Command Line Interface¶

The TypeGen Command Line Interface (CLI) can be used either from the Package Manager Console, after installing TypeGen NuGet package, or as a .NET tool.

You may need to restart Visual Studio before you can start using TypeGen in the Package Manager Console

Note: This issue has been resolved since Visual Studio 2017 RC

There is a known issue with using TypeGen from Package Manager Console with ASP.NET Core projects, under Visual Studio 2015: Package Manager Console doesn’t see TypeGen.ps1. If this happens to you, you can copy TypeGen.ps1 from your NuGet packages folder to your solution/project directory and use it from PowerShell or CMD. Alternatively, you may also consider using TypeGen .NET CLI tool instead of TypeGen Package Manager Console tool.

After running the [dotnet-]typegen command, the following set of actions is performed for each of the specified project folders:

The CLI reads the assembly file (.dll or .exe). By default (if no assembly path is specified in the config), the assembly file is searched recursively in the project folder’s bin directory. The name of the assembly must match the name of the .csproj or .xproj file present in the project folder.
File generation is performed based on the options specified in the configuration file

New syntax (>= 2.0.0)¶

[dotnet-]typegen [options] [command]

Options:
-h|--help               Show help information
-v|--verbose            Show verbose output
-p|--project-folder     Set project folder path(s)
-c|--config-path        Set config path(s) to use

Commands:
generate     Generate TypeScript files
getcwd       Get current working directory

Old syntax (1.x.x)¶

TypeGen ProjectFolder1[|ProjectFolder2|(...)] [-Config-Path path1[|path2|(...)]] [Get-Cwd] [-h | -Help] [-v | -Verbose]

Arguments/options

ProjectFolderN	The path to project(s) that TypeScript sources will be generated for. Package Manager Console runs from the solution directory by default, so usually ProjectFolderN would be the name of the project.
-Config-Path	Paths to config files for the specified projects (the order of config paths must match the order of projects). If a project doesn’t have its config specified, tgconfig.json file from ProjectFolderN will be used. If tgconfig.json is not present, the default configuration will be used.
Get-Cwd	A utility option. If present, the current working directory of the CLI will be outputted. No file generation will occur when this option is present.
-h or -Help	Shows the help.
-v or -Verbose	The CLI will run in verbose mode. More information will be outputted.

Configuration file¶

TypeGen CLI uses a JSON configuration file to read the file generation options. By default, the configuration file is read from the tgconfig.json file present in the specified project folder. If tgconfig.json does not exist, default options are used. Configuration file path can also be specified as a CLI argument (see syntax above). For configuration parameters not present in the configuration file, their default values are used upon file generation.

The table below shows all available config parameters, with their default values and a description:

