PkgTemplatesCommandLineInterface.jl

A command-line interface for PkgTemplates.jl.

Features

• Create Julia packages from the command line without REPL
• User-configurable defaults via TOML config file
• Optional mise task file generation
• Shell completion (fish, bash, zsh)

Requirements

• Julia 1.12+

Installation

julia -e 'using Pkg; Pkg.Apps.add(url="https://github.com/ultimatile/PkgTemplatesCommandLineInterface.jl")'

Using mise

git clone https://github.com/ultimatile/PkgTemplatesCommandLineInterface.jl
cd PkgTemplatesCommandLineInterface.jl
mise run install

Usage

# Create a package
jtc create MyPackage

# Create with options
jtc create MyPackage --author "Your Name" --user yourgithubuser --output-dir ~/projects

# Generate without mise configuration file
jtc create MyPackage --no-mise

# Dry run (preview without executing)
jtc create MyPackage --dry-run

Commands

Command	Description
create	Create a new Julia package
config show	Show current configuration
config set	Set configuration values
plugin-info [name]	Display plugin information
completion <shell>	Generate shell completion scripts (fish, bash, zsh)

Global Options

Option	Description
--version	Show version
--verbose, -v	Enable verbose logging

Configuration

jtc supports user-configurable defaults stored in $XDG_CONFIG_HOME/jtc/config.toml (default: ~/.config/jtc/config.toml).

Setting Defaults

# Show current configuration
jtc config show

# Set default values
jtc config set --author "Your Name" --user yourgithubuser

Configuration Precedence

1. Command-line options (highest priority)
2. Configuration file defaults
3. Built-in defaults (lowest priority)

Plugin options and secrets

Plugin fields are passed through to PkgTemplates.jl as key=value pairs, e.g. jtc create MyPackage --tagbot 'token=GITHUB_TOKEN'.

Fields typed as a secret (such as TagBot.token or TagBot.ssh) expect the name of a GitHub Actions secret — not the secret value itself. PkgTemplates.jl renders the name into the workflow as ${{ secrets.NAME }}, so a conventional value is an identifier like DOCUMENTER_KEY or GITHUB_TOKEN.

If you accidentally pass a literal credential, jtc warns and avoids echoing it in command output and --dry-run plans. The literal would still be written to your config file in plaintext, so remove it and use the secret's name instead. The config file and its directory are created with owner-only permissions (0600 / 0700) on POSIX systems.

Troubleshooting

No such file or directory error after Julia update

After updating Julia (e.g., juliaup up), you may see:

/path/to/julia-1.x.x+0.../bin/julia: No such file or directory

This occurs because the shim file has a hardcoded path to the old Julia version. Reinstall to fix:

julia -e 'using Pkg; Pkg.Apps.add(url="https://github.com/ultimatile/PkgTemplatesCommandLineInterface.jl")'

License

MIT