What's the Best Way to Parse Command Line Arguments

What's the best way to parse command line arguments?

This answer suggests optparse which is appropriate for older Python versions. For Python 2.7 and above, argparse replaces optparse. See this answer for more information.

As other people pointed out, you are better off going with optparse over getopt. getopt is pretty much a one-to-one mapping of the standard getopt(3) C library functions, and not very easy to use.

optparse, while being a bit more verbose, is much better structured and simpler to extend later on.

Here's a typical line to add an option to your parser:

parser.add_option('-q', '--query',
            action="store", dest="query",
            help="query string", default="spam")

It pretty much speaks for itself; at processing time, it will accept -q or --query as options, store the argument in an attribute called query and has a default value if you don't specify it. It is also self-documenting in that you declare the help argument (which will be used when run with -h/--help) right there with the option.

Usually you parse your arguments with:

options, args = parser.parse_args()

This will, by default, parse the standard arguments passed to the script (sys.argv[1:])

options.query will then be set to the value you passed to the script.

You create a parser simply by doing

parser = optparse.OptionParser()

These are all the basics you need. Here's a complete Python script that shows this:

import optparse

parser = optparse.OptionParser()

parser.add_option('-q', '--query',
    action="store", dest="query",
    help="query string", default="spam")

options, args = parser.parse_args()

print 'Query string:', options.query

5 lines of python that show you the basics.

Save it in sample.py, and run it once with

python sample.py

and once with

python sample.py --query myquery

Beyond that, you will find that optparse is very easy to extend.
In one of my projects, I created a Command class which allows you to nest subcommands in a command tree easily. It uses optparse heavily to chain commands together. It's not something I can easily explain in a few lines, but feel free to browse around in my repository for the main class, as well as a class that uses it and the option parser

Parsing Command Line Arguments in C++?

Boost.Program_options should do the trick

Best way to parse command line arguments in C#?

I would strongly suggest using NDesk.Options (Documentation) and/or Mono.Options (same API, different namespace). An example from the documentation:

bool show_help = false;
List<string> names = new List<string> ();
int repeat = 1;

var p = new OptionSet () {
    { "n|name=", "the {NAME} of someone to greet.",
       v => names.Add (v) },
    { "r|repeat=", 
       "the number of {TIMES} to repeat the greeting.\n" + 
          "this must be an integer.",
        (int v) => repeat = v },
    { "v", "increase debug message verbosity",
       v => { if (v != null) ++verbosity; } },
    { "h|help",  "show this message and exit", 
       v => show_help = v != null },
};

List<string> extra;
try {
    extra = p.Parse (args);
}
catch (OptionException e) {
    Console.Write ("greet: ");
    Console.WriteLine (e.Message);
    Console.WriteLine ("Try `greet --help' for more information.");
    return;
}

How do I parse command line arguments in Bash?

Bash Space-Separated (e.g., `--option argument`)

cat >/tmp/demo-space-separated.sh <<'EOF'
#!/bin/bash

POSITIONAL_ARGS=()

while [[ $# -gt 0 ]]; do
  case $1 in
    -e|--extension)
      EXTENSION="$2"
      shift # past argument
      shift # past value
      ;;
    -s|--searchpath)
      SEARCHPATH="$2"
      shift # past argument
      shift # past value
      ;;
    --default)
      DEFAULT=YES
      shift # past argument
      ;;
    -*|--*)
      echo "Unknown option $1"
      exit 1
      ;;
    *)
      POSITIONAL_ARGS+=("$1") # save positional arg
      shift # past argument
      ;;
  esac
done

set -- "${POSITIONAL_ARGS[@]}" # restore positional parameters

echo "FILE EXTENSION  = ${EXTENSION}"
echo "SEARCH PATH     = ${SEARCHPATH}"
echo "DEFAULT         = ${DEFAULT}"
echo "Number files in SEARCH PATH with EXTENSION:" $(ls -1 "${SEARCHPATH}"/*."${EXTENSION}" | wc -l)

if [[ -n $1 ]]; then
    echo "Last line of file specified as non-opt/last argument:"
    tail -1 "$1"
fi
EOF

chmod +x /tmp/demo-space-separated.sh

/tmp/demo-space-separated.sh -e conf -s /etc /etc/hosts

Output from copy-pasting the block above

FILE EXTENSION  = conf
SEARCH PATH     = /etc
DEFAULT         =
Number files in SEARCH PATH with EXTENSION: 14
Last line of file specified as non-opt/last argument:
#93.184.216.34    example.com

