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Text Template Transformation Toolkit
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<h2 id="overview">Overview</h2> <p>T4 is used by <a href="/facts/Developer_(software)/WGTS1Jv9">developers</a> as part of an application or tool <a href="/facts/Framework_(computer_science)/EWasA8sG">framework</a> to automate the creation of text files with a variety of parameters. These text files can ultimately be any text format, such as code (for example <a href="/facts/C_Sharp_(programming_language)/UC2gxeyb">C#</a>), <a href="/facts/XML_template_engine/0gw4WVyJ">XML</a>, <a href="/facts/HTML/sSc3fT78">HTML</a> or <a href="/facts/XAML_Browser_Applications/pzHXp8QA">XAML</a>. </p><p>T4 uses a custom template format which can contain .NET code and <a href="/facts/String_literal/Fj41vtVm">string literals</a> in it, this is parsed by the T4 command line tool into .NET code, compiled and executed. The output of the executed code is the text file generated by the template.<a class="footnote-ref" id="fnref:1" href="#fn:1"><sup>1</sup></a> By using the Text Transformation class, T4 can also be run entirely from within a .NET application, eliminating the need for the end user to have Visual Studio installed. </p><p>T4 is used within Microsoft in <a href="/facts/ASP.NET_MVC/KFyeWXHx">ASP.NET MVC</a> for the creation of the views and controllers, <a href="/facts/ADO.NET_Entity_Framework/20FoR2zr">ADO.NET Entity Framework</a> for entity generation, and <a href="/facts/ASP.NET_Dynamic_Data/6Bl20GgC">ASP.NET Dynamic Data</a>.<a class="footnote-ref" id="fnref:2" href="#fn:2"><sup>2</sup></a> It is also used outside of Microsoft in projects such as SubSonic.<a class="footnote-ref" id="fnref:3" href="#fn:3"><sup>3</sup></a> </p><p>T4 templating is supported in <a href="/facts/Visual_Studio/omNe6Lej">Visual Studio</a>, <a href="/facts/MonoDevelop/HN4e0nVj">MonoDevelop</a> and JetBrains Rider.<a class="footnote-ref" id="fnref:4" href="#fn:4"><sup>4</sup></a> </p> <h2 id="controls">Controls</h2> <p>There are four types of controls handled by the T4 template transformation engine. </p> <table><tbody><tr><th>Name</th><th>Syntax</th><th>Description</th></tr><tr><td>Directives</td><td><#@ ... #></td><td>Instructions for the transformation engine</td></tr><tr><td>Standard control blocks</td><td><# ... #></td><td>Code to be executed (e.g. loops)</td></tr><tr><td>Expression control blocks</td><td><#= ... #></td><td>Expressions evaluated and converted to a string</td></tr><tr><td>Class feature control blocks</td><td><#+ ... #></td><td>Class and function definitions</td></tr></tbody></table> <h2 id="history">History</h2> <ul><li>2005: Microsoft released the first version of T4 as an out-of-band release for Visual Studio 2005</li> <li>2008: Microsoft includes it with Visual Studio 2008</li> <li>2010: Microsoft includes it with Visual Studio 2010 which included significant new features to improve performance, usability for both template authors and tool builders and better integration into Visual Studio's DSL tools.