Pass custom json to actions

[plopjs]

Pass custom json to actions

[amwmedia]

so when you run a plop generator... you want to type json into the console? I'm not sure I understand the want here.

[fleed]

Sorry, I should have specified it better.
I'm expecting to load data from a json file which is "side-by-side" with templates.
I'm able to do it with yeoman, but I prefer the plop approach that keeps data and templates together with my source code.

[amwmedia]

interesting feature, so this would allow you to have a template that renders differently depending on the json data that is next to it I guess?

plop doesn't currently support this, but it sound like it could be worth adding. 😄

[fleed]

Happy to hear that you'll consider it!
A little bit more context: I'm a C# developer and I was convinced (and I proved it) that 60% of our code had patterns perfect for code generation or, if you wish, "continuous scaffolding".
I've defined a metadata small file and used Microsoft T4 to "continuously scaffold" entities (POCO objects), object mappers, data layer, (WCF) data services, etc.. When I find a bug, I can fix it in the template, regenerate the code and it's fixed everywhere (but it's also true the other way round you introduce a bug everywhere..). Partial classes in C# allow me to extend the generated part with custom code.
As we're moving to REST APIs I'd like to do the same but outside Visual Studio/pure .NET world, and I've started using yeoman.
Yeoman is anyway limited (I can't "nest" templates) and it's also hard to make it work in a "continuous" way. That's how I've found plop.
What I'm missing in Plop too is the possibility to get data "statically" (from a Json file, instead of prompting the user) and also the possibility to "nest" templates.
An example of nested template is the definition of a C# class: one template defines the class using the relative object, but internally I will use one or more property templates to generate the array of properties defined. That's what I mean for "data flowing from one generator to another".
I hope it helps and I would be glad to help if possible.

[amwmedia]

I see, it sounds like what you want to do could be pretty easily achieved with node-plop once I finish it. I've got a version that's pretty close to ready, but not quite there yet. It basically take the core functions of plop, and makes them usable from a node script. So you should be able to code up something like what you want to do in a custom node script and let node-plop take care of the heavy lifting. I'll let you know once I have the first version up.

[fleed]

Sounds very powerful.. Thanks!

[amwmedia]

please take a look at node-plop. It's available now, not well documented, but I'd consider it pretty stable at this point.