cases, include basic IntelliSense statement completion.

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/visualstudio/ide/develop-code-in-visual-studio-without-projects-or-solutions

You can simply open the Smoothieware project using File / Open Folder... and choose the Smoothieware folder. You'll get all the nice stuff described above.

This pull request adds simple Build, Rebuild, Clean tasks as described here.

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/visualstudio/ide/customize-build-and-debug-tasks-in-visual-studio

You can then right-click on the makefile in the Smoothieware root folder and choose one of the tasks in the context menu (see Screenshot):

NOTE: In order for this to work, you need to re-install the build tools using win_install.cmd and this will only succeed if you delete your existing gcc-arm-none-eabi folder first, otherwise win_install.cmd will fail trying to recreate that directory.

Why is re-installing needed?

I needed to modify win_install.cmd to slightly change the generated BuildCommand.cmd and buildenv.cmd to propagate and execute a command line passed as arguments. This way Visual Studio can send the build commands into the proper build environment. I have tried recreating the environment directly in the task, but failed. But calling the central BuildShell.cmd may be more future proof anyway.

NOTE 2: as per Visual Studio's standard, tasks.vs.json is in the .vs subdirectory so it might be hidden from some directory views.

In Visual Studio use the Show all Files Button to see it:

[wolfmanjm]

As visual studio is not an open source tool, I suspect we will not be able to accept this request.
maybe this would be better to document on the wiki.

[markmaker]

Hi wolfmanjm

Thanks for the quick reply.

I struggle to see the red line here, please advise.

You already have some .cmd files in the repo. Those only run against cmd.exe and only on Microsoft Windows ... neither of which are open source, as far as I know.

What is the difference for the single .json file I add here?

After all, I am not commiting Visual Studio binaries and in now way does this change mean you become somehow dependent on Visual Studio. You can still build from the command-line, in fact this tiny solution does nothing else.

If it is your "political" principle not to embrace such products at all, then I could understand (not agree). But I don't see how adding this to the Wiki would make a difference, then?

Thank you for having a fresh look.

_Mark

[arthurwolf]

Hey. This is more about whether we think this will be maintained or not. For example, people ask for something similar for eclipse, sometimes people create that, but then it very quickly becomes obsolete. Because of this, we tend to put things like this in separate branches/forks and link to them from the third-party branch on the wiki. Presumably, if somebody showed they can maintain their fork for a long time, and there is user interest in it, ultimately it'd get merged into mainstream. ( though so far we've never seen the maintenance or the interest happen in other cases ). Also, there is an ick factor because MS, not going to lie :)

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On Wed, May 2, 2018 at 5:46 PM, markmaker ***@***.***> wrote: Hi wolfmanjm Thanks for the quick reply. I struggle to see the red line here, please advise. You already have some .cmd files in the repo. Those *only* run against cmd.exe and *only* on Microsoft Windows ... neither of which are open source, as far as I know. What is the difference for the single .json file I add here? After all, I am not commiting Visual Studio binaries and *in now way* does this change mean you become somehow *dependent* on Visual Studio. You can still build from the command-line, in fact this tiny solution does nothing else. If it is your "political" principle not to embrace such products *at all*, then I could understand (not agree). But I don't see how adding this to the Wiki would make a difference, then? Thank you for having a fresh look. _Mark — You are receiving this because you are subscribed to this thread. Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub <#1321 (comment)>, or mute the thread <https://github.com/notifications/unsubscribe-auth/AAGpFZB2ES0XnSovVGAh8jZtAtKMh4Ddks5tudTogaJpZM4Tvl6Q> .

-- Courage et bonne humeur.

[markmaker]

Hi

thanks for the clarification.

Is there a chance you would merge just the shell part?

https://github.com/Smoothieware/Smoothieware/pull/1321/files#diff-ea076c228b65dbef8cb08e86a332c3dc

This is useful outside of any Visual Studio discussion. One can call a command line inside the build environment. Useful for creating shortcuts, more elaborate scripting etc.

_Mark