cargo-script-mvs

Note: this is a demo for the corresponding RFC. Devitions from the RFC include:

• Not as many compilation flags (e.g. --profile)

• -Zpolyfill flags like --test to demo how cargo test might work

• Assuming a "shell" script is actually a parameter from cargo and dropping it

• Implementation: Writing an explicit Cargo.toml in the target dir since cargo does not understand embedded manifests yet

• Overview

• Installation

  • Distro Packages
    • Arch Linux

• Scripts

• Executable Scripts

• Expressions

• Filters

• Environment Variables

• Troubleshooting

Overview

Run cargo scripts without any setup or explicit compilation step, with seamless use of crates specified as dependencies inside the scripts.

$ cargo install cargo-script-mvs
[...]

$ cat script.rs
#!/usr/bin/env cargo-eval
//! Dependencies can be specified in the script file itself as follows:
//!
//! ```cargo
//! [dependencies]
//! rand = "0.8.0"
//! ```

use rand::prelude::*;

fn main() {
    let x: u64 = random();
    println!("A random number: {}", x);
}

$ ./script.rs
A random number: 9240261453149857564

With cargo-eval Rust files and expressions can be executed just like a shell or Python script. Features include:

• Caching compiled artifacts for speed.
• Reading Cargo manifests embedded in Rust scripts.
• Supporting executable Rust scripts via Unix shebangs
• Using expressions as stream filters (i.e. for use in command pipelines).
• Running unit tests and benchmarks from scripts.

You can get an overview of the available options using the --help flag.

Installation

Install or update cargo-eval using Cargo:

$ cargo install cargo-script-mvs

Scripts

The primary use for cargo-eval is for running Rust source files as scripts. For example:

$ echo 'fn main() {println!("Hello, World!");}' > hello.rs
$ cargo-eval hello.rs
Hello, World!

This is the equivalent of:

$ mkdir src
$ echo 'fn main() {println!("Hello, World!");}' > src/hello.rs
$ echo '[package]' > Cargo.toml
$ echo 'name = "hello"' >> Cargo.toml
$ echo 'version = "0.0.0"' >> Cargo.toml
$ cargo run --quiet

To show the compilation output, pass --verbose.

cargo-eval will look for embedded dependency and manifest information in the script as shown by the below now.rs variants:

#!/usr/bin/env cargo-eval

//! This is a regular crate doc comment, but it also contains a partial
//! Cargo manifest.  Note the use of a *fenced* code block, and the
//! `cargo` "language".
//!
//! ```cargo
//! [dependencies]
//! time = "0.1.25"
//! ```

fn main() {
    println!("{}", time::now().rfc822z());
}

Executable Scripts

On Unix systems, you can use #!/usr/bin/env cargo-eval as a shebang line in a Rust script. This will allow you to execute a script files (which don't need to have the .rs file extension) directly.

License

Licensed under either of

• Apache License, Version 2.0, (LICENSE-APACHE or http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0)
• MIT license (LICENSE-MIT or http://opensource.org/licenses/MIT)

at your option.