SeqAn3  3.0.2
The Modern C++ library for sequence analysis.
Argument Parser

The Argument Parser Module. More...

Classes

class  seqan3::argument_parser
 The SeqAn command line parser. More...
 
interface  argument_parser_compatible_option
 Checks whether the the type can be used in an add_(positional_)option call on the argument parser. More...
 
struct  seqan3::argument_parser_meta_data
 Stores all parser related meta information of the seqan3::argument_parser. More...
 
struct  seqan3::custom::argument_parsing< t >
 A type that can be specialised to provide customisation point implementations for the seqan3::argument_parser such that third party types may be adapted. More...
 
class  seqan3::arithmetic_range_validator
 A validator that checks whether a number is inside a given range. More...
 
class  seqan3::file_validator_base
 An abstract base class for the file and directory validators. More...
 
class  seqan3::input_directory_validator
 A validator that checks if a given path is a valid input directory. More...
 
class  seqan3::input_file_validator< file_t >
 A validator that checks if a given path is a valid input file. More...
 
interface  named_enumeration
 Checks whether the free function seqan3::enumeration_names can be called on the type. More...
 
class  seqan3::output_directory_validator
 A validator that checks if a given path is a valid output directory. More...
 
class  seqan3::output_file_validator< file_t >
 A validator that checks if a given path is a valid output file. More...
 
class  seqan3::regex_validator
 A validator that checks if a matches a regular expression pattern. More...
 
interface  validator
 The concept for option validators passed to add_option/positional_option. More...
 
class  seqan3::value_list_validator< option_value_t >
 A validator that checks whether a value is inside a list of valid values. More...
 

Enumerations

enum  seqan3::option_spec { seqan3::DEFAULT = 0, seqan3::REQUIRED = 1, seqan3::ADVANCED = 2, seqan3::HIDDEN = 4 }
 Used to further specify argument_parser options/flags. More...
 

Functions

template<validator validator1_type, validator validator2_type>
auto seqan3::operator| (validator1_type &&vali1, validator2_type &&vali2)
 Enables the chaining of validators. More...
 

Customisation Points

template<typename option_type >
auto const seqan3::enumeration_names = detail::adl_only::enumeration_names_fn<option_type>{}()
 Return a conversion map from std::string_view to option_type. More...
 

Detailed Description

The Argument Parser Module.

The Argument Parser Class

The seqan3::argument_parser is a general purpose argument parser that provides convenient access to the command line arguments passed to the program. It automatically generates a help page and can export manual-pages as well as HTML documentation.

Furthermore common tool descriptor (CTD) files can be exported (soon) and a server be queried for available application updates.

Terminology

Since the terms option and arguments are frequently used in different contexts we want to first clarify our usage:

Add/get options, flags or positional Options

Adding an option is done in a single call. You simply need to provide a predeclared variable and some additional information like the identifier, description or advanced restrictions. To actually retrieve the value from the command line and enable every other mechanism you need to call the seqan3::argument_parser::parse function in the end.

int main(int argc, char ** argv)
{
seqan3::argument_parser myparser{"Grade-Average", argc, argv}; // initialize
std::string name{"Max Muster"}; // define default values directly in the variable.
bool bonus{false};
std::vector<double> grades{}; // you can also specify a vector that is treated as a list option.
myparser.add_option(name, 'n', "name", "Please specify your name.");
myparser.add_flag(bonus, 'b', "bonus", "Please specify if you got the bonus.");
myparser.add_positional_option(grades, "Please specify your grades.");
try
{
myparser.parse();
}
catch (seqan3::argument_parser_error const & ext) // the user did something wrong
{
std::cerr << "[PARSER ERROR] " << ext.what() << '\n'; // customize your error message
return -1;
}
if (bonus)
grades.push_back(1.0); // extra good grade
double avg{0};
for (auto g : grades)
avg += g;
avg = avg / grades.size();
seqan3::debug_stream << name << " has an average grade of " << avg << '\n';
return 0;
}

Now you can call your application via the command line:

MaxMuster% ./grade_avg_app -n Peter --bonus 1.0 2.0 1.7
Peter has an average grade of 1.425

You can also display the help page automatically:

MaxMuster% ./grade_avg_app --help
Grade-Average
=============
POSITIONAL ARGUMENTS
ARGUMENT-1 List of DOUBLE's
Please specify your grades.
OPTIONS
-n, --name STRING
Please specify your name.
-b, --bonus
Please specify if you got the bonus.
VERSION
Last update:
Grade-Average version:
SeqAn version: 3.0.0

Errors that are caught by the argument_parser

There are two different kinds of errors: Developer errors and user errors.

