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https://github.com/commander-rb/commander

The complete solution for Ruby command-line executables
https://github.com/commander-rb/commander

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The complete solution for Ruby command-line executables

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# Commander



The complete solution for Ruby command-line executables.

Commander bridges the gap between other terminal related libraries

you know and love (OptionParser, HighLine), while providing many new

features, and an elegant API.



## Features



* Easier than baking cookies

* Parses options using OptionParser

* Auto-populates struct with options ( no more `{ |v| options[:recursive] = v }` )

* Auto-generates help documentation via pluggable help formatters

* Optional default command when none is present

* Global / Command level options

* Packaged with two help formatters (Terminal, TerminalCompact)

* Imports the highline gem for interacting with the terminal

* Adds additional user interaction functionality

* Highly customizable progress bar with intuitive, simple usage

* Multi-word command name support such as `drupal module install MOD`, rather than `drupal module_install MOD`

* Sexy paging for long bodies of text

* Support for MacOS text-to-speech

* Command aliasing (very powerful, as both switches and arguments can be used)

* Growl notification support for MacOS

* Use the `commander` executable to initialize a commander driven program



## Installation



    $ gem install commander



## Quick Start



To generate a quick template for a commander app, run:



    $ commander init yourfile.rb



To generate a quick modular style template for a commander app, run:



    $ commander init --modular yourfile.rb



## Example



For more option examples view the `Commander::Command#option` method. Also

an important feature to note is that action may be a class to instantiate,

as well as an object, specifying a method to call, so view the RDoc for more information.



### Classic style



```ruby

require 'rubygems'

require 'commander/import'



# :name is optional, otherwise uses the basename of this executable

program :name, 'Foo Bar'

program :version, '1.0.0'

program :description, 'Stupid command that prints foo or bar.'



command :foo do |c|

  c.syntax = 'foobar foo'

  c.description = 'Displays foo'

  c.action do |args, options|

    say 'foo'

  end

end



command :bar do |c|

  c.syntax = 'foobar bar [options]'

  c.description = 'Display bar with optional prefix and suffix'

  c.option '--prefix STRING', String, 'Adds a prefix to bar'

  c.option '--suffix STRING', String, 'Adds a suffix to bar'

  c.action do |args, options|

    options.default :prefix => '(', :suffix => ')'

    say "#{options.prefix}bar#{options.suffix}"

  end

end

```



Example output:



```

$ foobar bar

# => (bar)



$ foobar bar --suffix '}' --prefix '{'

# => {bar}

```



### Modular style



**NOTE:** Make sure to use `require 'commander'` rather than `require 'commander/import'`, otherwise Commander methods will still be imported into the global namespace.



```ruby

require 'rubygems'

require 'commander'



class MyApplication

  include Commander::Methods



  def run

    program :name, 'Foo Bar'

    program :version, '1.0.0'

    program :description, 'Stupid command that prints foo or bar.'



    command :foo do |c|

      c.syntax = 'foobar foo'

      c.description = 'Displays foo'

      c.action do |args, options|

        say 'foo'

      end

    end



    run!

  end

end



MyApplication.new.run if $0 == __FILE__

```



### Block style



```ruby

require 'rubygems'

require 'commander'



Commander.configure do

  program :name, 'Foo Bar'

  program :version, '1.0.0'

  program :description, 'Stupid command that prints foo or bar.'



  # see classic style example for options

end

```



## HighLine



As mentioned above, the highline gem is imported into the global scope. Here

are some quick examples for how to utilize highline in your commands:



```ruby

# Ask for password masked with '*' character

ask("Password:  ") { |q| q.echo = "*" }



# Ask for password

ask("Password:  ") { |q| q.echo = false }



# Ask if the user agrees (yes or no)

agree("Do something?")



# Asks on a single line (note the space after ':')

ask("Name: ")



# Asks with new line after "Description:"

ask("Description:")



# Calls Date#parse to parse the date string passed

ask("Birthday? ", Date)



# Ensures Integer is within the range specified

ask("Age? ", Integer) { |q| q.in = 0..105 }



# Asks for a list of strings, converts to array

ask("Fav colors?", Array)

```



## HighLine & Interaction Additions



In addition to highline's fantastic choice of methods, commander adds the

following methods to simplify common tasks:



```ruby

# Ask for password

password



# Ask for password with specific message and mask character

password "Enter your password please:", '-'



# Ask for CLASS, which may be any valid class responding to #parse. Date, Time, Array, etc

names = ask_for_array 'Names: '

bday = ask_for_date 'Birthday?: '



# Simple progress bar (Commander::UI::ProgressBar)

uris = %w[

  http://vision-media.ca

  http://google.com

  http://yahoo.com

]

progress uris do |uri|

  res = open uri

  # Do something with response

end



# 'Log' action to stdout

log "create", "path/to/file.rb"



# Enable paging of output after this point

enable_paging



# Ask editor for input (EDITOR environment variable or whichever is available: TextMate, vim, vi, emacs, nano, pico)

ask_editor



# Ask editor, supplying initial text

ask_editor 'previous data to update'



# Ask editor, preferring a specific editor

ask_editor 'previous data', 'vim'



# Choose from an array of elements

choice = choose("Favorite language?", :ruby, :perl, :js)



# Alter IO for the duration of the block

io new_input, new_output do

  new_input_contents = $stdin.read

  puts new_input_contents # outputs to new_output stream

end

# $stdin / $stdout reset back to original streams



# Speech synthesis

speak 'What is your favorite food? '

food = ask 'favorite food?: '

speak "Wow, I like #{food} too. We have so much in common."

speak "I like #{food} as well!", "Victoria", 190



# Execute arbitrary applescript

applescript 'foo'



# Converse with speech recognition server

case converse 'What is the best food?', :cookies => 'Cookies', :unknown => 'Nothing'

when :cookies

  speak 'o.m.g. you are awesome!'

else

  case converse 'That is lame, shall I convince you cookies are the best?', :yes => 'Ok', :no => 'No', :maybe => 'Maybe another time'

  when :yes

    speak 'Well you see, cookies are just fantastic, they melt in your mouth.'

  else

    speak 'Ok then, bye.'

  end

end

