local-macro

A small utility to create and run directory-specific macros.

Usage

lm <macro-name> <args...>

Details

lm looks for and runs executable scripts in the .local-macro directory, as well as .local-marco directories in parent directories.

Configuration

Configuration is done via environment variables.

Env var	Description	Default
LM_DIR_NAME	The name of the directory containing the macro scripts	.local-macro

Example

Assume we have a project with the following directory structure:

- project/
  - frontend/
    - .local-macro/
      - run
      - ...
  - backend/
    - .local-macro/
      - run
      - ...
  - .local-macro/
    - sync-schemas
    - ...

with a node frontend

$ cat frontend/.local-macro/run
#!/bin/zsh
npm run dev

and a python backend

$ cat backend/.local-macro/run
#!/bin/zsh
python manage.py runserver

and a set of shared schemas that need to be synced between them

$ cat .local-macro/sync-schemas
#!/bin/zsh
cp frontend/schemas/schema.json backend/schemas/schema.json

Running the frontend and backend and syncing the schemas are all commands which need to be run often, but are only relevant to this project. lm makes it easy to define these macros only where they're relevant.

$ cd project/frontend
$ lm run # calls project/frontend/.local-macro/run

$ cd project/backend
$ lm run # calls project/backend/.local-macro/run

$ cd project/backend
$ lm sync-schemas # calls project/.local-macro/sync-schemas

Writing macros

Macros are simple scripts that are called with the arguments passed to lm. They can be written in any language, as long as they are executable. lm will pass along all arguments after the macro name to the script.

Additionally, lm will pass several environment variables to the script:

Env var	Description
LM_CALL_DIR	The path to the directory from which lm was called
LM_MACRO_DIR	The path to the parent of the resolved script's .local-macro directory
LM_MACRO	The name of the macro

These can be used to customize the behavior of the macro.