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Create your first command

We will create a simple command called hello that will print a sentence "Hello World!" to stdout.

Declare the command

touch ./lib/hammer_cli_hello/hello_world.rb

# ./lib/hammer_cli_hello/hello_world.rb
require 'hammer_cli'

# it's a good practice to nest commands into modules
module HammerCLIHello

  # hammer commands must be descendants of AbstractCommand
  class HelloCommand < HammerCLI::AbstractCommand

    # execute is the heart of the command
    def execute
      # we use print_message instead of simple puts
      # the reason will be described later in the part called Output
      print_message "Hello World!"
    end
  end

  # now plug your command into the hammer's main command
  HammerCLI::MainCommand.subcommand
    'hello',                  # command's name
    "Say Hello World!",       # description
    HammerCLIHello::HelloCommand  # the class
end

The last bit is to require the file with your command in hammer_cli_hello.rb. Hammer actually loads this file and this is how the commands from plugins get loaded into hammer.

# ./lib/hammer_cli_hello.rb
require 'hammer_cli_hello/hello_world'

Rebuild and reinstall your plugin and see the results of hammer -h

gem build ./hammer_cli_hello.gemspec && gem install hammer_cli_hello-0.0.1.gem

$ hammer -h
Usage:
    hammer [OPTIONS] SUBCOMMAND [ARG] ...

Parameters:
    SUBCOMMAND                    subcommand
    [ARG] ...                     subcommand arguments

Subcommands:
    shell                         Interactive Shell
    hello                         Say Hello World!

Options:
    -v, --verbose                 be verbose
    -c, --config CFG_FILE         path to custom config file
    -u, --username USERNAME       username to access the remote system
    -p, --password PASSWORD       password to access the remote system
    --version                     show version
    --show-ids                    Show ids of associated resources
    --csv                         Output as CSV (same as --adapter=csv)
    --output ADAPTER              Set output format. One of [csv, table, base, silent]
    --csv-separator SEPARATOR     Character to separate the values
    -P, --ask-pass                Ask for password
    --autocomplete LINE           Get list of possible endings
    -h, --help                    print help

Now try running the command.

$ hammer hello
Hello World!
Error: exit code must be integer

What's wrong here? Hammer requires integer exit codes as return values from the method execute. It's usually just HammerCLI::EX_OK. Add it as the very last line of execute, rebuild and the command should run fine.

See exit_codes.rb for the full list of available exit codes.

Declaring options

Our new command has only one option so far. It's -h which is built in for every command by default. Option declaration is the same as in clamp so please read it's documentation on that topic. However, unlike in Clamp, the option accessors in Hammer are created with prefix 'option_', to avoid conflict with methods of the commands. So to access value of an --name option you have to call option_name()

Example option usage could go like this:

class HelloCommand < HammerCLI::AbstractCommand

  option '--name', "NAME", "Name of the person you want to greet"

  def execute
    print_message "Hello %s!" % (option_name || "World")
    HammerCLI::EX_OK
  end
end
$ hammer hello -h
Usage:
    hammer hello [OPTIONS]

Options:
    --name NAME                   Name of the person you want to greet
    -h, --help                    print help

$ hammer hello --name 'Foreman'
Hello Foreman!

Nil values

To unset some option (i.e. to set it to nil value) use preset value NIL:

$ hammer hello --name NIL
Hello World!

When the NIL value collides with a real value being used it can be redefined using environment variable HAMMER_NIL:

$ HAMMER_NIL=NULL hammer hello --name NIL
Hello NIL!

Note that the normalizers are not called for a NIL values even when defined for the option.

Deprecated options

To mark an option as deprecated use the :deprecated option as follows:

  option '--name', "NAME", "Name of the person you want to greet",
    :deprecated => _('Use --alias instead')

It will ensure user is warned when deprecated option is used:

$ hammer hello --name 'Foreman'
Warning: Option --name is deprecated. Use --alias instead
Hello Foreman!

In cases when you want to deprecate just one of more possible switches use the extended syntax:

  option ['--alias','--name'], "NAME", "Name of the person you want to greet",
    :deprecated => { '--name' => _('Use --alias instead') }

Predefined options

Also Hammer offers predefined options now. Those are just options, but with predefined functionality. To define them in your command use use_option :option_name method.

Here is the list of predefined options:

  • :fields Expects a list with fields to show in output, see example.

Option family

Option family is the way to unify options which have the same meaning or purpose, but contain some differences in their definitions (e.g. the name/switch of an option). Mainly serves as a container for options, which purpose is to show less repetitive output in commands' help. Option builders use it by default.

