More powerful config params ..

[kiall]

Has any thought gone into adding more features to the command line option parser? If not .. what about these suggestions?

Things like:

• Required Paramaters
• Default Values
• Array Values
  • ./minion bla --id=1 --id=2 --id=3 .. $config['id'] = array(1,2,3)
• Validation/Typing
  • --id must be an int
  • --force must be a bool
• Short and Long forms
  • --quiet and -q
  • --verbose and -v

[zeelot]

Default values and validation sounds great and I can take care of that soon :) required parameters can be handled by validation, no?

I'm not too sure how the array values and the -q/-v options would be implemented, what are your ideas? How do all other CLI applications handle these kinds of things? I like how some allow you to use -vv or similar for a more verbose output than -v.

[kiall]

required parameters can be handled by validation, no?

Spot on .. But thought it should be mentioned explicitly :)

The -q vs --quiet etc will be harder to do right.. I'm not even sure what really is right :)

Here's a quick ruby example:

# Boolean flag
options[:verbose] = false # Default Value
opts.on("-v", "--verbose", "Verbose") do
    options[:verbose] = true
end

# List of arguments
options[:modules] = Array.new() # Default Value
opts.on("-m", "--modules x,y,z", Array, "Example 'list' of arguments") do |value|
    options[:modules] = value
end

# List of arguments and no short form ..
options[:modules] = Array.new() # Default Value
opts.on("--modules x,y,z", Array, "Example 'list' of arguments") do |value|
    options[:modules] = value
end

# The "LIBRARY" argument to the -r switch is mandatory  
options[:libs] = Array.new() # Default values
opts.on("-r", "--require LIBRARY") do |value|
    options[:libs] << value
end

# The "STRING" argument to the -s switch is optional
opts.on("-s", "--print [LIBRARY]") do |value|
    puts value
end

# Cast 'time' argument to a Time object.
options[:time] = Time.new() # Default Value
opts.on("-t", "--time [TIME]", Time, "Begin execution at given time") do |value|
    options[:time] = value
end

[zeelot]

I created smaller tickets for the features here. Closing this ticket in favor of the following: #42 #43 #44 #45 #46

Let me know if I missed any