# nur - the simple nu based task runner
`nur` is a simple, yet very powerful task runner. It borrows ideas from [`b5`](https://github.com/team23/b5)
and [`just`](https://github.com/casey/just), but uses [`nu` scripting](https://www.nushell.sh/book/programming_in_nu.md)
to define the tasks. This allows for very powerful, yet well structured tasks.
## Warning / disclaimer
In its current state `nur` is more or less a **proof of concept**. I wanted to put it out there, so
I may receive some feedback. But I am not using this in some production setup myself yet. So feel
free to poke around with this, but be aware this is far from being finished, stable or anything.
Also this is my first ever rust project and parts of the code are currently more like helping me
out to get to know rust. Meaning: There might be dragons!
## Usage example
`nur` allows you to execute tasks define in a file called `nurfile`. It will look through your
current working directory and all its parents to look for this file. When it has found the `nurfile`
it will change to the directory the file was found in and then `source` the file into `nu` script.
You can define tasks like this:
```
def "nur hello" [
name: string = "world",
] {
print $"hello {name}"
}
```
The important bit is that you define your tasks as subcommands for "nur". If you then execute
`nur hello` it will print "hello world", meaning it did execute the task `hello` in your `nurfile`.
You can also use `nur --help` to get some details on how to use `nur` and `nur --help hello` to
see what this `hello` task accepts as parameters.
*Note:* In the future you should be able to use something like `nur hello --name max` to pass parameters
to your tasks - but this still needs to be implemented.
Your tasks then can do whatever you want them to do in `nu` script. This allows for very structured
usage of for example docker to run/manage your project needs. But it can also just execute simple
commands like you would normally do in your shell (like `npm ci` or something). `nur` is not tight
to any programming language, packaging system or anything. As in the end the `nurfile` if just a
normal `nu` script you can put into this whatever you like.
See `nu` [custom commands](https://www.nushell.sh/book/custom_commands.html) for details on how to define
tasks and at least read through the [nu quick tour](https://www.nushell.sh/book/quick_tour.html) to
understand some basics about `nu` scripting.
## Why + some history
For me `nur` is the next logical step after I created `b5`. `b5` is based on running bash code and
allowing users to do this in a somewhat ordered matter. Initially `b5` even was just some bash script,
but then eventually I figured bash is just not enough to handle my requirements. So I switched to
using Python, but `b5` was still based on bash, as it would generate bash code and then just execute
the code. One issue I always had with this approach was that again bash isn't that nice to write
complex things without introducing issues everywhere. Look for example at parameter handling.
Then along came `just`, which did implement its own language you could use to write your `justfile`.
This language was inspired by what a `Makefile` would look like, still without the issued `Makefile`'s
impose when using those as your task runner. Also it did include a very nice way to define task arguments,
parse those, care about validation etc. Still the way `just` works is either to execute the task line
by line (and not having any context between those commands) or define some script language to execute
the full command (meaning using something like bash again). So `just` - at least for me - is a great
step forward, but still not what I had in mind when creating `b5` and what I would like to do with a
task runner.
Then I came across `nu`, especially the nu shell. This did become my default shell after a while and
I am using it as of now. `nu` feels nicely designed, has a very structured way to execute command and
also handle their "response" data (stdout/err) - as everything is structured data here. This is way
better than the original UNIX approach of always parsing text data. Also `nu` allows you to have simple
functions, that - as with `just` - handle argument parsing for you. So this did look like the perfect
combination for something like a task runner.
Of course you could just define some `nu` functions to completely create a task runner, that would
already be better than `b5` or `just`. But this would also mean that every dev using this task runner
would need to switch to `nu` first. So I decided to try the hard route and create my own rust based
cli tool that would parse a `nu` script and then execute tasks defined in this script.
This is what you are seeing here. `nur` will load the `nurfile` defined in your project directory and
then allows you to execute tasks from this file. As it is its own binary you can easily use `nur` from
bash, zsh and possibly even PowerShell - whatever you prefer. Still you will be able to have the `nu`
superpowers inside your defined tasks.
## About the name
`nur` stands for "nu run". Basically it should be "nu run task", which would lead to "nurt" - but then I
decided for just "nur" as:
* `nur` is very fast to type (one less character 💪)
* `nur` is the reverse of `run`, which I like as a side effect 🥳
* and then as a nice addon: You could translate "just" to "nur" in german 😂
## Contributing
If you want to contribute to this project, feel free to just fork the project, create a dev
branch in your fork and then create a pull request (PR). If you are unsure about whether
your changes really suit the project please create an issue first, to talk about this.