progen: A Project Generator

Since version 1.2 a little application called gtkmvc-progen is provided. Goal of gtkmvc-progen is to generate the skeleton of a project that can be used when starting up a new application based on gtkmvc.

gtkmvc-progen creates a directory containing the skeleton of a new project, called the top-level directory.

The newly created project is constituted by:

• A source directory containing all project source code
• An empty application-level Model
• A simple application-level Controller
• The application main View containing the application main window.
• A resources directory, containing for example the project glade files, but also possibly images, styles, and other resources loaded at runtime.
• A launching script, localized in the top-level directory

gtkmvc-progen can be executed as a batch program to be controlled from the command line, or as a simple GUI application. gtkmvc-progen is of course based on gtkmvc. All the work is performed by the model, and a view and a controller are loaded when a GUI is required. Depending on the hosting platform, gtkmvc-progen is launched by default either in batch or in GUI mode. Unix users are more familiar with command-line programs, and will find gtkmvc-progen to be executed in that modality by default. Windows users will find the GUI presented by default instead.

The way gtkmvc-progen can be customized is by setting some properties inside the model, either by using the command line, or by using the GUI that does not export the full set of properties, though.

Here is the list of properties with a short description:

Property name	Property type	Description	Default value
name	string	name of the project	REQUIRED
author	string	Developer’s name	REQUIRED
email	string	Developer’s email address
copyright	string	Copyright string	A sensible string
destdir	string	name of destination directory	“.”
complex	bool	Generates hierarchical MVC support	True
dist_gtkmvc	bool	If True, gtkmvc is embedded	True
glade	bool	if glade files are going to be used or not	True
glade_fn	string	filename of generated glade file	application.glade
src_header	string,None	Template for source header files.	None
other_comment	string	Additional comment pushed after headers
src_name	string	Name of the source directory	“src”
res_name	string	Name of the resources directory	“resources”
top_widget	string	Name of the View’s top-level widget	“window_appl”

Bottom part of the table contains less important properties. Python module gtkmv.progen.templates contains default templates that are used for headers, license, etc.

Boolean option gui can be used to select batch or gui mode. Option help can be used to print out an helping message.

gtkmvc-progen can be executed either locally (it is located within the scripts directory), or can be executed as any other program if gtkmvc has been properly installed on the hosting system.

From the local script directory:

$> (...)/scripts/gtkmvc-progen param=val ...

If gtkmvc was installed:

$> gtkmvc-progen param=val ...

Boolean properties can be specified in the form “param” or in the form “param=[yes|no]”. Specifying boolean “param” or “param=yes” is semantically equivalent.

For example:

$> gtkmvc-progen name=hello author="Roberto Cavada" gui glade=no

The result is the creation of the top-level directory whose name is the project name. Inside a top-level script can be used to launch the application.