zig-nestedtext

A NestedText parser written in Zig 0.8 targeting NestedText v2.0.

See my Zig NestedText Library blog post.

Usage

There are a few options for making use of this project:

• Download from the releases page
• Include as a dependency via git submodules
• Clone and build manually, using a static copy of the built artefacts
• Use the gyro package manager (untested)

The Zig library has no external dependencies.

The CLI tool depends only on Clap for command line arg parsing (included as a git submodule under deps/).

Run zig build to build the static library libnestedtext.a under zig-out/lib/, which can then be linked with your program.

CLI Tool

An executable CLI program nt-cli is included for exposing the core functionality of the project. When building with zig build this can be found under zig-out/bin/.

This tool can be used to convert between NestedText and JSON, for example:

$./zig-out/bin/nt-cli -f samples/employees.nt
debug(cli):     +0 Starting up
debug(cli):     +0 Parsed args
debug(cli):     +1 Finished reading input
debug(cli):     +1 Parsed NestedText
debug(cli):     +1 Converted to JSON
debug(cli):     +1 Stringified JSON
{"president":{"name":"Katheryn McDaniel","address":"138 Almond Street\nTopeka, Kansas 20697","phone":{"cell":"1-210-555-5297","home":"1-210-555-8470"},"email":"KateMcD@aol.com","additional-roles":["board member"]},"vice-president":{"name":"Margaret Hodge","address":"2586 Marigold Lane\nTopeka, Kansas 20682","phone":"1-470-555-0398","email":"margaret.hodge@ku.edu","additional-roles":["new membership task force","accounting task force"]},"treasurer":[{"name":"Fumiko Purvis","address":"3636 Buffalo Ave\nTopeka, Kansas 20692","phone":"1-268-555-0280","email":"fumiko.purvis@hotmail.com","additional-roles":["accounting task force"]},{"name":"Merrill Eldridge","phone":"1-268-555-3602","email":"merrill.eldridge@yahoo.com"}]}
debug(cli):     +1 Exiting with: 0

Yes, that took around 1 millisecond ;)

And back to NestedText:

$./zig-out/bin/nt-cli -f samples/employees.nt | ./zig-out/bin/nt-cli -F json -O nt
president:
  name: Katheryn McDaniel
  address:
    > 138 Almond Street
    > Topeka, Kansas 20697
  phone:
    cell: 1-210-555-5297
    home: 1-210-555-8470
  email: KateMcD@aol.com
  additional-roles:
    - board member
vice-president:
  name: Margaret Hodge
  address:
    > 2586 Marigold Lane
    > Topeka, Kansas 20682
  phone: 1-470-555-0398
  email: margaret.hodge@ku.edu
  additional-roles:
    - new membership task force
    - accounting task force
treasurer:
  -
    name: Fumiko Purvis
    address:
      > 3636 Buffalo Ave
      > Topeka, Kansas 20692
    phone: 1-268-555-0280
    email: fumiko.purvis@hotmail.com
    additional-roles:
      - accounting task force
  -
    name: Merrill Eldridge
    phone: 1-268-555-3602
    email: merrill.eldridge@yahoo.com

Development

Build with zig build - the library will be under zig-out/lib/ and the CLI tool will be under zig-out/bin/.

Run the tests with zig build test.

Please feel free to propose changes via a PR, but please make sure all tests are passing, and also make sure to run zig fmt . (there are GitHub actions checks for both of these).