Flutter Plugin Tools

This is a set of utilities used in this repository, both for CI and for local development.

Getting Started

There are two ways to use this tool. You can either run it locally from the flutter/packages repository, or you can install it globally using dart pub global activate.

If you are developing in flutter/packages, you should always use the local method, as only the checked in version is expected to work correctly with the current state of the repository.

If you are developing in flutter/core-packages or another repository using this tool, and don't have flutter/packages cloned locally (or don't keep it up to date), you can use the global method.

For simplicity, the setup instructions below assume you set up an fpt alias to your preferred method (e.g., in ~/.bashrc or ~/.zshrc), and all examples in this README use that alias. If you choose not to create an alias, or use a different name for your alias, adjust the examples accordingly.

Note: Regardless of which setup method you use, many commands require the Flutter-bundled version of Dart to be the first dart in the path.

Local Method

Set up the local package to be runnable:

dart pub get -C "/path/to/flutter/packages/"script/tool

Add an alias (recommended):

alias fpt='dart run "/path/to/flutter/packages/"script/tool/bin/flutter_plugin_tools.dart'

Global Method

Activate the tool globally:

dart pub global activate flutter_plugin_tools

Add an alias (recommended):

alias fpt='dart pub global run flutter_plugin_tools'

Commands

Run with --help for a full list of commands and arguments, but the following shows a number of common commands being run for a specific package.

Most commands take a --packages argument to control which package(s) the command is targetting. An package name can be any of:

  • The name of a package (e.g., path_provider_android).
  • The name of a federated plugin (e.g., path_provider), in which case all packages that make up that plugin will be targetted.
  • A combination federated_plugin_name/package_name (e.g., path_provider/path_provider for the app-facing package).

An alternative to --packages is the --current-package flag, which causes the script to target the current working directory's package (or enclosing package; it can be used from anywhere within a package).

Format Code

fpt format --packages package_name

The flutter/packages repository uses clang version 15.0.0 . Newer versions of clang may format code differently.

Run Static Analysis

To analyze only Dart code:

fpt analyze --packages package_name

To include native code, include the relevant platform flag(s). For example:

# Analyze Dart and Android Java/Kotlin code:
fpt analyze --android --packages package_name
# Analyze Dart and iOS+macOS Objective-C/Swift code:
fpt analyze --ios --macos --packages package_name

Dart analysis can be excluded with --no-dart.

Run General Validation

To check that changes follow team standards and best practices, run:

fpt validate --check-for-missing-changes --packages package_name

If you are making changes that fall under a CHANGELOG and/or version change exemption you can omit the --check-for-missing-changes flag to skip those checks.

Run Dart Unit Tests

fpt test --packages package_name

Run Dart Integration Tests

fpt build-examples --apk --packages package_name
fpt drive-examples --android --packages package_name

Replace --apk/--android with the platform you want to test against (omit it to get a list of valid options).

Run Native Tests

native-test takes one or more platform flags to run tests for. By default it runs both unit tests and (on platforms that support it) integration tests, but --no-unit or --no-integration can be used to run just one type.

Examples:

# Run just unit tests for iOS and Android:
fpt native-test --ios --android --no-integration --packages package_name
# Run all tests for macOS:
fpt native-test --macos --packages package_name
# Run all tests for Windows:
fpt native-test --windows --packages package_name

Update README.md from Example Sources

# Update all .md files for all packages:
fpt update-excerpts

# Update the .md files only for one package:
fpt update-excerpts --packages package_name

See also: https://github.com/flutter/flutter/blob/master/docs/ecosystem/contributing/README.md#readme-code

Update CHANGELOG and Version

update-release-info will automatically update the version and CHANGELOG.md following standard repository style and practice. It can be used for single-package updates to handle the details of getting the CHANGELOG.md format correct, but is especially useful for bulk updates across multiple packages.

For instance, if you add a new analysis option that requires production code changes across many packages:

fpt update-release-info \
  --version=minimal \
  --base-branch=upstream/main \
  --changelog="Fixes violations of new analysis option some_new_option."

The minimal option for --version will skip unchanged packages, and treat each changed package as either bugfix or next depending on the files that have changed in that package, so it is often the best choice for a bulk change.

For cases where you know the change type, minor or bugfix will make the corresponding version bump, or next will update only CHANGELOG.md without changing the version.

If you have a standard repository setup, --base-branch=upstream/main will usually give the behavior you want, finding all packages changed relative to the branch point from upstream/main. For more complex use cases where you want a different diff point, you can pass a different --base-branch, or use --base-sha to pick the exact diff point.

Update a dependency

update-dependency will update a pub dependency to a new version.

For instance, to updated to version 3.0.0 of some_package in every package that depends on it:

fpt update-dependency --pub-package=some_package --version=3.0.0

If a --version is not provided, the latest version from pub will be used.

Currently this only updates the dependency itself in pubspec.yaml, but in the future this will also update any generated code for packages that use code generation (e.g., regenerating mocks when updating mockito).

Publish a Release

Releases are automated for flutter/packages.

The manual procedure described here is deprecated, and should only be used when the automated process fails. Please read Releasing a Plugin or Package before using publish.

cd <path_to_repo>
git checkout <commit_hash_to_publish>
fpt publish --packages <package>

By default the tool tries to push tags to the upstream remote, but some additional settings can be configured. Run fpt publish --help for more usage information.

The tool wraps pub publish for pushing the package to pub, and then will automatically use git to try to create and push tags. It has some additional safety checking around pub publish too. By default pub publish publishes everything, including untracked or uncommitted files in version control. publish will first check the status of the local directory and refuse to publish if there are any mismatched files with version control present.

Configuration

The .repo_tool_config.yaml file at the root of the repository contains configuration for this tool, to support using the same script in multiple repositories.

The following sections are supported:

  • repo_name (required): The name of the repository (e.g., flutter/packages).
  • min_flutter or min_dart: The minimum SDK version that packages in the repository are allowed to support.
  • allowed_dependencies, containing one or both of:
    • pinned: A list of package names that are allowed as pubspec.yaml dependencies as long as they are pinned to an exact version.
    • unpinned: A list of package names that are allowed as pubspec.yaml dependencies without a specific version constraint (or with a broad constraint).
  • package_labels: A map from a package name to the label to use for that package's issue link query. This is only needed for packages that use a label other than p: <package_name>.

Libraries