What is the meta-programming story for KMP? Is it ...

# multiplatform

[dimsuz]

What is the meta-programming story for KMP? Is it planned, is there an issue on bugtracker I can vote on?
JVM has (imperfect) kapt , but I'd really like to be able to also generate common code.

I know about kotlin compiler plugins, but this seems like an overkill.

[spierce7]

Compiler Plugins are the intended multiplatform meta-programming strategy as far as I know.

It’s worth noting that there are different levels of compiler plugins. Compiler plugins at there simplest are generating new sources (similar to annotation processors), and from what I understand, don’t require an IDE plugin in order to see the generated code. This of course isn’t true if your are modifying an existing class / file.

I don’t know much about what I’m talking about here though. I’m sure other people can explain better. We still don’t have a stable compiler plugin api.

[dimsuz]

I see, thanks! I didn't know that sources generated by compiler plugins can be seen in IDE.

This would be nice indeed. Otherwise it feels like black magic which I don't like for a common use case...

[dimsuz]

I would appreciate an official statement/roadmap too

[spierce7]

I think they’ve been pretty clear on this in their roadmap. in the 2011 Kotlin Conf keynote I think this was discussed

[spierce7]

this was taken from a talk from Andrey Breslev

[spierce7]

[spierce7]

I’m also not sure that compiler plugins are more black-magic than annotation processors. Compiler plugins have access to add to and edit the existing AST, while annotation processors could only add to it.

[dimsuz]

The editiing of AST is what I consider a black magic. I mean this is the tool which is awesome in the right hands, but given the opportunity one can come up with a lot of bad things 🙂