Usage

demo-space-separated.sh -e conf -s /etc /etc/hosts

Bash Equals-Separated (e.g., `--option=argument`)

cat >/tmp/demo-equals-separated.sh <<'EOF'
#!/bin/bash

for i in "$@"; do
  case $i in
    -e=*|--extension=*)
      EXTENSION="${i#*=}"
      shift # past argument=value
      ;;
    -s=*|--searchpath=*)
      SEARCHPATH="${i#*=}"
      shift # past argument=value
      ;;
    --default)
      DEFAULT=YES
      shift # past argument with no value
      ;;
    -*|--*)
      echo "Unknown option $i"
      exit 1
      ;;
    *)
      ;;
  esac
done

echo "FILE EXTENSION  = ${EXTENSION}"
echo "SEARCH PATH     = ${SEARCHPATH}"
echo "DEFAULT         = ${DEFAULT}"
echo "Number files in SEARCH PATH with EXTENSION:" $(ls -1 "${SEARCHPATH}"/*."${EXTENSION}" | wc -l)

if [[ -n $1 ]]; then
    echo "Last line of file specified as non-opt/last argument:"
    tail -1 $1
fi
EOF

chmod +x /tmp/demo-equals-separated.sh

/tmp/demo-equals-separated.sh -e=conf -s=/etc /etc/hosts

Output from copy-pasting the block above

FILE EXTENSION  = conf
SEARCH PATH     = /etc
DEFAULT         =
Number files in SEARCH PATH with EXTENSION: 14
Last line of file specified as non-opt/last argument:
#93.184.216.34    example.com

Usage

demo-equals-separated.sh -e=conf -s=/etc /etc/hosts

To better understand ${i#*=} search for "Substring Removal" in this guide. It is functionally equivalent to `sed 's/[^=]*=//' <<< "$i"` which calls a needless subprocess or `echo "$i" | sed 's/[^=]*=//'` which calls two needless subprocesses.

Using bash with getopt[s]

getopt(1) limitations (older, relatively-recent getopt versions):

can't handle arguments that are empty strings
can't handle arguments with embedded whitespace

More recent getopt versions don't have these limitations. For more information, see these docs.

POSIX getopts

Additionally, the POSIX shell and others offer getopts which doen't have these limitations. I've included a simplistic getopts example.

cat >/tmp/demo-getopts.sh <<'EOF'
#!/bin/sh

# A POSIX variable
OPTIND=1         # Reset in case getopts has been used previously in the shell.

# Initialize our own variables:
output_file=""
verbose=0

while getopts "h?vf:" opt; do
  case "$opt" in
    h|\?)
      show_help
      exit 0
      ;;
    v)  verbose=1
      ;;
    f)  output_file=$OPTARG
      ;;
  esac
done

shift $((OPTIND-1))

[ "${1:-}" = "--" ] && shift

echo "verbose=$verbose, output_file='$output_file', Leftovers: $@"
EOF

chmod +x /tmp/demo-getopts.sh

/tmp/demo-getopts.sh -vf /etc/hosts foo bar

Output from copy-pasting the block above

verbose=1, output_file='/etc/hosts', Leftovers: foo bar

Usage

demo-getopts.sh -vf /etc/hosts foo bar

The advantages of getopts are:

It's more portable, and will work in other shells like dash.
It can handle multiple single options like -vf filename in the typical Unix way, automatically.

