Developing a "recipe" extension =============================== The objective of this tutorial is to illustrate roles, directives and domains. Once complete, we will be able to use this extension to describe a recipe and reference that recipe from elsewhere in our documentation. .. note:: This tutorial is based on a guide first published on `opensource.com`_ and is provided here with the original author's permission. .. _opensource.com: https://opensource.com/article/18/11/building-custom-workflows-sphinx Overview -------- We want the extension to add the following to Sphinx: * A ``recipe`` :term:`directive`, containing some content describing the recipe steps, along with a ``:contains:`` option highlighting the main ingredients of the recipe. * A ``ref`` :term:`role`, which provides a cross-reference to the recipe itself. * A ``recipe`` :term:`domain`, which allows us to tie together the above role and domain, along with things like indices. For that, we will need to add the following elements to Sphinx: * A new directive called ``recipe`` * New indexes to allow us to reference ingredient and recipes * A new domain called ``recipe``, which will contain the ``recipe`` directive and ``ref`` role Prerequisites ------------- We need the same setup as in :doc:`the previous extensions `. This time, we will be putting out extension in a file called :file:`recipe.py`. Here is an example of the folder structure you might obtain: .. code-block:: text └── source    ├── _ext │   └── recipe.py    ├── conf.py    └── index.rst Writing the extension --------------------- Open :file:`recipe.py` and paste the following code in it, all of which we will explain in detail shortly: .. literalinclude:: examples/recipe.py :language: python :linenos: Let's look at each piece of this extension step-by-step to explain what's going on. .. rubric:: The directive class The first thing to examine is the ``RecipeDirective`` directive: .. literalinclude:: examples/recipe.py :language: python :linenos: :pyobject: RecipeDirective Unlike :doc:`helloworld` and :doc:`todo`, this directive doesn't derive from :class:`docutils.parsers.rst.Directive` and doesn't define a ``run`` method. Instead, it derives from :class:`sphinx.directives.ObjectDescription` and defines ``handle_signature`` and ``add_target_and_index`` methods. This is because ``ObjectDescription`` is a special-purpose directive that's intended for describing things like classes, functions, or, in our case, recipes. More specifically, ``handle_signature`` implements parsing the signature of the directive and passes on the object's name and type to its superclass, while ``add_target_and_index`` adds a target (to link to) and an entry to the index for this node. We also see that this directive defines ``has_content``, ``required_arguments`` and ``option_spec``. Unlike the ``TodoDirective`` directive added in the :doc:`previous tutorial `, this directive takes a single argument, the recipe name, and an option, ``contains``, in addition to the nested reStructuredText in the body. .. rubric:: The index classes .. currentmodule:: sphinx.domains .. todo:: Add brief overview of indices .. literalinclude:: examples/recipe.py :language: python :linenos: :pyobject: IngredientIndex .. literalinclude:: examples/recipe.py :language: python :linenos: :pyobject: RecipeIndex Both ``IngredientIndex`` and ``RecipeIndex`` are derived from :class:`Index`. They implement custom logic to generate a tuple of values that define the index. Note that ``RecipeIndex`` is a simple index that has only one entry. Extending it to cover more object types is not yet part of the code. Both indices use the method :meth:`Index.generate` to do their work. This method combines the information from our domain, sorts it, and returns it in a list structure that will be accepted by Sphinx. This might look complicated but all it really is is a list of tuples like ``('tomato', 'TomatoSoup', 'test', 'rec-TomatoSoup',...)``. Refer to the :doc:`domain API guide ` for more information on this API. These index pages can be referenced with the :rst:role:`ref` role by combining the domain name and the index ``name`` value. For example, ``RecipeIndex`` can be referenced with ``:ref:`recipe-recipe``` and ``IngredientIndex`` can be referenced with ``:ref:`recipe-ingredient```. .. rubric:: The domain A Sphinx domain is a specialized container that ties together roles, directives, and indices, among other things. Let's look at the domain we're creating here. .. literalinclude:: examples/recipe.py :language: python :linenos: :pyobject: RecipeDomain There are some interesting things to note about this ``recipe`` domain and domains in general. Firstly, we actually register our directives, roles and indices here, via the ``directives``, ``roles`` and ``indices`` attributes, rather than via calls later on in ``setup``. We can also note that we aren't actually defining a custom role and are instead reusing the :class:`sphinx.roles.XRefRole` role and defining the :class:`sphinx.domains.Domain.resolve_xref` method. This method takes two arguments, ``typ`` and ``target``, which refer to the cross-reference type and its target name. We'll use ``target`` to resolve our destination from our domain's ``recipes`` because we currently have only one type of node. Moving on, we can see that we've defined ``initial_data``. The values defined in ``initial_data`` will be copied to ``env.domaindata[domain_name]`` as the initial data of the domain, and domain instances can access it via ``self.data``. We see that we have defined two items in ``initial_data``: ``recipes`` and ``recipe_ingredients``. Each contains a list of all objects defined (i.e. all recipes) and a hash that maps a canonical ingredient name to the list of objects. The way we name objects is common across our extension and is defined in the ``get_full_qualified_name`` method. For each object created, the canonical name is ``recipe.``, where ```` is the name the documentation writer gives the object (a recipe). This enables the extension to use different object types that share the same name. Having a canonical name and central place for our objects is a huge advantage. Both our indices and our cross-referencing code use this feature. .. rubric:: The ``setup`` function .. currentmodule:: sphinx.application :doc:`As always `, the ``setup`` function is a requirement and is used to hook the various parts of our extension into Sphinx. Let's look at the ``setup`` function for this extension. .. literalinclude:: examples/recipe.py :language: python :linenos: :pyobject: setup This looks a little different to what we're used to seeing. There are no calls to :meth:`~Sphinx.add_directive` or even :meth:`~Sphinx.add_role`. Instead, we have a single call to :meth:`~Sphinx.add_domain` followed by some initialization of the :doc:`standard domain `. This is because we had already registered our directives, roles and indexes as part of the directive itself. Using the extension ------------------- You can now use the extension throughout your project. For example: .. code-block:: rst :caption: index.rst Joe's Recipes ============= Below are a collection of my favourite recipes. I highly recommend the :recipe:ref:`TomatoSoup` recipe in particular! .. toctree:: tomato-soup .. code-block:: rst :caption: tomato-soup.rst The recipe contains `tomato` and `cilantro`. .. recipe:recipe:: TomatoSoup :contains: tomato, cilantro, salt, pepper This recipe is a tasty tomato soup, combine all ingredients and cook. The important things to note are the use of the ``:recipe:ref:`` role to cross-reference the recipe actually defined elsewhere (using the ``:recipe:recipe:`` directive). Further reading --------------- For more information, refer to the `docutils`_ documentation and :doc:`/extdev/index`. .. _docutils: https://docutils.sourceforge.io/docs/