Program

The Program represents an executable command line program. It offers an interface to define and enable command line arguments.

Features:

Abstract a command line program as a Python class.
Abstract arguments of that program as nested classes derived from pre-defined Argument classes.
See Arguments.
Construct a list of arguments in correct order and with proper escaping ready to be used with e.g. subprocess.

Simple Example

The following example implements a portion of the git program and its --version argument.

Program Definition

Git program defining –version argument.

class Git(Program):
  _executableNames: ClassVar[Dict[str, str]] = {
    "Darwin":  "git",
    "FreeBSD": "git",
    "Linux":   "git",
    "Windows": "git.exe"
  }

  @CLIArgument()
  class FlagVersion(LongFlag, name="version"):
    """Print the version information."""

Program Usage

Usage of the abstracted Git program.

git = Git()
git[git.FlagVersion] = True

print(git.AsArgument())

Setting Program Names based on OS

Todo

set executable name based on the operating system.

Defining Arguments on a Program

Todo

use decorator CLIArgument
usage of nested classes
parametrize nested classes with class-arguments

CLIArgument

CLIArgument attribute

Setting Arguments on a Program

Todo

Using dictionary syntax with nested classes as typed keys.
Using Value to change the arguments value at runtime.

Derive Program Variants

Todo

Explain helper methods to copy active arguments.