Using Kit Language in Windows and Linux

In the previous post, we have discussed about Kit, a very simple HTML templating language. If you had been following this, you should find that the GUI application which is capable of compiling Kit into browser-compliant HTML format is Codekit.

Unfortunately, Codekit, is only available for OS X, there is currently no similar application for Windows and Linux that support Kit.

If you are working in Windows and Linux machine, yet would like to use Kit, you can use Grunt as an alternative. Grunt has a massive collection of plugins, contributed by generous developers around the world — this includes the plugin to compile Kit language, grunt-codekit. Let’s check it out.

Recommended Reading: 5 Latest Web Development Tools You Should Know

Note: Even though the following tip is primarily aimed to show Windows and Linux users an alternative to Codekit, OS X user can also use it.

Getting Started

First, we will create a directory for our project. Let’s launch Terminal or Command Prompt, and type the following command lines:

mkdir kit-gruntcd kit-grunt

We have created a new directory named kit-grunt; the second line lets us enter it. But if you have previously created a project directory, you may skip the first line, and immediately navigate to your own directory in Terminal with the cd command.

Within the project directory, we create a new folder named kit where we will put the .kit files. Type this command below:

mkdir kit

We then also install both Grunt and the plugin, with these commands. Note that you have to install Node.js in your system first.

npm install grunt --save-devnpm install grunt-codekit --save-dev

Once the process is completed you will find a new folder, node_modules, containing the modules that we have installed.

Configuration

Create a new file named Gruntfile.js in the project directory, and put the following code in. This code is a Grunt Wrapper where we will register, configure and execute Grunt task. If you are using Sublime Text, you can easily insert this code using the Grunt Snippets.

module.exports = function(grunt) { grunt.initConfig({  }); }

Then we define the codekit task within the grunt.initConfig, like so.

module.exports = function(grunt) { grunt.initConfig({ codekit: { your_target: { files : { 'index.html' : 'kit/index.kit', } }, }, }); }

This configuration will compile index.kit into index.html. To try this out, we can add this in index.kit.

<!-- @var = This is the variable --><p><!-- @var --></p>

…and run grunt codekit in Terminal.

The index.html is successfully generated and as you can see below, the variable’s value is also successfully applied within the paragraph tag.

File Inclusion

As we have mentioned in our previous post, we can include/import files into a Kit file. Given that we have header.kit, sidebar.kit, and footer.kit (I assume that we have added corresponding content within these files), we can include them into index.kit, like so.

<!-- @include inc/header.kit --><div class="container"> <div class="header row"> <h1>This is the header</h1> </div> <div class="row"> <div class="col-md-8"> <p>This is the content</p> </div> <!-- @include inc/sidebar.kit -->  </div></div><!-- @include inc/footer.kit -->

Let’s run the grunt codekit command again in Terminal. And here we go! The content from those files are put together into index.html. Nice!

Conclusion

Grunt is a great alternative to many web development tools, including compiling Kit file. I hope this tip is useful, particularly for Windows and Linux users who want to get their hands on Kit language.

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Unreal Engine 4 Gets Support For Making Linux And SteamOS Games

Unreal Engine 4, the newest version of the game engine that powers many a AAA gaming title, just got a feature that may prove quite important in the near feature: the ability to build games that run on Linux.

This news comes just weeks after the entry fee for making an Unreal Engine-powered game got slashed considerably. Instead of requiring weeks of licensing negotiation and hundreds of thousands of dollars up front, Epic Games decided to license Unreal Engine 4 to developers for $19 a month (plus 5 percent of gross revenue).

That news (and this move into Linux to some extent) are almost certainly meant to help Epic secure their footing among indie developers — a market that a relative newcomer, Unity, has managed to get a pretty solid grasp on. With past releases of the Unreal engine, Epic largely focused on licensing to huge development houses. As the costs of game development plunge and things like the App Store/Google Play/Steam make self publishing an incredibly viable option, however, indie developers are more important than ever.

With this addition, Unreal Engine 4 is able to build games for OS X, Windows, iOS, Android, and Linux.

“Why does this Linux addition matter?” you might ask. “Doesn’t Linux account for something like 2% of the desktop OS usage?”

Yep. For now.

While many a Linux devotee would have said “It’s going to be big, soon!” for most of the last decade, there’s one key thing on the horizon that’s different this time: Valve’s Steam Machines.

For the last year or so, Valve has been working with third parties on a line of pre-built PCs primarily purposed for the living room. Dubbing the line “Steam Machines,” Valve is trying to take the perks of a PC and pack them into the small, convenient package of a console. It’s building its own controller and their own OS.

That OS, aptly called “SteamOS,” is Linux-based. If Valve’s Steam Machines see any sort of success, Linux support will be a must-have.

Financial Firms Looking To Linux, Windows 7 As XP Support Dries Up

In an unsurprising move, ATM operators and other financial organizations are beginning to look to Linux as a replacement for their outdated Windows XP installations. That these organizations are deciding to move from XP only now is a testament to the staying power of the OS and a certain conservatism in financial circles.

“Windows XP currently powers nearly 95% of ATMs around the world,” wrote ComputerWorld reporter Jaikumar Vijayan. The operating system, which Microsoft will stop supporting on April 8, was a popular choice for embedded systems and ATMs for most of the decade as countless references to the Blue Screen Of Death in odd places would suggest.

New ATM operating systems must be Payment Card Industry Security Standards Council (PCI SSC) compliant and hardware updates may be necessary to upgrade current ATMs – which have a five to ten year lifespan – to next generation OSes like Window 7. Linux, obviously, is a solid choice because it is open and can be hardened even on legacy hardware. However, as the “PIN and chip” style cards begin appearing in the US the need to update nearly every POS terminal and ATM may be far more pressing.

Presumably financial firms can keep their old machines running for a few more months or even years, but in the end XP is dead and, despite pleas to maintain support for the embedded OS, Microsoft is intent on pulling the plug. Which means, of course, the BSOD may soon be a thing of the past.