sugar-proto is a lightweight wrapper and plugin for Protocol Buffers. The main goal is to make working with protobuf in C++ feel simpler and more intuitive, closer to plain struct and stl like APIs.

Using the default protobuf C++ API can feel verbose and rigid. With sugar-proto, you can interact with your messages in a much friendlier way, for example:

u.id = 123;
u.tags.push_back("cpp");
u.profile.city = "Berlin";

cout << u.id << endl;
cout << u.tags[0] << endl;
cout << u.profile.city << endl;

Instead of juggling with reflection and getters/setters everywhere, you get a concise and readable interface.

Build and install with:

git clone https://github.com/illegal-instruction-co/sugar-proto.git
cd sugar-proto
mkdir build && cd build
cmake ..
make -j
sudo make install

After installation:

• The plugin binary will be placed at /usr/local/bin/protoc-gen-sugar
• The runtime header will be installed at /usr/local/include/sugar/sugar_runtime.h
• CMake config files will be available so you can simply use find_package(sugar-proto REQUIRED) in your own projects

In your project’s CMakeLists.txt:

find_package(Protobuf REQUIRED)
find_package(sugar-proto REQUIRED)

set(PROTO_FILE ${CMAKE_SOURCE_DIR}/my.proto)
set(GENERATED_DIR ${CMAKE_BINARY_DIR}/generated)
file(MAKE_DIRECTORY ${GENERATED_DIR})

add_custom_command(
    OUTPUT ${GENERATED_DIR}/my.pb.cc ${GENERATED_DIR}/my.pb.h
    COMMAND ${Protobuf_PROTOC_EXECUTABLE}
        --cpp_out=${GENERATED_DIR}
        -I ${CMAKE_SOURCE_DIR}
        ${PROTO_FILE}
    DEPENDS ${PROTO_FILE}
)

add_custom_command(
    OUTPUT ${GENERATED_DIR}/my.sugar.h
    COMMAND ${Protobuf_PROTOC_EXECUTABLE}
        --sugar_out=${GENERATED_DIR}
        -I ${CMAKE_SOURCE_DIR}
        ${PROTO_FILE}
    DEPENDS ${PROTO_FILE}
)

add_executable(my_app
    main.cpp
    ${GENERATED_DIR}/my.pb.cc
)

target_include_directories(my_app PRIVATE ${GENERATED_DIR})
target_link_libraries(my_app PRIVATE Protobuf::libprotobuf)

#include "my.pb.h"
#include "my.sugar.h"
#include <iostream>

int main() {
    MyMessage msg;
    MyMessageWrapped u(msg);

    u.id = 42;
    u.name = "hello world";
    u.tags.push_back("first");
    u.tags.push_back("test");

    std::cout << msg.DebugString() << std::endl;

    std::cout << u.id << std::endl;
    std::cout << u.name << std::endl;

    return 0;
}

• Minimum required CMake version is 3.16 (recommended 3.21 or newer)
• Currently supports: scalar fields, repeated fields, maps, and oneofs
• API is not considered stable yet, small breaking changes may occur

If you run into issues or missing features, please open an issue. The ultimate goal is to make protobuf usage in C++ enjoyable and developer friendly.