ByteDev.Cmd 4.2.2

ByteDev.Cmd

Library providing functionality to help when creating .NET Console applications.

Installation

ByteDev.Cmd has been written as a .NET Standard 2.0 library, so you can consume it from a .NET Core or .NET Framework 4.6.1 (or greater) application.

ByteDev.Cmd is hosted as a package on nuget.org. To install from the Package Manager Console in Visual Studio run:

Install-Package ByteDev.Cmd

Further details can be found on the nuget page.

Release Notes

Releases follow semantic versioning.

Full details of the release notes can be viewed on GitHub.

Usage

Output class

Provides wrapper functionality around the System.Console class to make writing out output easier.

To use reference namespace: ByteDev.Cmd.

Methods include:

• Write
• WriteLine
• WriteRainbowLine
• WriteAlignLeft
• WriteAlignRight
• WriteAlignCenter
• WriteAlignToSides
• WriteHorizontalLine
• WriteBlankLines
• WriteWrap

var output = new Output();

var color = new OutputColor(ConsoleColor.White, ConsoleColor.Blue);

output.WriteLine("Text in default colors");
output.WriteLine("Text looks a bit like default PowerShell", color);

// Message Box

var msgBox = new MessageBox("Text in a box")
{
    BorderColor = new OutputColor(ConsoleColor.Red, ConsoleColor.Blue),
    TextColor = new OutputColor(ConsoleColor.White, ConsoleColor.Blue)
};
            
output.Write(msgBox);

// Unordered List

var ul = new UnorderedList(new [] { "Item 1", "Item 2", "Item 3" })
{
    ItemPrefix = "* ",
    ItemColor = new OutputColor(ConsoleColor.DarkBlue, ConsoleColor.Gray)
};

output.Write(ul);

// Ordered List

var ol = new OrderedList(new[] { "Item 1", "Item 2", "Item 3" })
{
    ItemStartingNumber = 0,
    ItemColor = new OutputColor(ConsoleColor.Black, ConsoleColor.Yellow),
    ApplyItemNumberPadding = true
};

output.Write(ol);

// Tables

var table = new Table(3, 3)
{
    BorderStyle = new BorderSimple(),
    BorderColor = new OutputColor(ConsoleColor.White, ConsoleColor.Blue),
    ValueColor = new OutputColor(ConsoleColor.White, ConsoleColor.Blue)
};

table.UpdateCell(new CellPosition(0, 0), new Cell("A1") 
{ 
    ValueColor = new OutputColor(ConsoleColor.DarkBlue, ConsoleColor.White)
});

table.UpdateCell(new CellPosition(0, 1), new Cell("B1"));
table.UpdateCell(new CellPosition(1, 1), new Cell("B2"));
table.UpdateCell(new CellPosition(2, 1), new Cell("B3"));

table.UpdateCell(new CellPosition(2, 2), new Cell("C3"));

output.Write(table);

Logger class

The Logger class provides a convenient way to write log style messages to the console based on a given LogLevel.

To use reference namespace: ByteDev.Cmd.Logging.

Methods include:

• WriteDebug
• WriteInfo
• WriteWarning
• WriteError
• WriteCritical

// Example: at LogLevel.Error only Error and Critical messages will be written

var logger = new Logger(LogLevel.Error);

logger.WriteDebug("Debug message");
logger.WriteInfo("Info message");
logger.WriteWarning("Warning message");
logger.WriteError("Error message");
logger.WriteCritical("Critical message");

Arguments namespace

To use reference namespace: ByteDev.Cmd.Arguments.

The namespace defines a number of types:

• CmdAllowedArg - represents an allowed argument.
• CmdArgInfo - represents string[] args from the console app and a collection of CmdAllowedArg.
• CmdArg - represents an input command line argument.

// Define what arguments are allowed using the CmdAllowedArg class

var cmdAllowedArgs = new List<CmdAllowedArg>
{
    new CmdAllowedArg('o', false) 
    {
        LongName = "output", 
        Description = "Output something"
    },
    new CmdAllowedArg('p', true) 
    {
        LongName = "path", 
        Description = "Set a path", 
        IsRequired = true
    }
};

try
{
    // Handle console arguments using the CmdArgInfo class
    // args is the string array of args from Program.Main

    var cmdArgInfo = new CmdArgInfo(args, cmdAllowedArgs);

    // Use CmdArgInfo instance to determine what operations to perform

    if (cmdArgInfo.HasArguments)
    {
        foreach (CmdArg cmdArg in cmdArgInfo.Arguments)
        {
            switch (cmdArg.ShortName)
            {
                case 'o':
                    DoSomeOutput();
                    break;

                case 'p':
                    SetPath(cmdArg.Value);
                    break;
            }
        }
    }
    else
    {
        Console.WriteLine(cmdAllowedArgs.HelpText());
    }
}
catch (CmdArgException ex)
{
    // When creating CmdArgInfo if any invalid input a CmdArgException will be thrown
    Console.WriteLine(ex.Message);
    Console.WriteLine(cmdAllowedArgs.HelpText());
}

The ByteDev.Cmd.TestApp project on GitHub also has a working example of this.