andyli / CommentString

/*Comment*/ as Haxe Heredoc String

CommentString

A Haxe library that allows you to use /*Comment*/ as Heredoc String.

Install

Currently CommentString supports Haxe 3.1.3+. It is completely cross-target since it is mainly macros inside.

You can install CommentString via haxelib:

haxelib install CommentString

Then add CommentString to your project's hxml file:

-lib CommentString

Usage

import comments.CommentString.*;

class Test {
	static function main():Void {
		var name = "John";
		var age = 33;
		var str = comment(unindent, format) /**
			My name is <strong>$name</strong> and I'm <em>$age</em> years old.
		**/;
		trace(str); // Test.hx:10: My name is <strong>John</strong> and I'm <em>33</em> years old.
	}
}

Details

CommentString.comment() is a macro function that will read the immediately trailing comment(s) and return it as a constant String.

It accepts optional, variable-lengthed transform:String->String arguments to format the String. There are 2 transform functions provided by CommentString:

• unindent is a macro function that removes the leading indentation of each line.
• format is a macro function that applies Haxe string interpolation.

Note that custom transform function, being macro function or not, can also be used.

Despite of normal haxe single-line comment //comment, or multi-line comment /*comment*/, there is a special one:

var str = comment()
/**
Comment.
**/;

which will trim the first and the last lines, such that the above would be "Comment." instead of "\nComment.\n". Notice the ; has to be placed after the comment.

It is also possible to use multiple single-line comments:

var str = comment(unindent)
// A sentence
// that is
// so long.
;

which will be read as "A sentence\nthat is\nso long.". It is useful since a lot of editors allow commenting out block of text in this style (e.g. Sublime Text, ctrl + /). Additionally in this style there is no need to escape anything in the comment, unlike /**/ which you have to avoid */ in the comment. However, usually the unindent transform is needed since there are spaces after //.

It would be useful to create a shortcut function if there is a set of formatters that we often use. We can create such helper function as follows:

class Test {
    macro static public function cm() {
        var pos = haxe.macro.Context.currentPos();
        return macro @:pos(pos) comments.CommentString.comment(
            comments.CommentString.unindent,
            comments.CommentString.format
        );
    }
    static function main() {
        var str = cm()/**
            testing!!
        **/;
        trace(str); //testing!!
    }
}

License

The MIT License (MIT)

Copyright (c) 2015-2019 Andy Li

Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy of this software and associated documentation files (the "Software"), to deal in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions:

The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in all copies or substantial portions of the Software.

THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM, OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE SOFTWARE.