Usage

Pnyx CMD comes in 2 formats: YAML and C# scripts. When Pnyx is ported to other platforms / languages, then those will be available from the CMD. Plans are for Python, Java, Javascript, and others. The YAML format is language independent and will be supported on all platforms.

To use Pnyx with YAML, use the pnxy executable.
To use Pnyx with C# script, use the pncs executable.

Pnyx

pnyx reads a YAML array of commands and executes them. By default, pnyx reads the commands from a YAML file. pnyx parses YAML content and expects an array of mappings. Each mapping represents a method on the Pnyx fluent library. See the Library documentation for a full list of methods available. YAML is a very flexible format, but has a steep learning curve compared to other formats (like JSON). It is recommended to learn the basics well before writing Pnyx files (good YAMLTutorial).

For example:

pnyx my.yaml.pnyx

Listing of my.yaml.pnyx: (download sample)

- readString: ax,bx,cx,dx
- sed: ['x','y','ig']
- parseCsv:
- print: $4|$3|$2|$1

Which outputs:

dy|cy|by|ay

For simple commands or quick tests, use pnyx with the inline flag (-i, --inline) to embed YAML as a parameter. The previous example could be written as:

pnyx -i "[{readString: 'ax,bx,cx,dx'},{sed: ['x','y','ig']},{parseCsv: },{print: $4|$3|$2|$1}]"

Pncs

pncs reads a C# script and executes it. By default, pncs reads the C# scripts from a file. pncs uses the Roslyn compiler with a Pnyx object set as the global object, which allows method calls directly from the fluent library.

For example:

pnyx my.cs.pncs

Listing of my.cs.pncs: (download sample)

readString("ax,bx,cx,dx");
sed("x","y","ig");
parseCsv();
print("$4|$3|$2|$1");

Which outputs:

dy|cy|by|ay

For simple commands or quick tests, use pncs with the inline flag (-i, --inline) to embed C# script as a parameter. The previous example could be written as:

pncs -i 'readString("ax,bx,cx,dx");sed("x","y","ig");parseCsv();print("$4|$3|$2|$1");'

Performance

When running either version of pnyx.cmd, the performance of processing the files are identical. However, the initial parsing of YAML files will be much faster than parsing C# scripts. Since the Roslyn compiler is used by this project, the parsing performance is outside of the scope of pnyx. You may notice a delay when running pncs, typically around a second or two.