langchain/docs/modules/prompts/examples/custom_prompt_template.md

# Create a custom prompt template

Let's suppose we want the LLM to generate English language explanations of a function given its name. To achieve this task, we will create a custom prompt template that takes in the function name as input, and formats the prompt template to provide the source code of the function.

## Why are custom prompt templates needed?

LangChain provides a set of default prompt templates that can be used to generate prompts for a variety of tasks. However, there may be cases where the default prompt templates do not meet your needs. For example, you may want to create a prompt template with specific dynamic instructions for your language model. In such cases, you can create a custom prompt template.

:::{note}
Take a look at the current set of default prompt templates [here](../getting_started.md).
:::
<!-- TODO(shreya): Add correct link here. -->

## Create a custom prompt template

The only two requirements for all prompt templates are:

1. They have a input_variables attribute that exposes what input variables this prompt template expects.
2. They expose a format method which takes in keyword arguments corresponding to the expected input_variables and returns the formatted prompt.

Let's create a custom prompt template that takes in the function name as input, and formats the prompt template to provide the source code of the function.

First, let's create a function that will return the source code of a function given its name.

```python
import inspect

def get_source_code(function_name):
    # Get the source code of the function
    return inspect.getsource(function_name)
```

Next, we'll create a custom prompt template that takes in the function name as input, and formats the prompt template to provide the source code of the function.

```python
from langchain.prompts import BasePromptTemplate
from pydantic import BaseModel, validator


class FunctionExplainerPromptTemplate(BasePromptTemplate, BaseModel):
    """ A custom prompt template that takes in the function name as input, and formats the prompt template to provide the source code of the function. """

    @validator("input_variables")
    def validate_input_variables(cls, v):
        """ Validate that the input variables are correct. """
        if len(v) != 1 or "function_name" not in v:
            raise ValueError("function_name must be the only input_variable.")
        return v

    def format(self, **kwargs) -> str:
        # Get the source code of the function
        source_code = get_source_code(kwargs["function_name"])

        # Generate the prompt to be sent to the language model
        prompt = f"""
        Given the function name and source code, generate an English language explanation of the function.
        Function Name: {kwargs["function_name"].__name__}
        Source Code:
        {source_code}
        Explanation:
        """
        return prompt
```

## Use the custom prompt template

Now that we have created a custom prompt template, we can use it to generate prompts for our task.

```python
fn_explainer = FunctionExplainerPromptTemplate(input_variables=["function_name"])

# Generate a prompt for the function "get_source_code"
prompt = fn_explainer.format(function_name=get_source_code)
print(prompt)
```