opster 0.9.8

command line parsing speedster

Opster is a command line parser, intended to make writing command line applications easy and painless. It uses built-in Python types (lists, dictionaries, etc) to define options, which makes configuration clear and concise. Additionally it contains possibility to handle subcommands (i.e. hg commit or svn update).

Quick example

That’s an example of an option definition:

import sys
from opster import command

@command(usage='%name [-n] MESSAGE')
def main(message,
         nonewline=('n', False, 'don\'t print a newline')):
    'Simple echo program'
    sys.stdout.write(message)
    if not nonewline:
        sys.stdout.write('\n')

if __name__ == '__main__':
    main()

Running this program will print the help:

echo.py [-n] MESSAGE

Simple echo program

options:

 -n --nonewline  don't print a newline
 -h --help       show help

I think this mostly describes what’s going on, except that I’d like to mention one interesting feature - if you are using long name for option, you can use only partial name, for example ./echo.py --nonew a is valid command line. This is also true for subcommands: read about that and everything else you’d like to know in documentation.

Changelog

0.9.8

Fixed bug with option names clashing with name of arguments for call_cmd.

0.9.7

Library renamed to opster.

0.9.6

• Checks for option definition: long name should be specified always, short name should be 1 character in length if available.

• More specific argument name in guessed usage (this happens if you have not specified usage for command).

• Ability to add global decorator for all commands. See test.py in repository for example: ui object, to handle verbose/quiet options.

0.9.5

Fixed bug, which prevented programs to work without arguments (displayed help instead) if they are not using subcommands.

0.9.4

• Ability to hide subcommands from help listing.

• Append program name to subcommand usage.

0.9.3

Minor fix for setup.py, to avoid troubles with installing when there is no docs in package.

0.9.2

Ability to call commands as regular functions, using arguments and keyword arguments.

0.9.1

Fixed problem with multiple help options in subcommands

0.9

Initial version