Developer errors are those that violate the seqan3::argument_parser design (e.g. calling the seqan3::argument_parser::parse function twice or specifying two different options with the same identifier.) In this case, a seqan3::design_error is thrown.

The second kind are user errors, due to invalid command line calls. In this case a seqan3::argument_parser_error is thrown.

For example:

MaxMuster% ./grade_avg_app -n Peter 2.0 abc 1.7
[PARSER ERROR] Value cast failed for positional option 2: Argument abc could not be casted to type DOUBLE.

See the seqan3::argument_parser::parse documentation for a detailed list of which exceptions are caught.

Update Notifications

SeqAn applications that are using the seqan3::argument_parser can check SeqAn servers for version updates. The functionality helps getting new versions out to users faster. It is also used to inform application developers of new versions of the SeqAn library which means that applications ship with less bugs. For privacy implications, please see: https://github.com/seqan/seqan3/wiki/Update-Notifications.

Developers that wish to disable this feature permanently can pass an extra constructor argument:

int main(int argc, char ** argv)
{
seqan3::argument_parser myparser{"Game-of-Parsing", argc, argv, false};
// disable version checks permanently ----------------------------^
}

Users of applications that have this feature activated can opt-out, by either:

Note that in case there is no --version-check option (display available options with -h/--help), then the developer already disabled the version check functionality.

Parsing Command Line Arguments

Attention
The function must be called at the very end of all parser related code and should be enclosed in a try catch block.
Exceptions
seqan3::design_errorif this function was already called before.
seqan3::option_declared_multiple_timesif an option that is not a list was declared multiple times.
seqan3::user_input_errorif an incorrect argument is given as (positional) option value.
seqan3::required_option_missingif the user did not provide a required option.
seqan3::too_many_argumentsif the command line call contained more arguments than expected.
seqan3::too_few_argumentsif the command line call contained less arguments than expected.
seqan3::validation_errorif the argument was not excepted by the provided validator.

When no specific key words are supplied, the seqan3::argument_parser starts to process the command line for specified options, flags and positional options.

If the given command line input (argv) contains the following keywords (in order of checking), the parser will exit (std::exit) with error code 0 after doing the following:

Example:

Note
Since the argument parser may throw, you should always wrap parse() into a try-catch block.
int main(int argc, char ** argv)
{
seqan3::argument_parser myparser{"The-Age-App", argc, argv}; // initialize
int age{30}; // define default values directly in the variable
myparser.add_option(age, 'a', "user-age", "Please specify your age.");
try
{
myparser.parse();
}
catch (seqan3::argument_parser_error const & ext) // the user did something wrong
{
std::cerr << "The-Age-App - [PARSER ERROR] " << ext.what() << '\n'; // customize your error message
return -1;
}
seqan3::debug_stream << "integer given by user: " << age << '\n';
return 0;
}

The code above gives the following output when calling --help:

MaxMuster$ ./age_app --help
The-Age-App
===========
OPTIONS
-a, --user-age (signed 32 bit integer)
Please specify your age.
VERSION
Last update:
The-Age-App version:
SeqAn version: 3.0.0
Thanks for using The-Age-App!

If the user does something wrong, it looks like this:

MaxMuster$ ./age_app --foo
The Age App - [PARSER ERROR] Unknown option --foo. Please see -h/--help for more information.
MaxMuster$ ./age_app -a abc
The Age App - [PARSER ERROR] Value cast failed for option -a: Argument abc
could not be casted to type (signed 32 bit integer).

Argument Validation

The SeqAn 3 Argument Parser offers a validation mechanism for (positional_)options via callables. You can pass any functor that fulfils the seqan3::validator and takes the value passed to the add_(positional_)option function call as a parameter. We provide some commonly used functor that might come in handy:

Enumeration Type Documentation

◆ option_spec

Used to further specify argument_parser options/flags.

