Code Generation with Roslyn

by Nick Harrison

Learn how Roslyn's new code generation capability will let you write software that is more concise, runs faster, and is easier to maintain. You will learn from real-world business applications to create better software by letting the computer write its own code based on your business logic already defined in lookup tables.Code Generation with Rosyln is the first book to cover this new capability.  You will learn how these techniques can be used to simplify systems integration so that if one system already defines business logic through lookup tables, you can integrate a new system and share business logic by allowing the new system to write its own business logic based on already existing table-based business logic.One of the many benefits you will discover is that Roslyn uses an innovative approach to compiler design, opening up the inner workings of the compiler process. You will learn how to see the syntax tree that Roslyn is building as it compiles your code. Additionally, you will learn to feed it your own syntax tree that you create on the fly.What You'll LearnStructure logic to be stored in database designBuild complex conditional logic based on lookup data in the databaseCompile code that you generate programmaticallyDiscover generated code and run it dynamically to implement new business logicDebug problems in generated codeDeploy and access generated codeWho This Book Is ForBack end developers in very dynamic fast-paced business environments.   Developers focused on integrating different systems across an enterprise should also find this information useful.

195 pages, Kindle Edition

Published February 28, 2017

Reviews

[Dev · Rating 2 out of 5]

Easy read, very short book only a 100 pages. It's feels more like a multiple section blog post.
It has one use case to convert lookup table configuration to generated code using Roslyn. It does break this down per chapter. I would have liked different use case scenarios and examples for code generation. Why the author doesn't provide source code I really don't know as the code sample is complicated.

[Sebastian Gebski]

The general idea for this book was interesting -> to present code generation (using Roslyn) based on very practical scenario. Unfortunately it takes about 30% of the book just for scenario introduction ... Roslyn-related part is rather brief & unimpressive - each of the most crucial Roslyn APIs gets its own section, but they don't really explore the topic into the very depths. Good starter? Yes, indeed - understandable & fits the scenario. But nothing more than that.

To summarize:
* if you need a starter for Roslyn, it's ok
* if you want to learn more about various scenarios of using Roslyn (pre-/Core, F#/VB, reading solutions / reading binaries, inspection/generation, etc.), you'll have to look somewhere else
* value to price ratio is poor