🌱 Progenitor v0.3.0 (beta)

Now you can create and install your own templates.

Progenitor is a fast and efficient Rust CLI tool designed to generate project templates for a variety of frameworks and application types. With Progenitor, you can quickly bootstrap projects for frameworks like FastAPI, Express, Fiber, microservices, and many more with a simple command. 🚀

✨ Features

• 📦 Generate ready-to-use project templates for multiple frameworks
• 🏗️ Quickly bootstrap microservices architectures
• 💻 Easy-to-use CLI interface
• 🎨 Customizable template options

🛠️ Installation

To install Progenitor using Cargo:

cargo install progenitor-cli

To install Progenitor using Homebrew:

brew tap ctorum/progenitor
brew install progenitor

🚀 Basic Usage

Use the progenitor command in your terminal.

progenitor create -t <template> -n <project_name> <path>

or

pgen create -t <template> -n <project_name> <path>

✨ CLI Features

Progenitor v0.3.0 introduces significant enhancements to its CLI, making template management more flexible and powerful.

New Commands:

• add: This new command allows you to add custom templates directly from a local path or a Git repository. This means you can now easily integrate your own project structures or those shared by others into your Progenitor workflow. All your custom templates will be stored in your home directory at ~/.progenitor/templates.

• remove: The remove command allows you to remove the custom template from your local collection. This ensures that your Progenitor setup remains clean and organized. Also you can use the flag --all to remove all custom templates at once.

Changes to Existing Commands:

create command:

The create command now supports using both built-in and custom templates. When specifying a template, Progenitor will first look for a matching custom template before falling back to its built-in collection. This provides a seamless experience for using your own templates.

list command:

The list command has been updated to display both built-in and custom templates, providing a comprehensive overview of all available templates on your system. Custom templates are clearly marked to distinguish them from the default ones.

🔮 Upcoming Features

We are continuously working to expand Progenitor's capabilities. Here's a sneak peek at what's coming next:

• --recursive flag for add: Soon, the add command will support a --recursive flag, allowing you to add multiple projects at once inside a unique folder. This will streamline the process of setting up complex multi-project repositories. Additionally, the add command will gain the ability to automatically import templates directly from --uri (for URLs) or --git (for Git repositories), simplifying the process of adding remote templates.
• integrate command: A powerful new integrate command is on the horizon. This command will enable you to change the architecture of existing projects (e.g., applying Clean Architecture, Onion Architecture, Domain-Driven Design (DDD), or SOLID principles). Additionally, it will facilitate changing project settings and dependency managers, such as switching from pip to uv or poetry, or from npm to yarn or pnpm.

If you have any ideas for new features, improvements, or encounter any issues, feel free to discuss them in the Discussions tab of the Progenitor repository!

📝 Custom Template Example

Progenitor now empowers you to create and install your own project templates. Here's a simple example using a my-test-template:

Understanding Template Structure

Before adding your custom template, it's crucial to understand its expected structure and the role of special files:

• Template Root Directory: This is the main folder for your template (e.g., my-test-template/). It should contain all the files and directories that will be part of your generated project.

• generator.yml: This file, placed at the root of your template, allows you to define variables that Progenitor will prompt the user for during project creation. These variables can then be used within your template files. For example, for my-test-template:

  # my-test-template/generator.yml
  folder-app:
    description: "A simple Python application template with a subdirectory."
    variables:
      - name: author
        type: string
        default: "Roo"
        prompt: "Enter the authors name:"
    structure:
      - type: directory
        name: "src"
        content:
          - type: file
            name: "main.py"
            source: "src/main.py.gen"
      - type: file
        name: "README.md"
        source: "README.py.gen"

  This generator.yml defines an author variable and specifies the project structure, including a src directory and a README.md file sourced from README.py.gen.

  Let's break down the fields within generator.yml:

  • folder-app: This is the unique identifier (template name) for your template. When a user runs progenitor create -t <template_name>, this is the name they will use.
  • description: A brief explanation of what this template does or what kind of project it generates. This is useful for users to understand the template's purpose.
  • variables: An array of objects, where each object defines a variable that Progenitor will prompt the user for.
    • name: The name of the variable (e.g., author). This name will be used as a placeholder in your .gen files (e.g., ${author}).
    • type: The data type of the variable (e.g., string).
    • default: (Optional) A default value for the variable. If the user doesn't provide input, this value will be used. This is useful for common values or to provide a fallback.
    • prompt: (Optional) The message displayed to the user when prompting for this variable's value. This is crucial for guiding the user. For sensitive information (e.g., API keys, passwords), you can use a prompt without a default value to ensure the user explicitly enters the information, preventing it from being stored in the template itself.
  • structure: An array defining the file and directory structure of the generated project.
    • type: Can be directory or file.
    • name: The name of the directory or file. For directories, you can use variable placeholders like {{project_name}} which will be replaced by the actual project name.
    • content: (Only for directory type) An array of nested type and name definitions for files and subdirectories within this directory.
    • source: (Only for file type) The path to the source .gen file within your template directory. This file's content will be processed and copied to the generated project.

• gen files: Any file or directory within your template that ends with .gen will be processed by Progenitor's templating engine. This means you can embed variables (e.g., ${project_name}, ${author}) directly into your file names or content. The .gen extension will be removed after processing. For example, README.py.gen would become README.md with variables replaced. Consider the my-test-template/README.py.gen file:

  # ${project_name}
  
  This is a simple Python application generated by Progenitor, with a subdirectory.
  
  Author: ${author}
  

  Here, ${project_name} and ${author} are placeholders that Progenitor will replace with the actual project name and the author's name (prompted from generator.yml).

• Variable Placeholders: Use ${variable_name} to embed variables defined in generator.yml or built-in variables (like ${project_name} which is automatically provided by the create command) within your .gen files.

1. Create your template structure:

Organize your template files and directories as you would any project. For instance, the my-test-template structure looks like this:

my-test-template/
├── README.py.gen
├── generator.yml
└── src/

In this example:

• generator.yml defines the author variable and the project's file structure.
• README.py.gen contains placeholders like ${project_name} and ${author} that Progenitor replaces during generation.
• The src/ directory is created as specified in generator.yml.

2. Add your template to Progenitor:

Once your template is ready, use the add command to make it available:

progenitor add --path /path/to/your/my-test-template

or if it's a git repository:

progenitor add --git https://github.com/your-user/my-test-template.git

3. Use your custom template:

Now you can create new projects using your custom template just like any built-in one:

progenitor create -t folder-app -n my-new-project ./my-new-project

Note that -t folder-app refers to the folder-app key defined in generator.yml.

This flexibility allows you to standardize your team's project setups or quickly bootstrap personal projects with your preferred configurations.

📋 Contributing

If you want to contribute to Progenitor, please follow these steps:

1. Fork the repository.

2. Create a new branch for your feature or bug fix.

git checkout -b feature/your-feature

3. Build Progenitor from source:

cargo build --release

4. After building, you can find the binary in target/release/. To run it:

./target/release/progenitor

5. Commit your changes and push them to your forked repository.

git add .
git commit -m "Add your commit message here"
git push origin feature/your-feature

6. Create a pull request to the main repository.