{"id":498,"date":"2010-05-17T15:22:46","date_gmt":"2010-05-17T19:22:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.ikriv.com\/blog\/?p=498"},"modified":"2010-05-17T15:22:46","modified_gmt":"2010-05-17T19:22:46","slug":"t4","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ikriv.com\/blog\/?p=498","title":{"rendered":"T4 \u2013 Too Troublesome to Tackle?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Text Template Transformation Toolkit<\/a> (T4) is a code generator built into Visual Studio 2008 and 2010. Yes, you have it now on your machine \ud83d\ude42 It was proposed to me as a possible solution to the C# macros<\/a> problem.<\/p>\n

I played with it a little bit and my current verdict is it would be quite difficult to use in a serious project. Here’s why:<\/p>\n

1. No automated build integration.<\/b> This is a killer, especially if your templates include other templates. The only time template code is executed is when you save a template file. Not when you (re)build your solution. Not when you get your stuff from source control. If foobar.tt<\/code> has changed and there are 50 files that include foobar.tt<\/code>, you will have to hunt them down, open them in Visual Studio and save them to re-generate the code. That’s 51 files.<\/p>\n

This is not T4’s fault per se – all custom tools suffer from this problem, but it does not make developer’s life any easier. There is some build integration<\/a> in VS 2010, but “in order to configure a Visual Studio project for build-time template transformation, you have to manually modify the MSBuild definition in the project file<\/quote>“. Not cool.<\/p>\n

2. No proper source control integration.<\/b> When you add your .tt file to source control, the generated file is added along with it, and every time you change anything, both files get checked out.<\/p>\n

3. No ability to group all files of a class under one node.<\/b> This is not a show stopper, but an inconvenience. I would like to have all code for class Foo<\/code> to be under one node. Something like Foo.cs<\/code> with Foo.props.tt<\/code> below it, which generates Foo.props.cs<\/code>. I am not sure how it can be accomplished with TT.<\/p>\n

See also:
\nT4: Text Template Transformation Toolkit (Oleg Sych blog)<\/a>
\nUnderstanding T4-MSBuild integration<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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