All options and flags are set to option_spec::DEFAULT unless specified otherwise by the developer, e.g. when calling argument_parser::add_option().

int main(int argc, const char ** argv)
{
seqan3::argument_parser myparser{"Test", argc, argv};
std::string myvar{"Example"};
myparser.add_option(myvar, 's', "special-op", "You know what you doin'?",
}
Enumerator
DEFAULT 

The default were no checking or special displaying is happening.

REQUIRED 

Set an option as required if you want to enforce that the user supplies this option when calling the program via the command line. If the option is missing, the argument_parser will automatically detect this and throw a invalid_argument exception.

ADVANCED 

Set an option/flag to advanced if you do not want the option to be displayed in the normal help page (-h/--help). Instead, the advanced options are only displayed when calling -hh/--advanced-help

HIDDEN 

Set an option/flag to hidden, if you want to completely hide it from the user. It will never appear on the help page nor any export format. For example, this can be useful for debugging reasons. (e.g. "A tool for mapping reads to the genome").

Function Documentation

◆ operator|()

template<validator validator1_type, validator validator2_type>
auto seqan3::operator| ( validator1_type &&  vali1,
validator2_type &&  vali2 
)

Enables the chaining of validators.

Template Parameters
validator1_typeThe type of the fist validator; Must satisfy the seqan3::validator and the same option_value_type as the second validator type.
validator2_typeThe type of the second validator; Must satisfy the seqan3::validator and the same option_value_type as the fist validator type.
Parameters
[in]vali1The first validator to chain.
[in]vali2The second validator to chain.
Returns
A new validator that tests a value for both vali1 and vali2.

The pipe operator is the AND operation for two validators, which means that a value must pass both validators in order to be accepted by the new validator.

For example you may want a file name that only accepts absolute paths but also must have one out of some given file extensions. For this purpose you can chain a seqan3::regex_validator to a seqan3::input_file_validator like this:

int main(int argc, const char ** argv)
{
seqan3::argument_parser myparser{"Test", argc, argv}; // initialize
std::string file_name;
seqan3::regex_validator absolute_path_validator{"(/[^/]+)+/.*\\.[^/\\.]+$"};
seqan3::input_file_validator my_file_ext_validator{{"sa", "so"}};
myparser.add_option(file_name, 'f', "file","Give me a file name with an absolute path.",
seqan3::option_spec::DEFAULT, absolute_path_validator | my_file_ext_validator);
// an exception will be thrown if the user specifies a file name
// that is not an absolute path or does not have one of the file extension [sa,so]
try
{
myparser.parse();
}
catch (seqan3::argument_parser_error const & ext) // the user did something wrong
{
std::cerr << "[PARSER ERROR] " << ext.what() << "\n"; // customize your error message
return -1;
}
std::cout << "filename given by user passed validation: " << file_name << "\n";
return 0;
}

You can chain as many validators as you want which will be evaluated one after the other from left to right (first to last).

Variable Documentation

◆ enumeration_names

template<typename option_type >
auto const seqan3::enumeration_names = detail::adl_only::enumeration_names_fn<option_type>{}()
inline

Return a conversion map from std::string_view to option_type.

Template Parameters
your_typeType of the value to retrieve the conversion map for.
Parameters
valueThe value is not used, just its type.
Returns
A std::unordered_map<std::string_view, your_type> that maps a string identifier to a value of your_type.

This is a function object. Invoke it with the parameter(s) specified above.

It acts as a wrapper and looks for two possible implementations (in this order):

  1. A static member enumeration_names in seqan3::custom::argument_parsing<your_type> that is of type std::unordered_map<std::string_view, your_type>>.
  2. A free function enumeration_names(your_type const a) in the namespace of your type (or as friend) which returns a std::unordered_map<std::string_view, your_type>>.

