use a custom command to format dune files

[Khady]

Desired Behavior

We would like to be able to format dune files using a different tool than dune but still have dune run that tool during dune build @fmt and when requested from ocamllsp.

Example

in dune-project

(formatting
  (dune (command custom_dune_formatter %{dep})))

would lead dune to run custom_dune_formatter path/to/dune when dune tries to format path/to/dune.

[Khady]

would it be possible to do that using the dialect stanza? Can we use the dialect stanza to change dune's behavior for some dialects already known to dune? And is the dune language a dialect?

Thanks for the suggestion @davesnx

[nojb]

We would like to be able to format dune files using a different tool than dune

I have a vague recollection that this point came up in the past in the context of OCaml source code (eg to use ocp-indent instead of ocamlformat) and the proposal was rejected, but I don't remember the details...

And is the dune language a dialect?

No, dialects are only alternative forms of OCaml.

[rgrinberg]

No objections to this feature request, but if you want this one done, you will need to work on it yourself. This is too niche for us to work on.