jupyterlab-makefile-file-type-extension 1.0.80

Jupyterlab extension to add handling of Makefiles and syntax colouring support

jupyterlab_makefile_file_type_extension

A JupyterLab extension providing comprehensive Makefile support with syntax highlighting and custom file type recognition.

Features

Comprehensive Makefile editing support in JupyterLab with syntax highlighting that distinguishes targets, variables, conditionals, and shell constructs.

File recognition:

• Standard names: Makefile, makefile, GNUmakefile
• Extensions: *.mk, *.mak, *.make
• Custom red "M" icon in file browser

Highlighting coverage:

• Build targets and dependencies
• Variable references and shell constructs
• Conditional directives
• Special targets and silent commands
• Line continuations and quoted strings

Requirements

• JupyterLab >= 4.0.0

Install

To install the extension, execute:

pip install jupyterlab_makefile_file_type_extension

Configuration

IMPORTANT: Configure Tab Character Usage

Makefiles require tab characters for recipe command indentation. Recipe lines starting with spaces instead of tabs will cause Make execution to fail with "missing separator" errors. Configure JupyterLab to use tabs:

1. Open JupyterLab Settings → Settings Editor
2. Navigate to Text Editor section
3. Set the following options:
   • Insert Spaces: Uncheck this option (or set to false in JSON)
   • Tab Size: Set to 4 (or your preferred tab width)

Alternatively, add this to your JupyterLab settings JSON:

{
  "editorConfig": {
    "insertSpaces": false,
    "tabSize": 4
  }
}

Note: All recipe commands (lines that execute shell commands under targets) MUST start with a tab character. The syntax highlighter requires tab-indented recipe lines for proper highlighting - space-indented recipes will not be highlighted and will fail during Make execution.

Uninstall

To remove the extension, execute:

pip uninstall jupyterlab_makefile_file_type_extension

Contributing

Development install

Note: You will need NodeJS to build the extension package.

The jlpm command is JupyterLab's pinned version of yarn that is installed with JupyterLab. You may use yarn or npm in lieu of jlpm below.

# Clone the repo to your local environment
# Change directory to the jupyterlab_makefile_file_type_extension directory

# Set up a virtual environment and install package in development mode
python -m venv .venv
source .venv/bin/activate
pip install --editable "."

# Link your development version of the extension with JupyterLab
jupyter labextension develop . --overwrite

# Rebuild extension Typescript source after making changes
# IMPORTANT: Unlike the steps above which are performed only once, do this step
# every time you make a change.
jlpm build

You can watch the source directory and run JupyterLab at the same time in different terminals to watch for changes in the extension's source and automatically rebuild the extension.

# Watch the source directory in one terminal, automatically rebuilding when needed
jlpm watch
# Run JupyterLab in another terminal
jupyter lab

With the watch command running, every saved change will immediately be built locally and available in your running JupyterLab. Refresh JupyterLab to load the change in your browser (you may need to wait several seconds for the extension to be rebuilt).

By default, the jlpm build command generates the source maps for this extension to make it easier to debug using the browser dev tools. To also generate source maps for the JupyterLab core extensions, you can run the following command:

jupyter lab build --minimize=False

Development uninstall

pip uninstall jupyterlab_makefile_file_type_extension

In development mode, you will also need to remove the symlink created by jupyter labextension develop command. To find its location, you can run jupyter labextension list to figure out where the labextensions folder is located. Then you can remove the symlink named jupyterlab_makefile_file_type_extension within that folder.

Testing the extension

Frontend tests

This extension is using Jest for JavaScript code testing.

To execute them, execute:

jlpm
jlpm test

Integration tests

This extension uses Playwright for the integration tests (aka user level tests). More precisely, the JupyterLab helper Galata is used to handle testing the extension in JupyterLab.

More information are provided within the ui-tests README.

Packaging the extension

See RELEASE