command prompter

[Terrence Enger]

On Fri, 2009-10-02 at 16:35 -0400, Christopher Browne wrote:
> On Fri, Oct 2, 2009 at 1:41 PM, Chris F.A. Johnson <chris-E7bvbYbpR6jSUeElwK9/Pw at public.gmane.org> wrote:
> > On Fri, 2 Oct 2009, Terrence Enger wrote:
> >
> >> Greetings,
> >>
> >> I am used, working on another platform, to having a tool which relieves
> >> of the need to remember command line parameters ... sort of an entry
> >> panel with brief prompts and hyperlinks to the applicable part of the
> >> man page.
> >>
> >> Is there such a tool for GNU/Linux?  Nothing applicable jumped out at me
> >> from the first hundred results of a google search for linux command
> >> prompter.
> >>
> >> If this does not already exist, is there anybody else who thinks maybe
> >> it should?  If anybody expresses an interest, I shall put together an
> >> example of what it might do for you.
> >
> >    You could do it with bash's completion functions.
> 
> The "granddaddy" of this is the zsh completion functionality...
> 
> http://zsh.sourceforge.net/Doc/Release/zsh_19.html
> 
> A significant example that I use is the completion functions for PostgreSQL...
> 
> http://www.zsh.org/mla/users/2004/msg01002.html
> 
> For instance, it encodes the arguments for the "psql" client thus:
> 
> _psql () {
>     local curcontext="$curcontext" state line expl
>     typeset -A opt_args
> 
>     _arguments -C -s \
>         "$_pgsql_common_opts[@]" \
>         {-V,--version}'[display client version]' \
>         {-a,--echo-all}'[print commands read]' \
>         {-A,--no-align}'[unaligned output mode]' \
>         {-c+,--command=}':execute SQL command:' \
>         {-d+,--dbname=}':database to connect to:_pgsql_databases' \
>         {-e,--echo-queries}'[display queries submitted]' \
>         {-E,--echo-hidden}'[display hidden queries]' \
>         {-f+,--file=}':SQL file to read:_files' \
>         {-F+,--field-separator=}':field separator char:' \
>         {-H,--html}'[HTML output]' \
>         {-l,--list}'[list databases]' \
>         {-o+,--output=}':query output:_files' \
>         {-P+,--pset=}':set psql variable:' \
>         {-q,--quiet}'[non verbose mode]' \
>         {-R+,--record-separator=}':record separator char:' \
>         {-s,--single-step}'[prompt before each query]' \
>         {-S,--single-line}'[newline sends query]' \
>         {-t,--tuples-only}'[dont display header/footer]' \
>         {-T+,--table-attr=}':HTML table options:' \
>         -u'[prompt for username/password]' \
>         {-v+,--set=,--variable=}':set SQL variable:' \
>         {-x,--expanded}'[one column per line]' \
>         {-X,--no-psqlrc}'[dont read ~/.psqlrc]' \
>         ':PostgreSQL database:_pgsql_databases' \
>         ':PostgreSQL user:_pgsql_users'
> }
> 
> As a result of the above, if you type...
> 
> psql -[tab]
> 
> it'll display (in a fairly attractive format) the list of possible
> completions of the option.

I can see that this encodes a lot of useful information.  Do these
functions come with PostgreSQL, or zsh, or what?

Cheers,
Terry.


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