grunt-generate

Grunt plugin that generates files from user-defined templates.

It doesn't aim to replace grunt-init or Yo, but rather complement it. Yo generators are cool, but opinionated. This task allows you to set up your own templates and start using them right away, organized any which way you want.

When you run the task it basically looks for a specified template, processes it and uses it to generate a file right into your project structure. The real benefits are that the task is highly configurable and allows you to create files from templates of your own making (there are some pre-defined ones though) into a structure you have decided upon.

This grunt task is a derivative/enhancement of the backbone_generate grunt task.

Getting Started

This plugin requires Grunt ~0.4.0

If you haven't used Grunt before, be sure to check out the Getting Started guide, as it explains how to create a Gruntfile as well as install and use Grunt plugins. Once you're familiar with that process, you may install this plugin with this command:

npm install grunt-generate --save-dev

Once the plugin has been installed, it may be enabled inside your Gruntfile with this line of JavaScript:

grunt.loadNpmTasks('grunt-generate');

The "generate" task

v0.3.2

grunt-generate now respects files with multiple extensions, e.g. template.es6.js will generate a foo.es6.js.

v0.3.x

v0.3 introduces an entirely new API and is most definitely NOT backwards compatible. Compared to the previous versions it should be more clear, intuitive and save you some typing.

Overview

Some pre-defined templates are shipped with grunt-generate, let's take a look how you would start using the pre-defined templates.

We're going to use the template templates/backbone/Model.js and use it to generate app/scripts/models/UserModel.js.

Configuration

In your project's Gruntfile, add a section named generate to the data object passed into grunt.initConfig().

grunt.initConfig({
  generate: {
    options: {
      dest : 'app/scripts'
    }
  }
})

dest tells the task where to put the generated files by default. Since most of our templates will be used in the application itself we allow them to be generated into app/scripts.

Usage

grunt generate:backbone/Model:UserModel@models

This will generate a file app/scripts/models/UserModel by processing the template templates/backbone/Model.js.

Et voila, you just scaffolded your very first file using grunt-generate.

There's more

grunt-generate is simple to use yet pretty powerful. You can tell the task where to generate your files depending on what template you use, either by configuration or through task arguments.

Let's take a look how this is done.

Mapping directories

You can map template directories to destination directories, which means that any templates from a particular template directory will generate files into another specified directory.

Add the following to the above grunt configuration:

grunt.initConfig({
  generate: {
    options: {
      dest : 'app/scripts',
      map : {
        nodeunit : '/test'
      }
    }
  }
});

If you run

grunt generate:nodeunit/test:test_foo

It will process the nodeunit/test.js template and generate a file test_foo.js into the <project>/test directory. There's two things happening here:

1. We map everything coming from nodeunit to a test directory
2. We override the default dest by preceding our mapping destination with "/" (forward slash). It tells the task to forget whatever value dest has.

Mapping template files

You can also map specific template files to specific destinations.

grunt.initConfig({
  generate: {
    options: {
      dest : 'app/scripts',
      map : {
        "backbone/View" : 'views'
      }
    }
  }
});

When we run

grunt generate:backbone/View:LoginView

It will generate a file app/scripts/views/LoginView.js. Any file-specific mappings override directory mappings. For instance if we have this configuration:

grunt.initConfig({
  generate: {
    options: {
      dest : 'app/scripts',
      map : {
        backbone : 'core'
        "backbone/View" : 'ui'
      }
    }
  }
});

It will generate all backbone files (Collection, Model and Router) inside app/scripts/core, except Views will be generated into app/scripts/ui.

Constructing more complex paths

More complex path structures can be created using the :dir variable inside destinations, it will be replaced with the path-part of your arguments, i.e. everything which follows "@" (at-sign).

For example:

grunt.initConfig({
  generate: {
    options: {
      dest : 'app/scripts',
      map : {
        "backbone/View" : ':dir/views'
      }
    }
  }
});

Allows you to organize your files by domain, like this:

grunt generate:backbone/View:LoginView@user

This will generate app/scripts/user/views/LoginView.js file.

Inside the templates

You can write whatever you want obviously. The templates are processed with grunt.template (i.e. they use Lo-Dash templating)

Grunt is automatically exposed, so you have access to the full Grunt API.

There are a few special variables you can use however:

1. file contains all information on the generated file, e.g. for generate:backbone/View:LoginView@user/views

{
  name: 'LoginView',
  directory: 'user/views',
  basename: 'LoginView.js',
  template: '.tmp/:dir/:basename',
  relative: '.tmp/user/views/LoginView.js',
  absolute: '/Users/creynder/Dropbox/Work/Projects/grunt-generate/.tmp/user/views/LoginView.js',
  path: '.tmp/user/views'
}

E.g.:

//<%= file.basename %>, 2014 (c) Camille Reynders

1. meta contains information that can be useful for class declarations:

{
  className: 'Loginview',
  type: 'backbone.View',
  package: 'user.views',
  fqn: 'user.views.Loginview'
}

E.g.:

app.<%= meta.className %> = Backbone.View.extend({});

1. (>=v0.3.1) the entire grunt configuration is exposed inside the templates:

var jshintrc = '<%= jshint.options.jshintrc %>';

Options

src

Optional

Type: String

Default: 'templates'

Path to the source templates directory. Do not end this with a / (slash). Relative to the Gruntfile.

grunt.initConfig({
  generate: {
    options: {
      src : 'templates'
    }
  }
});

dest

Optional

Type: String

Defines the default destination directory.

grunt.initConfig({
  generate: {
    options: {
      dest : 'app/scripts'
    }
  }
});

map

Optional

Type : Object

Maps template directories to destination directories.

grunt.initConfig({
  generate: {
    options: {
      map : {
        "backbone/View" : 'app/scripts/views'
      }
    }
  }
});

prompt

Optional

Type : boolean

Default: true

When true you'll be asked confirmation whether you want to generate the file or not.

Quick cheat sheet

See some examples/a quick cheat sheet

Contributing

We'd like to provide some more pre-defined templates, since people can use them as a starting point for their own templates. If you happen to have some lying around we'd be very happy to add them.

• In lieu of a formal styleguide, take care to maintain the existing coding style.

• Add unit tests for any new or changed functionality.

• Lint and test your code:

  grunt test

• An .editorconfig file is provided; use it!

Contributors

• posabsolute
• creynders
• jrencz
• dallonf