To define an option family, use the following DSL:

  # options is a Hash with options for family/each defined option within it
  option_family(options = {}) do
    # parent is the main option. Must be single, option family can have only one parent.
    parent switches, type, description, options
    # child  is an additional option. Could be none or more than one. Aren't shown in the help output.
    child  switches, type, description, options
  end
Example
  option_family(
    aliased_resource: 'environment',
    description: _('Puppet environment'),
    deprecation: _("Use %s instead") % '--puppet-environment[-id]'
    deprecated: { '--environment' => _("Use %s instead") % '--puppet-environment[-id]',
                  '--environment-id' => _("Use %s instead") % '--puppet-environment[-id]'}
  ) do
    parent '--environment-id', 'ENVIRONMENT_ID', _(''),
           format: HammerCLI::Options::Normalizers::Number.new,
           attribute_name: :option_environment_id
    child '--environment', 'ENVIRONMENT_NAME', _('Environment name'),
          attribute_name: :option_environment_name
  end

  # $ hammer command --help:
  # ...
  #  Options:
  #    --environment[-id]               Puppet environment (Deprecated: Use --puppet-environment[-id] instead)
  # ...

  # $ hammer full-help:
  # ...
  #  Options:
  #    --environment   ENVIRONMENT_NAME    Environment name (--environment is deprecated: Use --puppet-environment[-id] instead)
  #    --environment-id   ENVIRONMENT_ID    (--environment-id is deprecated: Use --puppet-environment[-id] instead)
  # ...

Option builders

Hammer commands offer option builders that can be used for automatic option generation. See documentation page dedicated to this topic for more details.

Option normalizers

Another option-related feature is a set of normalizers for specific option types. They validate and preprocess option values. Each normalizer has a description of the format it accepts. This description is printed in commands' help.

See our tutorial if you want to create your custom normalizer.

List

Parses comma separated strings to a list of values.

option "--users", "USER_NAMES", "List of user names",
  :format => HammerCLI::Options::Normalizers::List.new

--users='J.R.,Gary,Bobby' -> ['J.R.', 'Gary', 'Bobby']

File

Loads contents of a file and returns it as a value of the option.

option "--poem", "PATH_TO_POEM", "File containing the text of your poem",
  :format => HammerCLI::Options::Normalizers::File.new

--poem=~/verlaine/les_poetes_maudits.txt -> content of the file

Bool

Case insensitive true/false values. Translates yes,y,true,t,1 to true and no,n,false,f,0 to false.

option "--start", "START", "Start the action",
  :format => HammerCLI::Options::Normalizers::Bool.new

--start=yes -> true

KeyValueList

Parses a comma separated list of key=value pairs. Can be used for naming attributes with vague structure.

option "--attributes", "ATTRIBUTES", "Values of various attributes",
  :format => HammerCLI::Options::Normalizers::KeyValueList.new

--attributes="material=unoptanium,thickness=3" -> {'material' => 'unoptanium', 'thickness' => '3'}

Advanced option evaluation

Sometimes it is necessary to tune or validate the option values based on other parameters given on CLI. An example could be setting default values based on other options, values lookup in a DB, etc. The right place for this are option processors. There are two basic kinds of option processors in hammer:

  • option sources - they provide values for the options, descendants of HammerCLI::Options::Sources::Base
  • option validators - they check if the options values are valid, descendants of HammerCLI::Options::Validators::Base

Option sources and validators can be mixed together. For example it's possible to collect options from the command line, do some validation on them and then continue with collecting options from a different source. The whole set of processors is invoked only once per command call. The processing is triggered by a first call to the options or all_options method, but at latest right after the option validation (before the command's execute method is invoked). The order is as follows:

  1. option parsing
  2. option normalization
  3. option processors execution (sources and validators)
  4. execute invocation

Default option sources

Abstract Hammer command uses two default option sources - HammerCLI::Options::Sources::CommandLine responsible for intial population of the options and HammerCLI::Options::Sources::SavedDefaults adding defaults managed by the defaults command.

The default option sources are wrapped in DefaultInputs processor list so that it's possible to easily place custom sources before or behind all the default ones. The full default hierarchy is:

- DefaultInputs
    - CommandLine
    - SavedDefaults (present only when defaults are enabled)

By overriding option_sources method in a command it is possible to add custom option sources for various tasks to the list. The option sources are evaluated one by one each being given output of the previous one as its input so the order in which the sources are listed matters.

Option validation

Hammer provides extended functionality for validating options.

