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Re: Project templates

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Re: Project templates

Subject: Re: Project templates
From: Philip Aker <email@hidden>
Date: Sun, 29 Jun 2008 12:59:34 -0700

On 08-06-26, at 06:37, Karan, Cem (Civ, ARL/CISD) wrote:

[...]

I propose that we have the ability to get the following:


I'm just summarizing here Cem:

Attributes
  VERSION
  RELEASENOTESURI

Elements
  DATE
  FILE
  PRODUCT
  TARGET
  TEMPLATE
  USER

I know there is more stuff that can be added, but this is just the start. Any thoughts from anyone out there? Should all key/values be strings (makes parsing easy), or should they be a mix of strings, integers, etc.?

I found your post very thought provoking. Especially the TEMPLATE part where we supply definitions, delimiters, and encoding. I've tried to merge your "This is what I need" outline above with a "This is one way to do it" notion and present a sketch of what an Xcode Project Template instance might look like below. The DATE and USER definitions have been blended into the TEMPLATE idea using the macros" element to contain named sets of them. These are referenced from the macro- expansion-files and rename-files elements which indicate what is to be expanded.


Discussion:

One problem that's bound to come up: given a new template mechanism -- what to do with the old? In order to create the least amount of disruption, new style templates could be housed in a bundle with a specific extension (let's call it .xptd (Xcode Project Template Directory)). The template importer will recognize the new format and delete the bundle extension in when presenting its name in the template list. A bundle format, whether like an actual bundle (.component, .plugin, etc.), a framework, or shallow bundle (.rtfd) would provide lots of familiar and convenient organizational possibilities. Not the least of which would be to use custom keys in the Info.plist for setting up the environment.

Practical Goals:

1. Do away with the current practice of housing an .xcodeproj and then have to munge it. Instead, proceed with the idea that the new XML format will be processed by various means to insert entries in what is essentially an empty project (always supplied by the processor).

2. Assume that all input files are UTF-8 unless they have have a Unicode BOM. Otherwise the encoding must be specified as an attribute in its file element.

3. There won't be much need for us to deal with UUID-type cross- referencing in our specification. That's the kind of stuff best dealt with in transformational code by the processor so we'll opt for the human-readable form when it's necessary.

4. Make use of .xcconfig files for our project/target settings and set up our Info.plist to make use of those setting definitions (like $ARCHES, $CURRENT_PROJECT_VERSION, INSTALL_PATH, etc.). This would seem to obviate the PRODUCT category above because all the details can be covered in an xcconfig.


Format:

Like sdef, we won't be using mixed elements and will tend towards attributes rather than sub-elements whenever possible. That's were the similarity ends however. We'll avoid the DTD pitfall and opt for an XML Schema in order to utilize the appinfo and documentation sub- elements of the annotation element for processing and documentation. I think you are working primarily on 10.4 -- one improvement that sdefs have in 10.5 is the use of xinclude. It's not in this version but I certainly see it could be put to good use in these templates.


Outline:

project-template
  macros+
    macro+
  project+
    info{1}
    documentation{1}
    group*
      (group | file)+
    target+
      info{1}
      phase+
    macro-expansion-files+
      file-ref+
    rename-files+
      file-ref +


An Instance:

A policy adopted here is that the processor is expected to assemble the total file list from file elements declared in arbitrary positions. If a file is to be referenced from another element, it must be assigned a unique id and referenced by that id. This referencing style extends to other elements such as configuration, and documentation. Note also that a file declared outside a group attains membership in that group by specifying a group id attribute.


<?xml version="0.1" encoding="utf-8"?>

<project-template version="1.0" xmlns="http://www.aker.ca/namespace/xcodeproj-template"; xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"; xsi:schemaLocation="http://localhost/Library/DTDs/xcodeproj-template.xsd " >

<macros id="default" open="«" close="»" encoding="utf-8">
  <macro name="PROJECTNAME" value="$PROJECTNAME"/>
  <macro name="DATE" value="/bin/date +'%F %T'"/>
  <macro name="AUTHOR" value="Foo Bar Jr."/>
</macros>

<project name="project">

<info default-configuration="project-release" archive-version="1" object-version="42" compatibility-version="Xcode 2.4"/> <documentation description="This project builds a ..." file- ref="docs"/>

  <configuration name="Release" file-ref="project-release"/>
  <configuration name="Debug" file-ref="project-debug"/>

  <rename-files macros="default">
    <file-ref file="project-c" dest="${PROJECTNAME}.c"/>
    <file-ref file="project-h" dest="${PROJECTNAME}.h"/>
    <file-ref file="project-r" dest="${PROJECTNAME}.r"/>
    <file-ref file="docs" dest="${PROJECTNAME}.xhtml"/>
    <file-ref file="pch" dest="${PROJECTNAME}.pch"/>
    <file-ref file="exp" dest="${PROJECTNAME}.exp"/>
  </rename-files>

</project>
</project-template>


Philip Aker
echo email@hidden@nl | tr a-z@. p-za-o.@

Democracy: Two wolves and a sheep voting on lunch.

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References:  
  >RE: Project templates (From: "Karan, Cem (Civ, ARL/CISD)" <email@hidden>)
  >Re: Project templates (From: "Dr. Rolf Jansen" <email@hidden>)
  >RE: Project templates (From: "Karan, Cem (Civ, ARL/CISD)" <email@hidden>)




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