cbuf.js

A TypeScript parser and serializer/deserializer for the Verdant Robotics cbuf Interface Definition Language (IDL)

What is this?

Verdant Robotics robots use an Interface Definition Language and message serialization format called "cbuf". This is similar to other IDLs such as Google Protobufs, FlatBuffers, Cap'n'Proto, DDS IDL+CDR, ROS message definitions, etc. It optimizes for matching on-wire and in-memory representations where possible, and the definition language is oriented toward C++ code generation, although dynamic parsing and non-C++ languages are also supported.

This library provides a TypeScript/JavaScript API for parsing .cbuf message definitions, and serializing and deserializing binary cbuf payloads.

Usage

Here's a simple example of parsing a single schema definition with no #import statements:

import { preprocessSchema, parseSchema } from "@verdant-robotics/cbuf"

// `preprocessSchema()` is used here to strip comments
const stripped = preprocessSchema(`struct vec2 { float x; float y; } // test`)
const result = parseSchema(stripped)
console.dir(result, { depth: null })
/**
  [
    {
      name: 'vec2',
      namespaces: [],
      definitions: [ { name: 'x', type: 'float32' }, { name: 'y', type: 'float32' } ],
      hashValue: 6141859528966909963n,
      isEnum: false,
    }
  ]
*/

Here's a more complete parsing example that handles multiple schema definitions and #import statements:

import { preprocessSchema, parseSchema } from "@verdant-robotics/cbuf"
import { readFileSync, readdirSync } from "fs"

// Load `schemas/*.cbuf` file contents into a Map<string, string> where the
// key is the filename and the value is the file contents
const schemas = new Map<string, string>()
for (const filename of readdirSync("schemas")) {
  schemas.set(filename, readFileSync(`schemas/${filename}`, "utf-8"))
}

const schemaToParse = schemas.get("example.cbuf")!
const preprocessed = preprocessSchema(schemaToParse)
const result = parseSchema(preprocessed, schemas)
console.dir(result, { depth: null })
// ...

Refer to the tests for more examples of how to use the library, including serialization and deserialization.

Development

You will need node.js >= 18.x and the yarn package manager installed.

1. yarn install
2. yarn build
3. yarn test

License

cbuf.js is licensed under the MIT.

Releasing

1. Run yarn version --[major|minor|patch] to bump version
2. Run git push && git push --tags to push new tag
3. GitHub Actions will take care of the rest