How to pretty print Syn AST? - rust

Question

I'm trying to use syn to create an AST from a Rust file and then using quote to write it to another. However, when I write it, it puts extra spaces between everything.
Note that the example below is just to demonstrate the minimum reproducible problem I'm having. I realize that if I just wanted to copy the code over I could copy the file but it doesn't fit my case and I need to use an AST.
pub fn build_file() {
let current_dir = std::env::current_dir().expect("Unable to get current directory");
let rust_file = std::fs::read_to_string(current_dir.join("src").join("lib.rs")).expect("Unable to read rust file");
let ast = syn::parse_file(&rust_file).expect("Unable to create AST from rust file");
match std::fs::write("src/utils.rs", quote::quote!(#ast).to_string());
}
The file that it creates an AST of is this:
#[macro_use]
extern crate foo;
mod test;
fn init(handle: foo::InitHandle) {
handle.add_class::<Test::test>();
}
What it outputs is this:
# [macro_use] extern crate foo ; mod test ; fn init (handle : foo :: InitHandle) { handle . add_class :: < Test :: test > () ; }
I've even tried running it through rustfmt after writing it to the file like so:
utils::write_file("src/utils.rs", quote::quote!(#ast).to_string());
match std::process::Command::new("cargo").arg("fmt").output() {
Ok(_v) => (),
Err(e) => std::process::exit(1),
}
But it doesn't seem to make any difference.

Answer 1

The quote crate is not really concerned with pretty printing the generated code. You can run it through rustfmt, you just have to execute rustfmt src/utils.rs or cargo fmt -- src/utils.rs.
use std::fs;
use std::io;
use std::path::Path;
use std::process::Command;
fn write_and_fmt<P: AsRef<Path>, S: ToString>(path: P, code: S) -> io::Result<()> {
fs::write(&path, code.to_string())?;
Command::new("rustfmt")
.arg(path.as_ref())
.spawn()?
.wait()?;
Ok(())
}
Now you can just execute:
write_and_fmt("src/utils.rs", quote::quote!(#ast)).expect("unable to save or format");
See also "Any interest in a pretty-printing crate for Syn?" on the Rust forum.

Answer 2

As Martin mentioned in his answer, prettyplease can be used to format code fragments, which can be quite useful when testing proc macro where the standard to_string() on proc_macro2::TokenStream is rather hard to read.
Here a code sample to pretty print a proc_macro2::TokenStream parsable as a syn::Item:
fn pretty_print_item(item: proc_macro2::TokenStream) -> String {
let item = syn::parse2(item).unwrap();
let file = syn::File {
attrs: vec![],
items: vec![item],
shebang: None,
};
prettyplease::unparse(&file)
}
I used this in my tests to help me understand where is the wrong generated code:
assert_eq!(
expected.to_string(),
generate_event().to_string(),
"\n\nActual:\n {}",
pretty_print_item(generate_event())
);

Answer 3

Please see the new prettyplease crate. Advantages:
It can be used directly as a library.
It can handle code fragments while rustfmt only handles full files.
It is fast because it uses a simpler algorithm.

Answer 4

Similar to other answers, I also use prettyplease.
I use this little trick to pretty-print a proc_macro2::TokenStream (e.g. what you get from calling quote::quote!):
fn pretty_print(ts: &proc_macro2::TokenStream) -> String {
let file = syn::parse_file(&ts.to_string()).unwrap();
prettyplease::unparse(&file)
}
Basically, I convert the token stream to an unformatted String, then parse that String into a syn::File, and then pass that to prettyplease package.
Usage:
#[test]
fn it_works() {
let tokens = quote::quote! {
struct Foo {
bar: String,
baz: u64,
}
};
let formatted = pretty_print(&tokens);
let expected = "struct Foo {\n bar: String,\n baz: u64,\n}\n";
assert_eq!(formatted, expected);
}