First of all there is a DSL for validating combinations of options:

validate_options do
  all(:option_name, :option_surname).required  # requires all the options
  option(:option_age).required          # requires a single option,
                                        # equivalent of :required => true in option declaration
  any(:option_email, :option_phone).required   # requires at least one of the options

  # It is possible to create more complicated constructs.
  # This example requires either the full address or nothing
  if any(:option_street, :option_city, :option_zip).exist?
    all(:option_street, :option_city, :option_zip).required
  end

  # Here you can reject all address related option when --no-address is passed
  if option(:option_no_address).exist?
    all(:option_street, :option_city, :option_zip).rejected
  end
end

It's possible to insert a validation block on a certain place in the option processor chain:

validate_options(:after, 'DefaultInputs') do
  # ...inserts the validation block after DefaultInputs option source
end

validate_options(:prepend) do
  # ...adds validation to the first place in the queue
end

# Following insert modes can be used:
# before, after, append, prepend (the default behavior)

Alternatively the functionality can be extracted in a validator object that can be shared by multiple commands:

validate_options(:after, 'DefaultInputs', validator: Custom::Validator.new)

validate_options adds validators into a specific command class and they aren't inherited with subclasses. Inheritable validators can be created command's add_validators method.

Adding subcommands

Commands in the CLI can be structured into a tree of parent commands (nodes) and subcommands (leaves). Neither the number of subcommands nor the nesting is limited. Please note that no parent command can perform any action and therefore it's useless to define execute method for them. This limit comes from Clamp's implementation of the command hierarchy.

We've already used command nesting for plugging the HelloCommand command into the main command. But let's create a new command say and show how to connect it with others to be more demonstrative.

module HammerCLIHello

  # a new parent command 'say'
  class SayCommand < HammerCLI::AbstractCommand

    # subcommand 'hello' remains the same
    class HelloCommand < HammerCLI::AbstractCommand

      option '--name', "NAME", "Name of the person you want to greet"

      def execute
        print_message "Hello %s!" % (option_ name || "World")
        HammerCLI::EX_OK
      end
    end

    # plug the original command into 'say'
    subcommand 'hello', "Say Hello World!", HammerCLIHello::SayCommand::HelloCommand
  end

  # plug the 'say' command into the main command
  HammerCLI::MainCommand.subcommand 'say', "Say something", HammerCLIHello::SayCommand
end

The result will be:

$ hammer say hello
Hello World!

This is very typical usage of subcommands. When you create more of them it may feel a bit duplicit to always define the subcommand structure at the end of the class definition. Hammer provides utility methods for subcommand autoloading. This is handy especially when you have a growing number of subcommands. See how it works in the following example:

module HammerCLIHello

  class SayCommand < HammerCLI::AbstractCommand

    class HelloCommand < HammerCLI::AbstractCommand
      command_name 'hello'      # name and description moves to the command's class
      desc 'Say Hello World!'
      # ...
    end

    class HiCommand < HammerCLI::AbstractCommand
      command_name 'hi'
      desc 'Say Hi World!'
      # ...
    end

    class ByeCommand < HammerCLI::AbstractCommand
      command_name 'bye'
      desc 'Say Bye World!'
      # ...
    end

    autoload_subcommands
  end

  HammerCLI::MainCommand.subcommand 'say', "Say something", HammerCLIHello::SayCommand
end
$ hammer say
Usage:
    hammer say [OPTIONS] SUBCOMMAND [ARG] ...

Parameters:
    SUBCOMMAND                    subcommand
    [ARG] ...                     subcommand arguments

Subcommands:
    hi                            Say Hi World!
    hello                         Say Hello World!
    bye                           Say Bye World!

Options:
    -h, --help                    print help

Aliasing subcommands

Commands can have two or more names, e.g. aliases. To support such functionality simple name addition could be used via command_name or command_names method:

module HammerCLIHello

  class SayCommand < HammerCLI::AbstractCommand

    class GreetingsCommand < HammerCLI::AbstractCommand
      command_name 'hello'
      command_name 'hi'
      # or use can use other method:
      command_names 'hello', 'hi'

      desc 'Say Hello World!'
      # ...
    end

    autoload_subcommands
  end

  HammerCLI::MainCommand.subcommand 'say', "Say something", HammerCLIHello::SayCommand
end

Conflicting subcommands

It can happen that two different plugins define subcommands with the same name by accident. In such situations subcommand will throw an exception. If this is intentional and you want to redefine the existing command, use subcommand!. This method does not throw exceptions, replaces the original subcommand, and leaves a message in a log for debugging purposes.

Removing subcommands

If your plugin needs to disable an existing subcommand, you can use remove_subcommand for this.

  HammerCLI::MainCommand.remove_subcommand 'say'

Call to this action is automatically logged.

