[makefile] highlighting issues with variable definitions and shell commands

[xornet-sl]

• VSCode Version: 1.25.1
• OS Version: Linux Arch (updated)

Variables in braces

According to this document (GNU Makefile reference) there are two allowed types of variable definitions: $(VARIABLE) and ${VARIABLE}:

To substitute a variable’s value, write a dollar sign followed by the name of the variable in parentheses or braces: either ‘$(foo)’ or ‘${foo}’ is a valid reference to the variable foo.

Currently Makefile highlighting definition supports only parentheses but not braces.

Shell commands with $()

Look at:

all:
	some_shell_var=$$(sed -nre 's/some regex with (group)/\1/p')

sed command is parsed as makefile function, just like $() Even when we escape dollar sign with another dollar sign. So in this case highlighting totally brakes on closing parenthesis inside sed's regexp.

[aeschli]

@fadeevab FYI
We're using your grammar from https://github.com/fadeevab/make.tmbundle
(Issues are disabled, so I can't move it there)

[fadeevab]

@aeschli, Thanks for notification, I didn't see that. I need to check to enable issues. And I'll check current issue little bit later today.

[fadeevab]

@xornet-sl,

1. Yes, I can fix ${}.
2. Your example of shell is not a shell: $(sed -nre 's/some regex with (group)/\1/p') is a variable, right syntax is $(shell sed -rne 's/.......'). So in your case the line is colored as variable because $(sed ..) is a variable. Other parentheses are not expected inside a variable. If you change your example to $$(shell ...) you could see that colors are correct.

[xornet-sl]

@fadeevab No!!! Please, look closer what I wrote in topic. I use two dollar signs before sed command. It should be passed to shell just like $(sed) and shouldn't be parsed as Makefile variable. In this case $(sed ...) will be evaluated by shell, not make.
This topic also described in GNU Makefile reference p. 5.1.2:

Variable and function references in recipes have identical syntax and semantics to references elsewhere in the makefile. They also have the same quoting rules: if you want a dollar sign to appear in your recipe, you must double it (‘$$’). For shells like the default shell, that use dollar signs to introduce variables, it’s important to keep clear in your mind whether the variable you want to reference is a make variable (use a single dollar sign) or a shell variable (use two dollar signs).

[fadeevab]

Hm, I've got your point. Actually, currently the parser is developed to colorize an expression even after $$, it's useful to see the expected contents of complex makefile variables after demangling. For your case, it seems reasonable to disable such colorization at all for $$ in a target's recipe. What do you think about such option? Need to think about how could it be implemented in a straightforward way...

[fadeevab]

@aeschli

Before, I tested TextMate xml syntax on https://github-lightshow.herokuapp.com/, but now it's down. Don't you know, is there any other method to check TextMate XML syntax? For instance, I could use any "TextMate XML to JSON converter" if there is any, then I would able to test final JSON (converted from xml) in VSCode. I find nothing, maybe you know any way to test. Thank you for any suggestion.

[aeschli]

@fadeevab VSCode also can load grammars in plist format. Just give the file the plist suffix...

[fadeevab]

@aeschli, great!

[fadeevab]

FYI

@aeschli, Putting *.plist into installation directory of VSCode doesn't work, and I don't know about to launch code from development directory, but I'm not able to set up VSCode development project right now.

So a simple way, that I found for myself to quickly test TextMate XML grammar:

Prerequisites:

1. git clone https://github.com/Microsoft/vscode.git
2. sudo apt-get install npm
3. (maybe some deps were installed previously via yarn before)

Then:

1. cd ./vscode/extensions/{lang}
2. put the grammar file (XML) into ./syntaxes/{lang}.tmLanguage.plist
3. npm run update-grammar
4. sudo cp ./syntaxes/{lang}.tmLanguage.json /usr/share/code/resources/app/extensions/{lang}/syntaxes/
5. code (F1->"Reload Window" if launched)

[aeschli]

You also have to change the path to the grammar in the extensions/{lang}/package.json file