AngelScript: Compiling scripts

# Compiling scripts

After registering the application interface it's time to compile the scripts that will be executed.

## Message callback

Before starting the compilation, remember to have the message callback set in the engine so that you can get more information on compilation errors than just an error code. In fact, it is recommended to set the message callback right after creating the script engine, as the message callback may even be helpful while registering the application interface.

The message callback has been designed so that it doesn't output anything if there are no errors or warnings, so when everything is ok, you shouldn't get anything from it. But if the Build method returns an error, the message callback will have received detailed information about the error.

If desired, the application may send its own messages to the callback via the WriteMessage method on the engine.

    // Implement a simple message callback function
    void MessageCallback(const asSMessageInfo *msg, void *param)
    {
      const char *type = "ERR ";
      if( msg->type == asMSGTYPE_WARNING )
        type = "WARN";
      else if( msg->type == asMSGTYPE_INFORMATION )
        type = "INFO";
      printf("%s (%d, %d) : %s : %s\n", msg->section, msg->row, msg->col, type, msg->message);
    }

    // Set the message callback when creating the engine
    asIScriptEngine *engine = asCreateScriptEngine(ANGELSCRIPT_VERSION);
    engine->SetMessageCallback(asFUNCTION(MessageCallback), 0, asCALL_CDECL);

## Loading and compiling scripts

To build a script module you first obtain a module from the engine, then add the script sections, and finally compile them. A compiled script module may be composed of one or more script sections, so your application may store each section in different files, or even generate them dynamically. It doesn't matter in which order the script sections are added to the module, as the compiler is able to resolve all names regardless of where they are declared in the script.

    // Create a new script module
    asIScriptModule *mod = engine->GetModule("module", asGM_ALWAYS_CREATE);

    // Load and add the script sections to the module
    string script;
    LoadScriptFile("script.as", script);
    mod->AddScriptSection("script.as", script.c_str());

    // Build the module
    int r = mod->Build();
    if( r < 0 )
    {
      // The build failed. The message stream will have received
      // compiler errors that shows what needs to be fixed
    }

AngelScript doesn't provide built-in functions for loading script files as most applications have their own way of loading files. However, it is quite easy to write your own routines for loading script files, for example:

    // Load the entire script file into a string buffer
    void LoadScriptFile(const char *fileName, string &script)
    {
      // Open the file in binary mode
      FILE *f = fopen("test.as", "rb");

      // Determine the size of the file
      fseek(f, 0, SEEK_END);
      int len = ftell(f);
      fseek(f, 0, SEEK_SET);

      // Load the entire file in one call
      script.resize(len);
      fread(&script[0], len, 1, f);

      fclose(f);
    }

As AngelScript doesn't load the files itself, it also doesn't have built-in support for including other files from within the script. However, if you look in the add-on directory, you'll find a CScriptBuilder class that provides this support and more. It is a helper class for loading files, perform a pre-processing pass, and then building the module. With it the code for building a module looks like this:

    CScriptBuilder builder;
    int r = builder.BuildScriptFromFile(engine, "module", "script.as");
    if( r < 0 )
    {
      // The build failed. The message stream will have received
      // compiler errors that shows what needs to be fixed
    }

See also:
  Pre-compiled byte code