<a class="footnote-ref" id="fnref:5" href="#fn:5"><sup>5</sup></a></li> <li>2015: Visual Studio 2015 Update 2 can use C# version 6.0 features<a class="footnote-ref" id="fnref:6" href="#fn:6"><sup>6</sup></a></li> <li>2017: Open source version of engine released which supports <a href="/facts/.NET_Core/NhHe0l06">.NET Core</a><a class="footnote-ref" id="fnref:7" href="#fn:7"><sup>7</sup></a></li> <li>2019: JetBrains adds support for T4 in Rider<a class="footnote-ref" id="fnref:8" href="#fn:8"><sup>8</sup></a></li></ul> <h2 id="see-also">See also</h2> <ul> <li>Free and open-source software portal</li></ul> <ul><li><a href="/facts/Comparison_of_code_generation_tools/R094dLfH">Comparison of code generation tools</a></li> <li><a href="/facts/M4_(computer_language)/Q4gX4ske">m4 (computer language)</a></li> <li><a href="/facts/Smarty_(template_engine)/ayxNIBqT">Smarty</a></li></ul> <h2 id="external-links">External links</h2> <ul><li><a href="https://github.com/mono/t4">GitHub - mono/t4: T4 text templating engine</a></li></ul> <h2 id="references">References</h2> <ol> <li id="fn:1"><p>Web Templates (2013), Website templates, Website Templates South Africa, ISBN 978-1-4251-3374-0, retrieved 19 November 2013 <a href="978-1-4251-3374-0" target="_blank">978-1-4251-3374-0</a> <a href="#fnref:1" class="footnote-back-ref">↩</a></p></li> <li id="fn:2"><p>"Fun with T4 templates and Dynamic Data - Angle Bracket Percent - Site Home - MSDN Blogs". Blogs.msdn.com. 2008-11-26. Retrieved 2012-05-17. <a href="http://blogs.msdn.com/b/davidebb/archive/2008/11/26/fun-with-t4-templates-and-dynamic-data.aspx" target="_blank">http://blogs.msdn.com/b/davidebb/archive/2008/11/26/fun-with-t4-templates-and-dynamic-data.aspx</a> <a href="#fnref:2" class="footnote-back-ref">↩</a></p></li> <li id="fn:3"><p>"SubSonic v3's T4 Templates « Daily Cycle". Gcapnias.wordpress.com. 2009-01-12. Retrieved 2012-05-17. <a href="http://gcapnias.wordpress.com/2009/01/12/subsonic-v3%e2%80%99s-t4-templates/" target="_blank">http://gcapnias.wordpress.com/2009/01/12/subsonic-v3%e2%80%99s-t4-templates/</a> <a href="#fnref:3" class="footnote-back-ref">↩</a></p></li> <li id="fn:4"><p>"Rider: The Cross-Platform .NET IDE from JetBrains". <a href="https://www.jetbrains.com/rider/" target="_blank">https://www.jetbrains.com/rider/</a> <a href="#fnref:4" class="footnote-back-ref">↩</a></p></li> <li id="fn:5"><p>"What's new in T4 in Visual Studio 2010 - [Profoundly Esoteric Image] - Site Home - MSDN Blogs". Blogs.msdn.com. 2010-04-15. Retrieved 2012-05-17. <a href="http://blogs.msdn.com/b/garethj/archive/2010/04/15/what-s-new-in-t4-in-visual-studio-2010.aspx" target="_blank">http://blogs.msdn.com/b/garethj/archive/2010/04/15/what-s-new-in-t4-in-visual-studio-2010.aspx</a> <a href="#fnref:5" class="footnote-back-ref">↩</a></p></li> <li id="fn:6"><p>"Code Generation and T4 Text Templates - Visual Studio (Windows)". 12 January 2024. <a href="https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/visualstudio/modeling/code-generation-and-t4-text-templates" target="_blank">https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/visualstudio/modeling/code-generation-and-t4-text-templates</a> <a href="#fnref:6" class="footnote-back-ref">↩</a></p></li> <li id="fn:7"><p>"Mono.TextTemplating". GitHub. 22 October 2021. <a href="https://github.com/mono/t4" target="_blank">https://github.com/mono/t4</a> <a href="#fnref:7" class="footnote-back-ref">↩</a></p></li> <li id="fn:8"><p>"ForTea". GitHub. 20 October 2021. <a href="https://github.com/jetbrains/fortea" target="_blank">https://github.com/jetbrains/fortea</a> <a href="#fnref:8" class="footnote-back-ref">↩</a></p></li> </ol>