Example

If you are working on a type in your own namespace, you should implement a free function like this:

namespace foo
{
enum class bar
{
one,
two,
three
};
// Specialise a mapping from an identifying string to the respective value of your type bar.
{
return std::unordered_map<std::string_view, bar>{{"one", bar::one}, {"two", bar::two}, {"three", bar::three}};;
}
} // namespace foo
int main(int argc, char const * argv[])
{
foo::bar value{};
seqan3::argument_parser parser{"my_program", argc, argv};
// Because of the enumeration_names function
// you can now add an option that takes a value of type bar:
parser.add_option(value, 'f', "foo", "Give me a foo value.", seqan3::option_spec::DEFAULT,
seqan3::value_list_validator{(seqan3::enumeration_names<foo::bar> | seqan3::views::get<1>)});
try
{
parser.parse();
}
catch (seqan3::argument_parser_error const & ext) // the user did something wrong
{
std::cerr << "[PARSER ERROR] " << ext.what() << "\n"; // customize your error message
return -1;
}
}

Only if you cannot access the namespace of your type to customize you may specialize the seqan3::custom::argument_parsing struct like this:

#include <system_error>
namespace seqan3::custom
{
// Specialise the seqan3::custom::argument_parsing data structure to enable parsing of std::errc.
template <>
struct argument_parsing<std::errc>
{
// Specialise a mapping from an identifying string to the respective value of your type Foo.
{
{"no_error", std::errc{}},
{"timed_out", std::errc::timed_out},
{"invalid_argument", std::errc::invalid_argument},
{"io_error", std::errc::io_error}
};
};
} // namespace seqan3::custom
int main(int argc, char const * argv[])
{
std::errc value{};
seqan3::argument_parser parser{"my_program", argc, argv};
// Because of the argument_parsing struct and
// the static member function enumeration_names
// you can now add an option that takes a value of type std::errc:
parser.add_option(value, 'e', "errc", "Give me a std::errc value.", seqan3::option_spec::DEFAULT,
seqan3::value_list_validator{(seqan3::enumeration_names<std::errc> | std::views::values)});
try
{
parser.parse();
}
catch (seqan3::argument_parser_error const & ext) // the user did something wrong
{
std::cerr << "[PARSER ERROR] " << ext.what() << "\n"; // customize your error message
return -1;
}
return 0;
}

Customisation point

This is a customisation point (see Customisation). To specify the behaviour for your own type, simply provide one of the two functions specified above.

debug_stream.hpp
Provides seqan3::debug_stream and related types.
std::string
seqan3::regex_validator
A validator that checks if a matches a regular expression pattern.
Definition: validators.hpp:851
system_error
seqan3::argument_parser
The SeqAn command line parser.
Definition: argument_parser.hpp:154
std::vector
seqan3::argument_parser::add_option
void add_option(option_type &value, char const short_id, std::string const &long_id, std::string const &desc, option_spec const spec=option_spec::DEFAULT, validator_type option_validator=validator_type{})
Adds an option to the seqan3::argument_parser.
Definition: argument_parser.hpp:237
seqan3::DEFAULT
@ DEFAULT
The default were no checking or special displaying is happening.
Definition: auxiliary.hpp:234
std::cerr
all.hpp
Meta-header for the views submodule .
filesystem
This header includes C++17 filesystem support and imports it into namespace std::filesystem (independ...
std::cout
seqan3::input_file_validator
A validator that checks if a given path is a valid input file.
Definition: validators.hpp:484
seqan3::value_list_validator
A validator that checks whether a value is inside a list of valid values.
Definition: validators.hpp:177
seqan3::enumeration_names
auto const enumeration_names
Return a conversion map from std::string_view to option_type.
Definition: auxiliary.hpp:155
std::errc
ranges
Adaptations of concepts from the Ranges TS.
all.hpp
Meta-Header for the argument parser module.
std
SeqAn specific customisations in the standard namespace.
seqan3::argument_parser_error
Argument parser exception that is thrown whenever there is an error while parsing the command line ar...
Definition: exceptions.hpp:49
seqan3::debug_stream
debug_stream_type debug_stream
A global instance of seqan3::debug_stream_type.
Definition: debug_stream.hpp:42
seqan3::ADVANCED
@ ADVANCED
Definition: auxiliary.hpp:240
std::unordered_map
std::runtime_error::what
T what(T... args)
seqan3::custom
A namespace for third party and standard library specialisations of SeqAn customisation points.
Definition: char.hpp:44
get.hpp
Provides seqan3::views::get.