See the tutorial for a simple example how to define a new filetype. FILETYPE DETECTION A-A-P detects the type of a file automatically. This is used to decide what tools can be used for a certain file. To manually set the file type of an item add the "filetype" attribute. This overrules the automatic detection. Example: foo.o : foo.x {filetype = cpp} Most detection is already built in. If this is not sufficient for your work, filetype detection instructions can be used to change the way file type detection works. These instructions can either be in a file or directly in the recipe: :filetype filename :filetype suffix p pascal script .*bash$ sh The advantage of using a file is that it will also be possible to use it when running the filetype detection as a separate program. The advantage of using the instructions directly in the recipe is that you don't have to create another file. For the syntax of the file see filetype.txt. It is sometimes desired to handle a group of files in a different way. For example, to use a different optimizer setting when compiling C files. An easy way to do this is to give these files a different filetype. Then define a compile action specifically for this filetype. Example: :attr {filetype = c_opt} bar.c foo.c :action compile c_opt CFLAGS = -O3 :do compile $source The detected filetypes never contain an underscore. A-A-P knows that the underscore separates the normal filetype from the additional part. When no action is found for the whole filetype, it is tried by removing the "_" and what comes after it. (This isn't fully implemented yet!) Care should be taken that an action should not invoke itself. For example, to always compile "version.c" when linking a program: :attr {filetype = my_prog} $TARGET :action build my_prog object :do compile {target = version$OBJSUF} version.c :do build {target = $target {filetype = program}} $source version$OBJSUF Without "{filetype = program}" on the :do build" command, the action would invoke itself, since the filetype for $TARGET is "my_prog". EXECUTING ACTIONS The user can select how to perform an action for each type of file. For example, the user may specify that the "view" action on a file of type "html" uses Netscape, and the "edit" action on a "html" file uses Vim. To start an application: :do action filename This starts the "action" application for file "filename". Attributes for the commands can be specified after the action: :do action {arg = -r} filename The filetype is automatically detected from the file name and possibly its contents. Extra suffixes like ".in" and ".gz" are ignored. To overrule the automatic filetype detection, specify the filetype as an attribute on the file: :do action filename {filetype = text} Multiple filename arguments can be used: :do action file1 file2 file3 For some actions a target can or must be specified. This is done as an attribute on the action: :do action {target = outfile} infile1 infile2 Attributes of the filenames other than "filetype" are not used! The "async" attribute can be used to start the application without waiting for it to finish. However, this only works for system commands and when multi-tasking is possible. Example: :do email {async} {remove} {to = piet} {subject = done building} logmessage The "remove" attribute specifies that the files are to be deleted after the command is done, also when it fails. When the filetype contains a "_" and no action can be found for it, the search for an action is done with the part before the "_". This is useful for specifying a variant on a filetype where some commands are different and the rest is the same. "action" is usually one of these: view Look at the file. The "readonly" attribute is normally set, it can be reset to allow editing. edit Edit the file. email Send the file by e-mail. Relevant attributes: edit edit before sending subject subject of the message to destination build Build the file(s), resulting in a program file. The "target" attribute is needed to specify the output file. compile Build the file(s), resulting in object file(s). The "target" attribute may be used to specify the output file. When "target" is not specified the action may use a default, usually $BDIR/root$OBJSUF. extract Unpack an archive. Requires the program for unpacking to be available. Unpacks in the current directory. preproc Run the preprocessor on the file. The "target" attribute can be used to specify the output file. When it is missing the output file name is formed from the input file name by using the ".i" suffix. reference Run a cross referencer, creating or updating a symbol database. strip Strip symbols from a program. Used to make it smaller after installing. Examples: :do view COPYRIGHT {filetype = text} :do edit configargs.xml :do email {edit} bugreport :do build {target = myprog} main.c version.c :do compile foo.cpp Default actions: These are defined in the default.aap recipe. TODO: update this info :action edit default Uses the environment variable $VISUAL or $EDITOR. Falls back to "vi" for Posix systems or "notepad" otherwise :action view html,xml,php Uses the environment variable $BROWSER. Searches a list of known browsers if it's not set. :action email default Uses the environment variable $MAILER. Falls back to "mail". :action build default default Does: ":sys $CC $LDFLAGS $CFLAGS -o $target $source $?LIBS" :action compile object c,cpp Does ":sys $CC $CPPFLAGS $CFLAGS -c -o $target" $source :action preproc default c,cpp Does ":sys $CC $CPPFLAGS -E $source > $target" Specifying actions: Applications for an action-filetype pair can be specified with this command: :action action in-filetype commands This associates the commands with action "action" and filetype "in-filetype". The commands are A-A-P commands, just like what is used in the build commands in a dependency. The "in-filetype" is used for the source of the action, the type of the target is undefined. It is also possible to specify an action for turning a file of one filetype into another filetype. This is like a ":rule" command, but using filetypes instead of patterns. :action action out-filetype in-filetype commands Actually, specifying an action with one filetype is like using "default" for the out-filetype. Several variables are set and can be used by the commands: $fname The first file name of the ":do" command. $source All the file names of the ":do" command. $filetype The detected or specified filetype for the input. $targettype The detected or specified filetype for the output. $action The name of the action for which the commands are executed. Furthermore, all attributes of the action are turned into variables. Thus when ":do action {arg = -x} file " is used, $arg is set to "-x". Example for using an optional "arg" attribute: :action view foo :sys fooviewer $?arg $source In Python code check if the {edit} attribute is specified: :action email default # when $subject and/or $to is missing editing is required @if not globals().get("subject") or not globals().get("to"): edit = 1 @if globals().get("edit"): :do edit $fname :sys mail -s $subject $to < $fname "action" and "ftype" can also be a comma-separated list of filetypes. There can't be any white space though. Examples: :action view html,xml,php :sys netscape --remote $source :action edit,view text,c,cpp :sys vim $source "filetype" can be "default" to specify an action used when there is no action specifically for the filetype. Note that the "async" attribute of the ":do" command may cause the ":sys" command to work asynchronously. That is done because the "async" attribute is turned into the "async" variable for the ":action" commands. If you don't want a specific ":sys" command to work asynchronously, reset "async": :action view foo tt = $?async async = :sys foo_prepare async = $tt :sys foo $source However, since two consecutive ":sys" commands are executed together, this should do the same thing: :action view foo :sys foo_prepare :sys foo $source Quite often the program to be used depends on whether it is available on the system. For example, viewing HTML files can be done with netscape, mozilla, konquerer or another browser. We don't want to search the system for all kinds of programs when starting, it would make the startup time quite long. And we don't want to search each time the action is invoked, the result of the first search can be used. This construct can be used to achieve this: BROWSER = :action view html @if not BROWSER: :progsearch BROWSER netscape mozilla konquerer :sys $BROWSER $source :export BROWSER The generic form form :progsearch is: :progsearch varname progname ... ":export" needs to be used for variables set in the commands and need to be used after the action is finished. The first argument is the variable name to which to assign the resulting program name. When none of the programs is found an error message is given. Note that shell aliases are not found, only executable programs. More examples: :action compile c,cpp :sys $CC $CPPFLAGS $CFLAGS -c $source :action build object :sys $CC $LDFLAGS $CFLAGS -o $target $source |