Gazelle is a build file generator for Go projects. It can create new BUILD.bazel files for a project that follows "go build" conventions, and it can update existing build files to include new files and options. Gazelle can be invoked directly in a project workspace, or it can be run on an external repository during the build as part of the go_repository rule.
Gazelle is under active development. Its interface and the rules it generates may change.
Contents
To use Gazelle in a new project, add the following to the BUILD or BUILD.bazel file in the root directory of your repository:
load("@io_bazel_rules_go//go:def.bzl", "gazelle")
gazelle(
name = "gazelle",
prefix = "github.com/example/project",
)
Replace the string in prefix
with the portion of your import path that
corresponds to your repository.
After adding those rules, run the command below:
bazel run //:gazelle
This will generate new BUILD.bazel files for your project. You can run the same command in the future to update existing BUILD.bazel files to include new source files or options.
If you have a Go SDK installed, you can install Gazelle in your GOPATH
with
the command below:
go get -u github.com/bazelbuild/rules_go/go/tools/gazelle/gazelle
Make sure to re-run this command to upgrade Gazelle whenever you upgrade rules_go in your repository.
To generate BUILD.bazel files in a new project, run the command below, replacing the prefix with the portion of your import path that corresponds to your repository.
gazelle -go_prefix github.com/my/project
The prefix only needs to be specified the first time you run Gazelle. To update
existing BUILD.bazel files, you can just run gazelle
without arguments.
gazelle <command> [flags...] [package-dirs...]
The first argument to Gazelle may be one of the commands below. If no command
is specified, update
is assumed.
Commands | |
---|---|
update |
Gazelle will create new build files and update existing build files. New rules may be created. Files, dependencies, and other options may be added or removed from existing rules. |
Gazelle accepts a list Go of package directories to process. If no directories are given, it defaults to the current directory when run on the command line or the repository root when run with Bazel. It recursively traverses subdirectories.
Gazelle accepts the following flags:
Name | Default value |
---|---|
-build_file_name file1,file2,... |
BUILD.bazel,BUILD |
Comma-separated list of file names. Gazelle recognizes these files as Bazel
build files. New files will use the first name in this list. Use this if
your project contains non-Bazel files named BUILD (or build on
case-insensitive file systems). |
|
-build_tags tag1,tag2 |
|
List of Go build tags Gazelle will consider to be true. Gazelle applies
constraints when generating Go rules. It assumes certain tags are true on
certain platforms (for example, amd64,linux ). It assumes all Go release
tags are true (for example, go1.8 ). It considers other tags to be false
(for example, ignore ). This flag overrides that behavior. |
|
-external external|vendored |
external |
Determines how Gazelle resolves import paths. May be external or
vendored . Gazelle translates Go import paths to Bazel labels when
resolving library dependencies. Import paths that start with the
go_prefix are resolved to local labels, but other imports
are resolved based on this mode. In external mode, paths are
resolved using an external dependency in the WORKSPACE file (Gazelle does
not create or maintain these dependencies yet). In vendored mode,
paths are resolved to a library in the vendor directory. |
|
-go_prefix example.com/repo |
|
A prefix of import paths for libraries in the repository that corresponds to
the repository root. Gazelle infers this from the This prefix is used to determine whether an import path refers to a library in the current repository or an external dependency. |
|
-known_import example.com |
|
Skips import path resolution for a known domain. May be repeated. When Gazelle resolves an import path to an external dependency, it attempts to discover the remote repository root over HTTP. Gazelle skips this discovery step for a few well-known domains with predictable structure, like golang.org and github.com. This flag specifies additional domains to skip, which is useful in situations where the lookup would fail for some reason. |
|
-mode fix|print|diff |
fix |
Method for emitting merged build files. In |
|
-proto default|legacy|disable |
default |
Determines how Gazelle should generate rules for .proto files. See details in Directives below. | |
-repo_root dir |
|
The root directory of the repository. Gazelle normally infers this to be the directory containing the WORKSPACE file. Gazelle will not process packages outside this directory. |
When Gazelle is run by Bazel, most of the flags above can be encoded in the
gazelle
macro. For example:
load("@io_bazel_rules_go//go:def.bzl", "gazelle")
gazelle(
name = "gazelle",
command = "fix",
prefix = "github.com/example/project",
external = "vendored",
build_tags = [
"integration",
"debug",
],
args = [
"-build_file_name",
"BUILD,BUILD.bazel",
],
)
Gazelle supports several directives, written as comments in build files.
# gazelle:ignore
: may be written at the top level of any build file. Gazelle will not update files with this comment.# gazelle:exclude path
: may be written at the top level of any build file. If the path refers to a source file, Gazelle won't include it in any rules. If the path refers to a directory, Gazelle won't recurse into it. The path may refer to something in a subdirectory, for example, a testdata directory somewhere in a vendor tree. This directive may be repeated to exclude multiple paths, one per line.# gazelle:proto <mode>
: Tells Gazelle how to generate rules for .proto files. Applies to the current directory and subdirectories. Valid values formode
are:default
:proto_library
,go_proto_library
,go_grpc_library
, andgo_library
rules are generated using@io_bazel_rules_go//proto:def.bzl
. This is the default mode.legacy
:filegroup
rules are generated for use by@io_bazel_rules_go//proto:go_proto_library.bzl
.go_proto_library
rules must be written by hand. Gazelle will run in this mode automatically ifgo_proto_library.bzl
is loaded to avoid disrupting existing projects, but this can be overridden with a directive.disable
: .proto files are ignored. Gazelle will run in this mode automatically ifgo_proto_library
is loaded from any other source, but this can be overridden with a directive.
# keep
: may be written before a rule to prevent the rule from being updated or after a source file, dependency, or flag to prevent it from being removed.
Suppose you have a library that includes a generated .go file. Gazelle won't
know what imports to resolve, so you may need to add dependencies manually with
# keep
comments.
load("@io_bazel_rules_go//go:def.bzl", "go_library")
load("@com_github_example_gen//:gen.bzl", "gen_go_file")
gen_go_file(
name = "magic",
srcs = ["magic.go.in"],
outs = ["magic.go"],
)
go_library(
name = "go_default_library",
srcs = ["magic.go"],
visibility = ["//visibility:public"],
deps = [
"@com_github_example_gen//:go_default_library", # keep
],
)
When Gazelle is invoked with the fix
command, in addition to updating
source files and dependencies of existing rules, Gazelle will remove deprecated
usage of the Go rules, analogous to go fix
. The following transformations
are performed.
Squash cgo libraries: Gazelle will remove cgo_library rules named
cgo_default_library
and merge their attributes with a go_library
rule
in the same package named go_default_library
. If no such go_library
rule exists, a new one will be created. Other cgo_library
rules will not
be removed.
Remove legacy protos: Gazelle will remove usage of go_proto_library
rules loaded from @io_bazel_rules_go//proto:go_proto_library.bzl
and
filegroup
rules named go_default_library_protos
. Newly generated
proto rules will take their place. Since filegroup
isn't needed anymore
and go_proto_library
has different attributes and was always written by
hand, Gazelle will not attempt to merge anything from these rules with the
newly generated rules.
This transformation is only applied in the default proto mode. Since Gazelle
will run in legacy proto mode if go_proto_library.bzl
is loaded, this
transformation is not usually applied. You can set the proto mode explicitly
using the directive # gazelle:proto default
.