```



## Growl Notifications



Commander provides methods for displaying Growl notifications. To use these

methods you need to install https://github.com/tj/growl which utilizes

the [growlnotify](https://growl.info/extras.php#growlnotify) executable. Note that

growl is auto-imported by Commander when available, no need to require.



```ruby

# Display a generic Growl notification

notify 'Something happened'



# Display an 'info' status notification

notify_info 'You have #{emails.length} new email(s)'



# Display an 'ok' status notification

notify_ok 'Gems updated'



# Display a 'warning' status notification

notify_warning '1 gem failed installation'



# Display an 'error' status notification

notify_error "Gem #{name} failed"

```



## Commander Goodies



### Option Defaults



The options struct passed to `#action` provides a `#default` method, allowing you

to set defaults in a clean manner for options which have not been set.



```ruby

command :foo do |c|

  c.option '--interval SECONDS', Integer, 'Interval in seconds'

  c.option '--timeout SECONDS', Integer, 'Timeout in seconds'

  c.action do |args, options|

    options.default \

      :interval => 2,

      :timeout  => 60

  end

end

```



### Command Aliasing



Aliases can be created using the `#alias_command` method like below:



```ruby

command :'install gem' do |c|

  c.action { puts 'foo' }

end

alias_command :'gem install', :'install gem'

```



Or more complicated aliases can be made, passing any arguments

as if it was invoked via the command line:



```ruby

command :'install gem' do |c|

  c.syntax = 'install gem  [options]'

  c.option '--dest DIR', String, 'Destination directory'

  c.action { |args, options| puts "installing #{args.first} to #{options.dest}" }

end

alias_command :update, :'install gem', 'rubygems', '--dest', 'some_path'

```



```

$ foo update

# => installing rubygems to some_path

```



### Command Defaults



Although working with a command executable framework provides many

benefits over a single command implementation, sometimes you still

want the ability to create a terse syntax for your command. With that

in mind we may use `#default_command` to help with this. Considering

our previous `:'install gem'` example:



```ruby

default_command :update

```



```

$ foo

# => installing rubygems to some_path

```



Keeping in mind that commander searches for the longest possible match

when considering a command, so if you were to pass arguments to foo

like below, expecting them to be passed to `:update`, this would be incorrect,

and would end up calling `:'install gem'`, so be careful that the users do

not need to use command names within the arguments.



```

$ foo install gem

# => installing  to

```



### Long descriptions



If you need to have a long command description, keep your short description under `summary`, and consider multi-line strings for `description`:



```ruby

  program :summary, 'Stupid command that prints foo or bar.'

  program :description, %q(

#{c.summary}



More information about that stupid command that prints foo or bar.



And more

  )

```



### Additional Global Help



Arbitrary help can be added using the following `#program` symbol:



```ruby

program :help, 'Author', 'TJ Holowaychuk '

```



Which will output the rest of the help doc, along with:



    AUTHOR:



      TJ Holowaychuk 



### Global Options



Although most switches will be at the command level, several are available by

default at the global level, such as `--version`, and `--help`. Using

`#global_option` you can add additional global options:



```ruby

global_option('-c', '--config FILE', 'Load config data for your commands to use') { |file| ... }

```



This method accepts the same syntax as `Commander::Command#option` so check it out for documentation.



All global options regardless of providing a block are accessable at the command level. This

means that instead of the following:



```ruby

global_option('--verbose') { $verbose = true }

...

c.action do |args, options|

  say 'foo' if $verbose

...

```



You may:



```ruby

global_option '--verbose'

...

c.action do |args, options|

  say 'foo' if options.verbose

...

```



### Formatters



Two core formatters are currently available, the default `Terminal` formatter

as well as `TerminalCompact`. To utilize a different formatter simply use

`:help_formatter` like below:



```ruby

program :help_formatter, Commander::HelpFormatter::TerminalCompact

```



Or utilize the help formatter aliases:



```ruby

program :help_formatter, :compact

```



This abstraction could be utilized to generate HTML documentation for your executable.



### Tracing



By default the `-t` and `--trace` global options are provided to allow users to get a backtrace to aid debugging.



You can disable these options:



```ruby

never_trace!

```



Or make it always on:



```ruby

always_trace!

```



## Tips



When adding a global or command option, OptionParser implicitly adds a small

switch even when not explicitly created, for example `-c` will be the same as

`--config` in both examples, however `-c` will only appear in the documentation

when explicitly assigning it.



```ruby

global_option '-c', '--config FILE'

global_option '--config FILE'

```



## ASCII Tables



For feature rich ASCII tables for your terminal app check out the terminal-table gem at https://github.com/tj/terminal-table



    +----------+-------+----+--------+-----------------------+

    | Terminal | Table | Is | Wicked | Awesome               |

    +----------+-------+----+--------+-----------------------+

    |          |       |    |        | get it while its hot! |

    +----------+-------+----+--------+-----------------------+



## Running Specifications



    $ rake spec



OR



    $ spec --color spec



## Contrib



Feel free to fork and request a pull, or submit a ticket

https://github.com/commander-rb/commander/issues



## License



This project is available under the MIT license. See LICENSE for details.