Lazy-loaded subcommands

In some cases it's beneficial to load the command classes lazily at the time when they are really needed. It can save some time in CLIs containing many commands with time-consuming initialization.

Such commands have to be placed in a separate file (hammer_cli_hello/say.rb in our case). Following construct registers the command as lazy-loaded. CLI then requires the file when it needs the command class for the first time.

HammerCLI::MainCommand.lazy_subcommand(
  'say',                        # command's name
  'Say something',              # description
  'HammerCLIHello::SayCommand', # command's class in a string
  'hammer_cli_hello/say'        # require path of the file
)

Deprecated commands

To mark a command as deprecated use the :warning option as follows:

HammerCLI::MainCommand.lazy_subcommand(
  'say',                        # command's name
  'Say something',              # description
  'HammerCLIHello::SayCommand', # command's class in a string
  'hammer_cli_hello/say',       # require path of the file
  warning: _('This command is deprecated and will be removed.')
)

Or you can mark a command in its definition:

class SayCommand < HammerCLI::AbstractCommand

  class HelloCommand < HammerCLI::AbstractCommand
    warning 'This command is deprecated and will be removed.'
    command_name 'hello'
    desc 'Say Hello World!'
    # ...
  end
  # ...

  autoload_subcommands
end

Printing some output

We've mentioned above that it's not recommended practice to print output directly with puts in Hammer. The reason is we separate definition of the output from its interpretation. Hammer uses so called output adapters that can modify the output format.

The detailed documentation on adapters and related things is here.

Printing messages

Very simple, just call

print_message(msg)

Printing hash records

Typical usage of a CLI is interaction with some API. In many cases it's listing some records returned by the API.

Hammer comes with support for selecting and formatting of hash record fields. You first create an output definition that you apply to your data. The result is a collection of fields, each having its type. The collection is then passed to an output adapter which handles the actual formatting and printing.

Adapters support printing by chunks, e.g. if you want to print a large set of data (1000+ records), but you make several calls to the server instead of one, you may want to print received data right away instead of waiting for the rest. This can be achieved via :current_chunk option for print_collection and print_data methods. Allowed values for :current_chunk are :first, :another, :last. By default adapters use :single value that means only one record will be printed.

Printing by chunks
# ...
  def execute
    loop do
      # ...
      data = send_request
      print_data(data, current_chunk: :first)
      # ...
      data = send_request
      print_data(data, current_chunk: :another)
      # ...
      data = send_request
      print_data(data, current_chunk: :last)
    end
  end
# ...

Hammer provides a DSL for defining the output. Next rather complex example will explain how to use it in action.

Imagine there's an API of some service that returns list of users:

[{
  :id => 1,
  :email => 'tom@email.com',
  :phone => '123456111',
  :first_name => 'Tom',
  :last_name => 'Sawyer',
  :roles => ['Admin', 'Editor'],
  :timestamps => {
      :created => '2012-12-18T15:24:42Z',
      :updated => '2012-12-18T15:24:42Z'
  }
},{
  :id => 2,
  :email => 'huckleberry@email.com',
  :phone => '123456222',
  :first_name => 'Huckleberry',
  :last_name => 'Finn',
  :roles => ['Admin'],
  :timestamps => {
      :created => '2012-12-18T15:25:00Z',
      :updated => '2012-12-20T14:00:15Z'
  }
}]

We can create an output definition that selects and formats some of the fields:

NOTE: Every field can be arranged in so-called field sets. All the fields by default go to 'DEFAULT' and 'ALL' sets. Fields which are in the 'DEFAULT' set will be printed by default. To see printed other field sets, use predefined option --fields NAME, where NAME is a field set name in ALLCAPS.

class Command < HammerCLI::AbstractCommand
  # To be able to select fields which should be printed
  use_option :fields

  output do
    # Simple field with a label. The first parameter is the key in the printed hash.
    field :id, 'ID'

    # Fields can have types. The type determines how the field is printed.
    # All available types are listed below.
    # Here we want the roles to act as list.
    field :roles, 'System Roles', Fields::List

    # Label is used for grouping fields.
    label 'Contacts', sets: ['ADDITIONAL', 'ALL'] do
      field :email, 'Email'
      field :phone, 'Phone No.'
    end

    # From is used for accessing nested fields.
    from :timestamps do
      # See how date gets formatted in the output
      field :created, 'Created At', Fields::Date
    end
  end

  def execute
    records = retrieve_data
    print_record(          # <- printing utility of AbstractCommand
      output_definition,   # <- method for accessing fields defined in the block 'output'
      records              # <- the data to print
    )
    return HammerCLI::EX_OK
  end

end

Using the base adapter the output will look like:

