Question

I’m starting to investigate T4 for Code Generation.

I get that you have a basic template in which you can embed little chunks of c#/vb which can perform clever stuff…

<#@ template language='VB' debug='True' hostspecific='True' #> <#@ output extension='.vb' debug='True' hostspecific='True' #> Imports System <#For Each Table as String in New String(0 {'Table1','Table2'}#> Public Class <#=Table#>DA     Public Sub New         <#= WriteConstructorBody() #>     End Sub  End Class <#Next#> <#+     Public Function WriteConstructorBody() as String         return '' Some comment'     End function #> 

This is great.. However I would like to be able to write my main block thus…

<#@ template language='VB' debug='True' hostspecific='True' #> <#@ output extension='.vb' debug='True' hostspecific='True' #> Imports System <#  For Each BaseTableName as String in New String(){'Table1','Table2'}      WriteRecDataInterface(BaseTableName)      WriteRecDataClass(BaseTableName)      WriteDAInterface(BaseTableName)      WriteDAClass(BaseTableName)  Next  #> 

Then I would like to be able to have the WriteX methods exist in a Class Block but themselves be writable using code by example ie escaped Code blocks.

How can I achieve this?

Answer 1

It seems that you can mix static output with template code in Class Blocks. Here is an example with C#:

<#@ template language='C#' #> <# HelloWorld(); #> <#+     private string _field = 'classy';     private void HelloWorld()     {         for(int i = 1; i <= 3; i++)         { #> Hello <#=_field#> World <#= i #>! <#+         }     } #>