Shuttle.Cli

Provides the Arguments class that gives you access to command-line interface arguments:

Installation

dotnet add package Shuttle.Cli

Constructor

public Arguments(params string[] commandLine)

The commandLine is parsed as arguments starting with -, -- or / followed by the argument name then either =, :, or a space, and then the argument value.

The following are valid arguments:

-name=value
--name=value
/name=value
-name:value
--name:value
/name:value
-name value
--name value
/name value

The argument name and value may be quoted with either a single quote (') or double quote (").

Boolean Flags

You may also pass boolean flags without a value to automatically assign them the value "true":

-flag
--flag
/flag

Static Factory Method

public static Arguments FromCommandLine()

Creates an Arguments instance from the current process command line, automatically skipping the executable name:

var args = Arguments.FromCommandLine();

Properties

public string[] CommandLine { get; }
public IEnumerable<ArgumentDefinition> Definitions { get; }
public string? this[string name] { get; }

• CommandLine: Returns the original command line arguments
• Definitions: Returns read-only collection of argument definitions
• this[string name]: Indexer to get argument value by name

Checking for values

public bool Contains(string name)

Returns true if the given argument name is found; else false.

Getting values

public T Get<T>(string name)
public T Get<T>(string name, T @default)

Returns the value of the given argument name as type T. If the argument name cannot be found the value given as @default will be returned. If not @default is specified an InvalidOperationException is thrown.

Adding arguments programmatically

public Arguments Add(string key)
public Arguments Add(string key, string value)

Add arguments programmatically to the collection:

args.Add("verbose");
args.Add("output", "results.txt");

Argument definitions

You can add ArgumentDefinition entries to an Arguments instance by using the following method:

public Arguments Add(ArgumentDefinition definition)

ArgumentDefinition constructor

public ArgumentDefinition(string name, params string[] aliases)

Creates a new argument definition with optional aliases:

var definition = new ArgumentDefinition("input", "i", "in");

ArgumentDefinition fluent methods

public ArgumentDefinition WithDescription(string description)
public ArgumentDefinition AsRequired()

Configure argument definitions using fluent interface:

var definition = new ArgumentDefinition("input", "i")
    .WithDescription("Input file path")
    .AsRequired();

Argument definitions must have unique keys and if aliases are used these too have to be unique across definitions. Duplicate aliases within the same argument definition will be ignored.

Help text generation

public string GetDefinitionText(int consoleWidth = 80, bool required = false, string prefix = "  ")

Generates formatted help text for defined arguments:

var helpText = args.GetDefinitionText();
Console.WriteLine(helpText);

To show only required arguments:

var requiredHelp = args.GetDefinitionText(required: true);

Validation

public bool HasMissingValues()

Returns true if there are any required arguments that have not been specified using either the proper name or an alias:

if (args.HasMissingValues())
{
    Console.WriteLine("Missing required arguments:");
    Console.WriteLine(args.GetDefinitionText(required: true));
}