langline

Node library for getting information about programming languages by supplying either of the following options,

• Name of the language
• File extension of the language (E.g: js, py)
• Fully qualified file name with the extension
• The actual file which holds the code

Add langline to a project

npm i @itassistors/langline

Importing LangLine to a project

// ES5 require
const { LangLine } = require("@itassistors/langline");

// ES6 import
import { LangLine } from "@itassistors/langline";

• Fetching language with Extension

const { LangLine } = require("@itassistors/langline");

const extension = "js"; //file extension
const language = new LangLine().withExtension(extension);

console.log(language);

• Fetching language with File Name

const { LangLine } = require("@itassistors/langline");

const fileName = "addRepoApi.js"; //file name with extension
const language = new LangLine().withFileName(fileName);

console.log(language);

• Fetching language with Language Name

const { LangLine } = require("@itassistors/langline");
const language = new LangLine().withLanguageName("javascript");
console.log(language);

• Fetching language by supplying an actual file

Note: In this method, the supplied file will be validated to check its existence and to confirm its type. If the validation fails, then the language will not be returned. This is supported only when referred in the backend as it relies on the fs module and it is not supported when used in the client side (E.g: React)

const { LangLine } = require("@itassistors/langline");
const path = require("path");

async function langline() {
  const fileName = path.join(__dirname, "..", "server.js"); //file name with extension
  const language = await new LangLine()
    .withFile(fileName)
    .then((lang) => {
      return lang;
    })
    .catch((err) => {
      console.log("ERROR: ", err);
    });

  console.log(language);
}

langline();

Output

{
  name: 'JavaScript',
  extensions: [
    '.js',   '._js',   '.bones',
    '.cjs',  '.es',    '.es6',
    '.frag', '.gs',    '.jake',
    '.jsb',  '.jscad', '.jsfl',
    '.jsm',  '.jss',   '.mjs',
    '.njs',  '.pac',   '.sjs',
    '.ssjs', '.xsjs',  '.xsjslib'
  ],
  prismIndicator: 'javascript',
  founder: ["Brendan Eich"],
  year: ["1995"]
}

The programming language dataset is adapted from github linguist language list. The founder and year data were collected using a google search web scrapping module which is available in the addons directory

Langline CLI Support

The library can also be accessed via the CLI, provided langline is installed as a global npm module. To use langline's CLI capability, install it using the following command

npm i -g @itassistors/langline

In CLI mode, langline supports the following options to fetch the details of a language

Alias	Option	Function
-we	--with-extension	Lookup for a language data with file extension
-wfn	--with-file-name	Lookup for a language data with file name
-wf	--with-file	Lookup for a language data with actual file

$ langline -h
Usage: langline 


  langline [option] [argument]
  langline [option] [argument] --format=[argument]


Langline CLI - Use any of the options from below

Options:
  -V, --version                  output the version number
  -we, --with-extension <type>   Lookup for a language data with file extension
  -wfn, --with-file-name <type>  Lookup for a language data with file name
  -wf, --with-file <type>        Lookup for a language data with actual file
  --format <value>               To format the output based (choices: "json", "csv", "table")
  -h, --help                     display help for command


E.g:

  # Without explicit formatting (defaults to table output)
  $ langline --with-extension c

  Output  :

  ╔══════╤════════════════╤═══════════════╤═════════════════╤════════════╗
  ║ Name │ Founder        │ Year          │ Prism Indicator │ Extensions ║
  ╟──────┼────────────────┼───────────────┼─────────────────┼────────────╢
  ║ C    │ Dennis Ritchie │ 1972 and 1973 │ c               │ .c         ║
  ║      │                │               │                 │ .cats      ║
  ║      │                │               │                 │ .h         ║
  ║      │                │               │                 │ .idc       ║
  ╚══════╧════════════════╧═══════════════╧═════════════════╧════════════╝

  # Specified formatting
  $ langline --with-file main.c --format=csv

  Output :

  "name","founder","year","prismIndicator","extensions"
  "C","Dennis Ritchie","1972 and 1973","c",".c;.cats;.h;.idc"

Prism Indicator Field

This field is for prismjs users who relies on the framework for syntax highlighting. This field will come in handy for dynamic syntax highlighting when using prism with react or other frontend development frameworks

Client side support

From v1.0.1, the library was tweaked to access the data from linguistDataSet.ts instead of reading from the JSON file to provide client side support for the library. This makes LangLine methods compatible with front-end develoment as well *

* Except the withFile method

Add a new Language

The languages are maintained in a JSON file and a CSV file. If you wish to add a new language, fork the repo and submit a PR by updating either the JSON data file or the CSV data file

JSON File

Update the JSON file linguistDataSet.json with the language specific entries

{
    "name": "NAME OF THE LANGUAGE",
    "prismIndicator": "LANGUAGE COMPONENT NAME AS SUCH IN PRISMJS LIBRARY",
    "extensions": [".extension, "..."]
}

CSV File

Update the CSV file langData.csv with the following entries

name	extensions	prismIndicator	founder	year
NAME OF THE LANGUAGE	LANGUAGE FILE EXTENSIONS. SEPARATE MULTIPLE ENTRIES WITH PIPE	IF THE LANGUAGE IS SUPPORTED BY PRISM THEN THE PRISMJS COMPONENT NAME	FOUNDER NAME. SEPARATE MULTIPLE ENTRIES WITH PIPE	INITIAL RELEASE YEAR IN YYYY FORMAT