BuildTask.nvim

Neovim Plugin to use build tasks similar to VScode

Table of Contents

• BuildTask.nvim
  • Features
  • Requirements
  • Installation
  • Config
    • Fields and values
  • Usage
  • Feature Plan
  • Contributing

Features

Note: this plugin is still in development and there might be some breaking changes

• Reads taks from a json file
• Very similar to VScode's task.json
• Runs default build task in terminal
• Written in Lua, configured in Lua

Requirements

• Neovim v0.6.0+ or nightly build

Installation

Recommended is to use packer.nvim

use({
    'Arjun31415/BuildTask.nvim',
    requires="rcarriga/nvim-notify"
    })

Config

The plugin config with default values-

require('buildtask').setup({default_shell = "$SHELL", default_task_file="task.json"})

<default_task_file>.json config-

This file must be present in the working directory and must adhere to strict json format. An example file is given below-

{
  "tasks": [
    {
      "type": "python run",
      "label": "Python run active file",
      "command": "/usr/bin/python",
      "args": ["${file}"],
      "options": {
        "cwd": "${fileDirname}"
      },
      "group": {
        "kind": "build",
        "isDefault": true
      },
      "detail": "interpreter: /usr/bin/python"
    },

    {
      "type": "cppbuild",
      "label": "C/C++: g++-11 build active file",
      "command": "/bin/g++",
      "args": [
        "-g",
        "${file}",
        "-std=c++20",
        "-o",
        "${fileDirname}/${fileBasenameNoExtension}"
      ],
      "options": {
        "cwd": "${fileDirname}"
      },
      "problemMatcher": ["$gcc"],
      "group": {
        "kind": "build",
        "isDefault": false
      },
      "detail": "compiler: /bin/g++"
    }
  ]
}

Fields and values

Field	Value	Type
tasks	An array of tasks to perform	Required
type	The type of task it is	Optional
label	label given to this task	Optional
command	the command/executable which runs this task	Required
args	the space separated command line arguments array to give to the executable specified in the command field.	Required
group	As of now it must contain a isDefault field which specifies if it is the default task or not	Required
detail	Any additional comments or details	Optional

Any additional field are just ignored and not used.
It currently supports 3 variables in the json file -

1. ${file} - it is substituted for the file name in the active buffer
2. ${fileDirname} - the current directory of the file (Note: The task.json file must be present in this directory )
3. ${fileBasenameNoExtension} - the file name with the extension removed

Usage

As of now it provides a single command :BtBuildDefault which runs the default build task

Feature Plan

• Command to run other tasks apart from default tasks

Contributing

Contributions are welcome, If you find any issues please create a new issue in Github