jamplate.org

What It Is

Jamplate is a C-style preprocessor, but the official site explicitly states that it is not the same as a standards-compliant C preprocessor. Instead, it aims to provide behavior similar to a standard C preprocessor, while also including some added and missing features. Judging from the examples, it is mainly used at build time to generate text or files through directives, variables, and conditional logic.

Core Features and Integration

In terms of functionality, Jamplate supports #for loops for generating multiple output files in bulk, #include for importing files, and #if/#elif/#else/#endif conditional branches. It also provides directives such as #message, #error, and #declare. The examples also use built-in macros including __FILE__, __DATE__, __TIME__, __LINE__, __OUTPUT__, and __PROJECT__, indicating that it can be used to generate files with contextual metadata.

On the ecosystem side, Jamplate clearly provides a Gradle plugin and can be integrated through JitPack. The Gradle setup involves adding the https://jitpack.io repository under buildscript, then importing org.jamplate:gradle:TAG and applying the jamplate plugin. Alternatively, org.jamplate:processor:Tag and org.jamplate:gradle:Tag can be added separately as implementation dependencies. Overall, it appears to be more oriented toward the Java/Gradle build ecosystem.

Pricing, Open Source, and Documentation

The scraped page does not provide information about pricing, licensing, commercial support, or hosted services. A GitHub entry is present on the page, but that alone is not enough to determine its open-source license or maintenance status. The documentation quality is “enough to get started, but incomplete”: there are examples and integration snippets, but no full directive reference, release notes, compatibility boundaries, debugging guide, or best practices.

Pros, Cons, and Who It’s For

Its strengths are that the syntax is close to a C preprocessor, and it provides loops, conditionals, and macro replacement, making it suitable for bulk generation of configuration files, source-code snippets, or text files. Gradle/JitPack integration is also fairly straightforward. The downside is limited disclosure of key information, and the fact that it “does not fully follow the C standard” means you need to verify behavioral differences when migrating existing C preprocessor logic.

It is best suited for Gradle/JVM developers who need lightweight build-time template generation. It is less suitable for teams that require a mature templating ecosystem, strong documentation, stable commercial support, or a standardized cross-language solution.

Access from China

The page does not provide information about access from China, mirrors, or payment options. JitPack and GitHub may experience connectivity fluctuations in mainland China, so it is advisable to verify dependency download stability before using it in practice. Alternatives include GNU cpp, M4, Jinja2, Mustache, Freemarker, Velocity, or custom Gradle tasks.