duck template

Fast, customizable Rust-powered project scaffolding — because smart devs don’t start from scratch.

duck-template helps you scaffold and manage projects using structured JSON configurations and flexible CLI commands. With variant support, remote configs, and dynamic flag injection, it gives you complete control over how projects and files are created.

Features

Template-based scaffolding using JSON
Variants for different project layouts (api, web, cli, etc.)
Local or remote configs (URL or file path)
Unified flag parsing with dynamic injection into templates
Blazing fast — written in Rust
Modular commands: init, create, and create-variant

Installation

cargo install duck-template

cargo install duck-template

Quick Start

Initialize a New Project

duck-template init --name my-app

duck-template init --name my-app

This will:

Create a directory my-app/
Inject the project name into template files
Use your local duck-template.json

Create From a Variant

duck-template create --variant api --config ./duck-template.json

duck-template create --variant api --config ./duck-template.json

With a remote config:

duck-template create --variant api --config https://example.com/template.json

duck-template create --variant api --config https://example.com/template.json

With extra arguments:

duck-template create \
  --variant cli \
  --config ./template.json \
  --outdir ./output \
  --args author=Ahmed,year=2025

duck-template create \
  --variant cli \
  --config ./template.json \
  --outdir ./output \
  --args author=Ahmed,year=2025

Create a New Variant

duck-template create-variant \
  --source ./template-source \
  --name cli \
  --description "Command-line app setup" \
  --config ./duck-template.json

duck-template create-variant \
  --source ./template-source \
  --name cli \
  --description "Command-line app setup" \
  --config ./duck-template.json

This will:

Package the folder into a new variant
Append it to the config (if valid and writable)

Configuration Format

Templates are defined in a duck-template.json file:

{
  "$schema": "https://zpgqhogoevbgpxustvmo.supabase.co/storage/v1/object/public/json/duck-template-schema.json",
  "name": "my-template",
  "version": "1.0.0",
  "description": "Reusable project setup",
  "outdir": "./output",
  "args": {
    "author": "Anonymous",
    "license": "MIT"
  },
  "variants": [
    {
      "name": "api",
      "description": "Express API starter",
      "files": [
        { "path": "src/index.ts", "content": "console.log('API ready');" },
        { "path": "tsconfig.json", "template": "tsconfig-template.json" }
      ]
    }
  ]
}

{
  "$schema": "https://zpgqhogoevbgpxustvmo.supabase.co/storage/v1/object/public/json/duck-template-schema.json",
  "name": "my-template",
  "version": "1.0.0",
  "description": "Reusable project setup",
  "outdir": "./output",
  "args": {
    "author": "Anonymous",
    "license": "MIT"
  },
  "variants": [
    {
      "name": "api",
      "description": "Express API starter",
      "files": [
        { "path": "src/index.ts", "content": "console.log('API ready');" },
        { "path": "tsconfig.json", "template": "tsconfig-template.json" }
      ]
    }
  ]
}

Command Reference

`init` — Create a New Project Directory

duck-template init --name my-app

duck-template init --name my-app

Flag	Description
`-n`, `--name`	Project name (used for folder name and inside templates).

`create` — Generate Files from a Variant

duck-template create --variant api --config ./config.json

duck-template create --variant api --config ./config.json

Flag	Description
`-v`, `--variant`	Name of the variant to generate
`-d`, `--outdir`	Output directory (defaults to `./`)
`-c`, `--config`	Local or remote JSON config
`-a`, `--args`	Key=value overrides for template variables (`author=Ahmed`)

`create-variant` — Package a Folder into a Variant

duck-template create-variant \
  --source ./starter \
  --name basic \
  --description "Basic setup" \
  --config ./duck-template.json

duck-template create-variant \
  --source ./starter \
  --name basic \
  --description "Basic setup" \
  --config ./duck-template.json

Flag	Description
`-s`, `--source`	Source directory or file
`-n`, `--name`	Unique name for the variant
`-d`, `--description`	Short description of the variant
`-c`, `--config`	Optional path to an existing config to update

Output Example

Given:

duck-template init --name wiseman

duck-template init --name wiseman

With config:

{
  "name": "wiseman",
  "outdir": "./output",
  "variants": [
    {
      "name": "wiseman",
      "files": [
        { "path": "src/main.ts", "content": "console.log('{{name}} is wise');" }
      ]
    }
  ]
}

{
  "name": "wiseman",
  "outdir": "./output",
  "variants": [
    {
      "name": "wiseman",
      "files": [
        { "path": "src/main.ts", "content": "console.log('{{name}} is wise');" }
      ]
    }
  ]
}

Result:

output/
└── src/
    └── main.ts   // console.log("wiseman is wise");

Help & Version

duck-template --help
duck-template --version

duck-template --help
duck-template --version

Also works with subcommands:

duck-template init --help
duck-template create-variant --help

duck-template init --help
duck-template create-variant --help

Contributions

Pull requests, issues, and suggestions are welcome! Fork, tweak, and share your own templates.

🦆 duck-template — smart scaffolding for smart developers.

Gentleduck Ttest Accordion