Tasks - a general-purpose task runner for Emacs

Installation

For elpaca user:

(use-package tasks
 :ensure (:host codeberg :repo "meow_king/tasks"))

For other users, please figure it yourself.

Usage

Note: example file see my own configuration: my-tasks.el

1. Define your custom task run function, and set customizable variable tasks-function, tasks-project-function

Example:

 (defun mk/tasks/run ()
 (interactive)
 (let ((file-extension (file-name-extension buffer-file-name)))
 (cond
 ((derived-mode-p '(c-mode c-ts-mode))
 (mk/tasks/c))
 ((derived-mode-p '(python-base-mode))
 (mk/tasks/python))
 ((derived-mode-p '(rust-ts-mode))
 (mk/tasks/rust))
 ((derived-mode-p '(zig-mode zig-ts-mode))
 (mk/tasks/zig))
 ((derived-mode-p '(kotlin-ts-mode))
 (mk/tasks/kotlin))
 ((string-match-p (regexp-opt '("puml" "plantuml")) file-extension)
 (tasks-wrap-compile-command
 '(concat "env PLANTUML_LIMIT_SIZE=327680 plantuml " rel-file-name
 " && imv " bare-rel-file-name ".png")))
 (t (message "No tasks defined for current condition.")))))
 (defun mk/tasks/project-run ()
 (interactive)
 (let ((project-root-path (project-root (project-current))))
 (cond
 ((file-exists-p (expand-file-name "Cargo.toml" project-root-path))
 (mk/tasks/rust))
 ((file-exists-p (expand-file-name "build.zig" project-root-path))
 (mk/tasks/zig))
 (t (mk/tasks/run)))))
 (setq tasks-function #'mk/tasks/run)
 (setq tasks-project-function #'mk/tasks/project-run))

2. Use utility functions provided by tasks to define specific tasks for various condition.

Currently, tasks provides:

• tasks-transient-define-prefix as a modified version of transient-define-prefix, through which you can define a transient menu for easily managing and invoking tasks. (NOTE excellent resource to learn transient: transient-showcase) Example Usage:

  (tasks-transient-define-prefix mk/tasks/rust ()
   "Tasks for Rust language."
   ["Options"
   ("-p" "package" mk/tasks-infix/rust/package)]
   [["Cargo"
   ("pc" "check" (concat "cargo check " (tasks-transient-get-arg "--package=")))
   ("pC" "clippy" (concat "cargo clippy " (tasks-transient-get-arg "--package=")))
   ("pf" "clippy fix" (concat "cargo clippy fix " (tasks-transient-get-arg "--package=")))
   ("pr" "run" (concat "cargo run " (tasks-transient-get-arg "--package=")))]])
  

  tasks-transient-define-prefix has some special modifications of transient-define-prefix. For command definition ("pc" "check" "echo 1"), for the third argument:

  • when it is function-alias type (e.g defined by transient-define-argument macro), it is handled the same as transient-define-prefix
  • when it is symbol type, it is treated as a command (interactive function) and wrapped by tasks-wrap-thing to make sure run-last-command function working.
  • when it is of other types, it is evaluated as an Emacs expression using eval. Some convenient variables such as directory-path, file-name, rel-file-path are provided so you can directly use them like (concat "echo " file-name). More information can be referred from tasks-wrap-compile-command command (see its source code). Since transient normally treat expression as infix expression when the third argument is string type or list type, e.g. ("-s" "switch" "--switch"), We recommend to use utility macros like transient-define-argument to define infix arguments. For example:

    (transient-define-argument mk/tasks-infix/rust/package ()
     :class 'transient-option
     :argument "--package=")
    

• tasks-transient-get-arg: get the value of transient infix argument and return a -a=v like string.

• tasks-wrap-thing, tasks-wrap-function and tasks-wrap-compile-command for wrap your command with tasks. Currently this wrapper record the last run command so that you can invoke the last run command.

3. commands provided by tasks

tasks-run, tasks-run-last-cmd, tasks-project-run, tasks-project-run-last-cmd