The disadvantage of getopts is that it can only handle short options (-h, not --help) without additional code.

There is a getopts tutorial which explains what all of the syntax and variables mean. In bash, there is also help getopts, which might be informative.

Is there a standardized way to parse command line arguments in C?

Is there a standardized way to parse command line arguments in C?

Yes there is. Not standardized by the C committee, but by others. The most commonly widespread is POSIX with it's Utility Conventions and getopt utility. Using GNU Argument Syntax with argp is just fun and cool. There is also commonly used GNUs getopt_long for supporting long arguments with getopt.

The only standardized and portable way to parse command line args is to do it yourself?

There is none standardized in C11 way to parse command line. The C11 only specifies, that the main arguments are strings, but they're value is just implementation-defined:

If the value of argc is greater than zero, the array members argv[0] through argv[argc-1] inclusive shall contain pointers to strings, which are given implementation-defined values by the host environment prior to program startup. The intent is to supply to the program information determined prior to program startup from elsewhere in the hosted environment.

The C standard doesn't introduce an abstraction of a "command line", so an abstraction consisting of "command line arguments" and furthermore "command line arguments parsing" is just not defined. I think introducing a standardized way to parse command line arguments is out of scope for a C standard.

The most portable way is to write and use the most portable code. Indeed the most portable code would not use any non-standard C libraries and "do it yourself" in a most portable manner.There is little sense to target all possible architectures and environments. If you are going only for GNU/Linux, I would go with getopt if you want to stay portable to some crazy environment and for argp if you want just to target GNU/Linux specific systems. getopt is really widespread, even a library for embedded systems like newlib has getopt and getopt_long implemented. For others, you can just copy/include the code for getopt from other sources into your program, thus protecting against environments that doesn't have it.

Best way to parse command-line parameters?

scopt/scopt

val parser = new scopt.OptionParser[Config]("scopt") {
  head("scopt", "3.x")

  opt[Int]('f', "foo") action { (x, c) =>
    c.copy(foo = x) } text("foo is an integer property")

  opt[File]('o', "out") required() valueName("<file>") action { (x, c) =>
    c.copy(out = x) } text("out is a required file property")

  opt[(String, Int)]("max") action { case ((k, v), c) =>
    c.copy(libName = k, maxCount = v) } validate { x =>
    if (x._2 > 0) success
    else failure("Value <max> must be >0") 
  } keyValueName("<libname>", "<max>") text("maximum count for <libname>")

  opt[Unit]("verbose") action { (_, c) =>
    c.copy(verbose = true) } text("verbose is a flag")

  note("some notes.\n")

  help("help") text("prints this usage text")

  arg[File]("<file>...") unbounded() optional() action { (x, c) =>
    c.copy(files = c.files :+ x) } text("optional unbounded args")

  cmd("update") action { (_, c) =>
    c.copy(mode = "update") } text("update is a command.") children(
    opt[Unit]("not-keepalive") abbr("nk") action { (_, c) =>
      c.copy(keepalive = false) } text("disable keepalive"),
    opt[Boolean]("xyz") action { (x, c) =>
      c.copy(xyz = x) } text("xyz is a boolean property")
  )
}
// parser.parse returns Option[C]
parser.parse(args, Config()) map { config =>
  // do stuff
} getOrElse {
  // arguments are bad, usage message will have been displayed
}

The above generates the following usage text:

scopt 3.x
Usage: scopt [update] [options] [<file>...]

  -f <value> | --foo <value>
        foo is an integer property
  -o <file> | --out <file>
        out is a required file property
  --max:<libname>=<max>
        maximum count for <libname>
  --verbose
        verbose is a flag
some notes.

  --help
        prints this usage text
  <file>...
        optional unbounded args

Command: update
update is a command.

  -nk | --not-keepalive
        disable keepalive    
  --xyz <value>
        xyz is a boolean property

This is what I currently use. Clean usage without too much baggage.
(Disclaimer: I now maintain this project)

What's the Best Way to Parse Command Line Arguments