Parameter	Type	Default value	Description
addFilesToProject	boolean	false	Only for .NET Framework apps (not .NET Core). Whether to add the generated TypeScript files to the project file (*.csproj).
assemblies	string[]	[]	An array of paths to assembly files to generate TypeScript sources from. If null or empty, the default strategy for finding an assembly will be used. Note: the order of assemblies also determines the order of reading any custom converters.
(DEPR.) assemblyPath	string	null	The path to the assembly file with C# types to generate TypeScript sources for. If null or empty, the default strategy for finding an assembly will be used.
buildProject	boolean	false	Whether to build the project before performing file generation.
clearOutputDirectory	boolean	false	Whether to clear the output directory before generating new files (removing all files and recursively removing all subdirectories in the output directory).
(DEPR.) createIndexFile	boolean	false	Whether to generate an index (barrel) file in the root TypeScript output directory. The generated barrel file exports everything from all generated TypeScript files. This option should be avoided in favor of generating barrels from generation specs.
csAllowNullsForAllTypes	boolean	null	Specifies whether null union types should be added for all types.
csDefaultValuesForConstantsOnly	boolean	false	Whether to generate the property/field default values only for constants.
csNullableTranslation	string	“”	Determines which strict-null-checking type unions will be added to C# nullable property types by default. Possible values: “null”, “undefined”, “optional”, “null\|undefined” or “”.
customTypeMappings	Object	{}	Object containing a map of custom [C# to TypeScript] type mappings (example below).
defaultValuesForTypes	Object	{}	Object containing a map of default values for the specified TypeScript types (example below).
enumStringInitializers	boolean	false	Whether to use TypeScript enum string initializers by default.
enumStringInitializersConverters (*)	string[]	[]	Converter chain used for converting C# enum value names to TypeScript enum string initializers. See the (*) explanation below regarding ways in which class names can be specified.
enumValueNameConverters (*)	string[]	[]	Converter chain used for converting C# enum value names to TypeScript enum value names. See the (*) explanation below regarding ways in which class names can be specified.
explicitPublicAccessor	boolean	false	Whether to use explicit public accessor in the generated TypeScript class files.
exportTypesAsInterfacesByDefault	boolean	false	Whether to export types as interfaces by default. For example affects member types which aren’t explicitly selected to be generated.
externalAssemblyPaths	string[]	[]	An array of paths to external assemblies. These paths are searched (recursively) for any assembly references that cannot be automatically resolved. NuGet package folders (global + machine-wide and project fallback) are searched by default.
fileHeading	string	null	TypeScript file heading text (default is “(…) This is a TypeGen auto-generated file. (…)”)
fileNameConverters (*)	string[]	[“PascalCaseToKebabCaseConverter”]	Converter chain used for converting C# type names to TypeScript file names. See the (*) explanation below regarding ways in which class names can be specified.
generateFromAssemblies	boolean	null	Whether to generate files from assemblies specified in assemblies parameter. If null, files are generated from assemblies only if no generation specs are specified.
generationSpecs (*)	string[]	[]	An array of generation specs to be used for file generation. See the (*) explanation below regarding ways in which class names can be specified.
outputPath	string	“”	Output path for generated files, relative to the project folder.
projectOutputFolder	string	“bin”	The project’s output folder.
propertyNameConverters (*)	string[]	[“PascalCaseToCamelCaseConverter”]	Converter chain used for converting C# property/field names to TypeScript property names. See the (*) explanation below regarding ways in which class names can be specified.
singleQuotes	boolean	false	Whether to use single quotes for string literals in the generated TypeScript files.
tabLength	number	4	The number of spaces per tab in the generated TypeScript files.
typeBlacklist	string[]	[]	Types that should not be generated (specified by name or full name). Apart from the specified types, the following default types are also added to typeBlacklist: IAsyncDisposable, ICloneable, IComparable, IConvertible, IDisposable, IEquatable, IFormattable, IParsable, ISerializable, ISpanFormattable, ISpanParsable, ValueType (and their generic variants where applicable). Types can be removed from typeBlacklist by using typeWhitelist.
typeNameConverters (*)	string[]	[]	Converter chain used for converting C# type names to TypeScript type names. See the (*) explanation below regarding ways in which class names can be specified.
typeScriptFileExtension	string	“ts”	File extension for the generated TypeScript files.
typeUnionsForTypes	Object	{}	Object containing a map of [TypeScript type -> type unions] mappings (example below).
typeWhitelist	string[]	[]	Removes types from typeBlacklist. Types can be specified by name or full name.
useDefaultExport	boolean	false	Whether to use TypeScript default exports by default.
useImportType	boolean	false	Whether to use “import type” instead of “import” in the generated TypeScript sources.
useTabCharacter	boolean	false	Whether to use the tab character instead or multiple spaces.

(*) The rules for specifying class names are as follows:

Class names can be specified as a name or a fully qualified name.
If only the name of a class is specified, the class will first be searched in the assemblies specified in assemblies (or the project’s assembly if no assemblies are specified) and then (if not found) in TypeGen.Core.
To read a class from a specific assembly, path can be defined in the following format: assembly/path/assembly.dll:ClassName, where assembly path is relative to the project’s folder.

Example¶

An example of a configuration file (tgconfig.json) is presented below:

{
    "assemblies": ["my/app/MyApp.Web.dll", "my/app/MyApp.Models.dll"],
    "fileNameConverters": ["converters/MyApp.Converters.dll:StripDto", "PascalCaseToKebabCase"],
    "typeNameConverters": ["converters/MyApp.Converters.dll:Fqcn.Converters.StripDto"],
    "propertyNameConverters": [],
    "enumValueNameConverters": ["UnderscoreCaseToPascalCase"],
    "typeScriptFileExtension": "ts",
    "tabLength": 2,
    "explicitPublicAccessor": true,
    "defaultValuesForTypes": {
        "number": "-1",
        "Date | null": "null",
        "string": "\"\""
    },
    "customTypeMappings": {
        "System.DateTime": "string",
        "Some.Custom.Type": "number"
    },
    "typeUnionsForTypes": {
        "string": ["null", "undefined"],
        "Date": ["string"]
    }
}