A getopts-like Dart package to parse command-line options simple way and in a portable style (bash, find, java, PowerShell), plus, sub-options (see below)

Features

• Comprises functions parseArgs and parseSubCmd as well as several helper classes including custom exceptions.

• The function parseSubCmd takes a list of command-line arguments and a map <String, Function>{}. It checks the first command-line argument only. If that one is a plain argument (i.e. does not start with a dash - or plus +), it will be treated as a key in the map, and the associated function will be executed. Every such function will receive the list of the rest arguments, and typically will call parseArgs to parse secific set of options and their values.

• The function parseArgs recognises options, i.e. any words starting with one or more dashes - or pluses + followed by an English letter, then by other characters. It accumulates all possible values (every arg until the next option), validates against the user-defined format and creates result collections for further consume.

• It validates user-specified options and values using an options definitions string (the first parameter). This string can be multi-line, as all blank characters will get removed. Let's have a look at an example of such string:

|q,quiet|v,verbose|?,h,help|d,dir:|c,app-config:|f,force|p,compression:
|l,filter:: >and,c,case   not,  or 
|i,inp,inp-files:,:
|o,out,out-files:,:?
|::

• Every option definition is separated by the pipe | character.

• Plain arguments are treated as values of an option with an empty name.

• If a command-line argument starts with plus + or with -no, it will be treated as a negative option, unless you define the long one as an option like north. In that case, it will not be converted to the negatve rth. Please note that only flags (options without values) can be negative.

• By specifying a colon : you require the respective option to have a single argument

• By specifying a double-colon :: you require the respective option to have one or more arguments: -inp-file abc.txt de.lst fghi.docx

• By specifying a double-colon with a comma :,: inside, you require the following argument to represent a list of values which should be split by comma. The absense of comma means a single value. No more value will be linked to this option. You can use any other character instead of a comma except a pipe and a colon. Example: -inp-file abc.txt,de.lst fghi.docx results in two values for the option -inp-file followed by one plain argument. The same is achieved by -inp-file=abc.txt,de.lst fghi.docx. But -inp-file abc.txt de.lst,fghi.docx results in one value for the option -inp-file followed by one or two plain arguments depending on whether plain arguments have a value separator too. This discourages mixed lists where sometimes option values are passed as separate arguments, and sometimes as a list of delimited values. However, the list of plain arguments will grow regardless the presence of a value separator.

• By specifying :? or ::? or :,:? you allow 0 or 1/many/separated values (useful for making plain arguments optional)

• You can specify multiple option names.

• Every option name gets normalized: all possible spaces, dashes - and pluses + (for the negative flags) are removed, all letters converted to the desired case: exact (no conversion), lower (lowercase, i.e. case-insensitive) or smart (exact for short options, and lower for the long ones).

• Short options and sub-options can be bundled: -c -l -i is the same as -cli, the order of appearance doesn't matter for options, but does matter for sub-options.

• The function parseArgs returns an object of the type List<CliOpt>. The methods of the extension class CliOptList are used to retrieve one or more values and convert those to the required data type: isSet(optName), getIntValues(optName, {radix}), getDateValues(optName), getStrValues(optName)

• If an option definition contains >, the rest (up to the next | or the end of the string) will be considered as a comma-separated list of sub-options. These will be treated as plain values relying on the caller's interpretation. For instance, you need to pass multiple filter strings as values of some option. Some filters might require case-sensitive comparison, and some - case-insensitive, some might require straight match, and some - the opposite match (not found):

  myapp -filter -case "Ab" "Cd" --no-case "xyz" -not "uvw"

The array of values for the option -filter will be: ["-case", "Ab", "Cd", "+case", "xyz", "-not", "uvw"]. This allows you to traverse through the elements and turn some flags on or off when a sub-option encountered. Certainly, one can argue that it is possible to introduce 4 different options and achieve the same result. But firstly, this is a simple example. And secondly, in the latter case, you'll also have to deal with the sequence of permutation extras like: --filter-case-not should be equivalent to --filter-not-case, etc. Things can get really ugly without sub-options.

• The function allows a 'weird' (or even 'incorrect') way of passing multiple option values. However, this simplifies the case and makes obsolete the need to have plain arguments (the ones without an option). You can override this behaviour by the use of the value separator or by the use of an equal sign: -a="1,2" 3 4 -b -c 5 (option -a gets ["1", "2"], -c gets ["5"], and ["3", "4"] will be considered as plain arguments.

• If you wish to pass plain arguments, you should specify that in the options definition string explicitly. The format is the same as for options, but the option name should be empty: |:, |::, |::>and,or (the latter allows sub-options for plain arguments).

• The function allows an equal sign: -name="value" or -name='value'. However, the separate plain arguments straight after this one will NOT be considered as additional values of that option, but rather as plain arguments. Even if an option is defined as the one allowing multiple values, and no value separator is defined.

• The function interprets a standalone double-dash -- as a flag meaning that any argument beyond this point will be treated as plain argument (no option).

• The function interprets triple-dash --- as a flag meaning that no more argument should be treated as an option name, but rather added as a value to the last encountered option.

• The function allows bundling for short (single-character) option names. There is a method testNames of CliOptDef and of CliOptDefList which can be called from unit tests to ensure all option and sub-option names are unique as well as no long option name can be treated as a combination of short options names.

• Sub-option-first policy: if option -a has a sub-option -b, and there is also another major option -b, in the following situation -b will be treated as a sub-option: -a -b -c. Still -b will be treated as a major option in -b -a -c. This allows mixing options with similar sub-options. For instance, |p,plain::>and,not,or,p,plain,r,regex|r,regex::>and,not,or,p,plain,r,regex allows mixing two kinds of patterns with logical operations

Usage

See under the Example tab. All sample code files are under the sub-directory example.