ID:            1
System Roles:  Admin, Editor
Name:          Tom Sawyer
Created At:    2012/12/18 15:24:42

ID:            2
System Roles:  Admin
Name:          Huckleberry Finn
Created At:    2012/12/18 15:25:00

Using the base adapter with --fields ALL or --fields DEFAULT,ADDITIONAL the output will look like:

ID:            1
System Roles:  Admin, Editor
Name:          Tom Sawyer
Created At:    2012/12/18 15:24:42
Contacts:
  Email:       tom@email.com
  Phone No.:   123456111

ID:            2
System Roles:  Admin
Name:          Huckleberry Finn
Created At:    2012/12/18 15:25:00
Contacts:
  Email:       huckleberry@email.com
  Phone No.:   123456222

NOTE: --fields as well lets you to print desired fields only. E.g. to see the users' emails without any additional information use --fields contacts/email:

Email:       tom@email.com

Email:       huckleberry@email.com

You can optionally use the output definition from another command as a base and extend it with additional fields. This is helpful when there are two commands, one listing brief data and another one showing details. Typically it's list and show.

class ShowCommand < HammerCLI::AbstractCommand

  output ListCommand.output_definition do
    # additional fields
  end

  # ...
end

All Hammer field types are:

  • Date
  • Id - Used to mark ID values, current print adapters have support for turning id printing on/off. See hammer's parameter --show-ids.
  • List
  • KeyValue - Formats hashes containing :name and :value
  • Collection - Enables to render subcollections. Takes a block with another output definition.

The default adapter for every command is the Base adapter. It is possible to override the default one by redefining command's method adapter.

def adapter
  # return :base, :table, :csv or name of your own adapter here
  :table
end

Verbosity

Currently Hammer defines three basic verbose modes:

  • QUIET - Prints nothing
  • UNIX - Prints data only
  • VERBOSE - Prints data and other messages

By default Hammer works in VERBOSE mode, but it can be changed with specific option (see hammer --help) or in the configuration file.

If you want to force some messages to be printed with print_message in UNIX mode for example, you can specify verbosity of this message:

class MyCommand < HammerCLI::Apipie::Command
  def execute
    print_message("Hello, %{name}!", { name: 'Jason' }, verbosity: HammerCLI::V_UNIX)
  end
end

Other useful command features

Logging

Hammer provides integrated logger with broad setting options (use hammer's config file):

:log_dir: '<path>'    # - directory where the logs are stored.
                      #   The default is /var/log/foreman/ and the log file is named hammer.log
:log_level: '<level>' # - logging level. One of debug, info, warning, error, fatal
:log_owner: '<owner>' # - logfile owner
:log_group: '<group>' # - logfile group
:log_size: 1048576  # - size in bytes, when exceeded the log rotates. Default is 1MB
:watch_plain: false # - turn on/off syntax highlighting of data being logged in debug mode

Example usage in commands:

# Get a logger instance
logger('Logger name')

# It uses a command class name as the logger's name by default
logger

# Log a message at corresponding log level
logger.debug("...")
logger.error("...")
logger.info("...")
logger.fatal("...")
logger.warn("...")

# Writes an awesome print dump of a value to the log
logger.watch('Some label', value)

Exception handling

Exception handling in Hammer is centralized by ExceptionHandler. Each plugin, module or even a command can have a separate exception handler. The exception handler class is looked up in the module structure from a command to the top level.

Define method self.exception_handler_class in your plugin's module to use a custom exception handler:

# ./lib/hammer_cli_hello.rb

module HammerCLIHello

  def self.exception_handler_class
    HammerCLIHello::CustomExceptionHandler
  end
end

require 'hammer_cli_hello/hello_world'

Centralized exception handling implies that you should raise exceptions on error states in your command rather than handle it and return error codes. This approach guarantees that error messages are logged and printed consistently and correct exit codes are returned.

Configuration

Values form config files are accesible via class HammerCLI::Settings. It's method get returns either the value or nil when it's not found.

Config values belonging to a specific plugin must be nested under the plugin's name (without the prefix 'hammer_cli_') in config files.

#cli_config.yml
:log_dir: /var/log/hammer/
:hello_world:
    :name:  John
HammerCLI::Settings.get(:log_dir)             # get a value
HammerCLI::Settings.get(:hello_world, :name)  # get a nested value

There are more ways where to place your config file for hammer. The best practice is to place module's configuration into a separate file named by the module. In this example it would be ~/.hammer/cli.modules.d/hello_world.yml.

Read more about configuration locations in the settings howto.