godot-code-generator

A lightweight Godot library for code generation from template (or just for any general text template processing)

You can generate output (e.g. script):

• From a source template file containing tags
• According to generator specification, where you describe the tags
• Using a context (any object), which provides subtitutions for the tags

Driving force:

• Was needed for this: https://github.com/coderbloke/godot-inspector-architect
  Code snippets coming from different places, they put together into a script, which then can be loaded and used dynamically on-the-fly
• It turned out to be a quite neat reusable, even in the early phase Can be help useful for anyone

Contact:

• Indicate/share your presence, interest, ideas, give inspiration, or ask here:
  https://github.com/coderbloke/godot-code-generator/discussions/5
• See already existing plans/progress/issues, suggest or indicate new ones here:
  https://github.com/coderbloke/godot-code-generator/issues

Usage

1. Make source template files. Put tags into it, where you want text substitution. (First image / Left side)
   Tags don't have any predefined form. They are just simple tags you define later, so you don't have to follow the below example.
   

   With possibility of different way of handling comment and prefixes by the generator, it is possible to make such a template file,
   which is syntactically/semantically a correct source file, so won't be full of compiler errors, for example.

2. Make aCodeGeneratorSpecification specification resource. (First image / Right side)
   Define your tags (any text, no fixed format). Specify how the generator should handle the surrounding of the tags. Specify methods names (Action Method), from which the generator will get the text to insert, and which will be implemented in the context object. Pull/set the source template file (Template property)

3. Implement the methods in your class, which will serve as context for the generator.
   Currently, these are simple function returning string (as not yet other feature in the generator yet, which would require else.) Built your text in these functions. You don't have to care about the indentification outside the tags. Just deal with the indents of your snippets. The generator will extend the indents according to the source template. (Currently, you have to use tabs or spaces, as they will be required in the out file. But auto converting indent format is planned.) Just start and try, the generator will put error messages in the output, if it does not find the method.

4. Bring the pieces together, and get the generated output with
   CodeGenerator.generate_source_code(code_generator_specification, context).

   Use the output as you need. For example, like this:

   var code_generator_specification = load("res://your_generator_specification.tscn")
   var source_code = CodeGenerator.generate_source_code(code_generator_specification, self)
   if not source_code.is_empty():
       var script := GDScript.new()
       script.source_code = source_code
       script.reload()

   In this example, self is the context, so the action methods are in the same script. Then you can simply add this script to any object, node as you want. Engine will handle, nothing to do with the generator no more.

5. Resource changed signal as used and propagated up to the CodeGeneratorSpecification. Triggered by any change in the specification or the template. Using that to auto-update according to your needs. E.g.: code_generator_specification.changed.connect(_update_script)

Example template and generator specification:

See example usage below of the above template and generator spec during development of godot-inspector-architect

Here the context, which implemented the action methods (like _get_declaration, _get_initialization), which collected code snippets from a resource file (on the right).
See the output result (right side). You can see the tags substituted with the provided texts. The function returned the text as a simple multiline string, starting with 0 level indent. You can also see examples for error message for the context functions, which were not yet present.