Overview

General overview

Knut allows to automate some code modifications on a codebase. This allows applying some modification on multiple files at once, for example the source and header files in a C++ project.

When running knut, the first thing is to open a project, a project being just the root directory for the codebase. Once a project is open, knut can open one or multiple files inside the project, and run transformations on those files. Transformations are defined in script files (see writing scripts).

Each file open provides different API usable by the scripts, depending on the type of file:

• a text file has find/replace/navigation APIs (and more...)
• a C++ file adds block navigation, switch header/source or declaration/definition...
• a ui file has API to change the object name or class of items
• ...

Running a script

Setup

To run scripts you need to set it up accordingly:

• start the knut user interface and go to File>Options...
• or start directly the settings dialog via the command line: knut --gui-setting`

This will display a dialog with the script knut general settings.

You need at least one script directory.

Running

Once done, you can run any scripts:

• from the command line:

knut --run <path-to-script>

- from the user interface, using the Script>Run Script... menu

Settings

Knut has 3 levels of settings:

• internal settings (can't be changed by the user)
• user settings: stored in <user home>/knut.json
• project settings: stored in <project home>/knut.json

Settings can be overridden, project settings have priority over user settings over internal settings. When a project is loaded, settings are saved in the project settings, otherwise in the user settings. Script paths are merged between the user and project settings, allowing for some general scripts, and project-specific scripts.

Some settings (like Text Editor Behavior) are only per project.

Internal settings

{
    "lsp" : [
        {
            "type": "cpp_type",
            "program": "clangd",
            "arguments": []
        }
    ],
    "rc": {
        "dialog_flags": ["UpdateGeometry", "UseIdForPixmap"],
        "dialog_scalex": 1.5,
        "dialog_scaley": 1.65,
        "asset_flags": ["RemoveUnknown", "SplitToolBar", "ConvertToPng"],
        "asset_transparent_colors": ["Gray", "Magenta", "BottomLeftPixel"]
    },
    "mime_types": {
        "c": "cpp_type",
        "cpp": "cpp_type",
        "cxx": "cpp_type",
        "h": "cpp_type",
        "hpp": "cpp_type",
        "txt": "text_type",
        "json": "text_type",
        "rc": "rc_type",
        "rc2": "rc_type",
        "ui": "qtui_type",
        "png": "image_type",
        "bmp": "image_type",
        "jpg": "image_type",
        "ico": "image_type"
    },
    "text_editor": {
        "tab": {
            "insertSpaces": true,
            "tabSize": 4
        }
    }
}