StaticWrapper Generation

What is StaticWrapper?

When calling C# from JavaScript, PuerTS uses the class name or function name on the JavaScript side to find the corresponding C# function.

This searching for classes/functions by string functionality is implemented using reflection by default.

After finding the function, the corresponding function is called through the Invoke method, which also falls within the scope of reflection.

Obviously, using a lot of reflection can lead to performance degradation.

Therefore, PuerTS provides the ability to generate a version of the class/function that can be called directly by V8 for those classes/functions that you want to use.

In this way, the generated function can be directly called through C++ and C# communication without going through reflection in the future, greatly improving the call performance. We call it the StaticWrapper function.

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How to use it?

You must define the classes/functions you will use in the future in advance, so that PuerTs can generate StaticWrapper for you. You can configure it in your project like this:

//1. Configure class must have [Configure] attribute
//2. It must be placed in the Editor directory
using System;
using System.Collections.Generic;
using Puerts;
using UnityEngine;

[Configure]
public class ExamplesCfg
{
    [Binding]
    static IEnumerable<Type> Bindings
    {
        get
        {
            return new List<Type>()
            {
                typeof(UnityEngine.Debug),
                typeof(UnityEngine.Vector3),
            };
        }
    }
}

Then use the Tools/PuerTS/Generate Code command in the Unity menu to generate the quick-callable versions for Debug and Vector3.

Note: The configuration of this list is actually very flexible. You can generate your own list by dynamically analyzing it. See the StartTemplate example in the official Demo for reference.

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Other reasons for generating StaticWrapper

In addition to improving performance, there are two other major benefits to generating them:

1. Preventing stripping
2. After generating the list, Puerts can generate dts declaration files for these interfaces. In general, we recommend that you check the interfaces you use and generate static-wrapper code during game release or regression testing.

During the development phase or when you want your game's code memory to be as small as possible, you can skip the code generation step and call them via reflection.