My program "program.py" has the form:
if __name__=='__main__':
args = parse_args()
main_function(args)
However, if I import program.py as a module and run program.main_function, how can I pass the parsed arguments structure as an argument to the main_function?
Here is the definition of the parse_args()
def parse_args():
parser=argparse.ArgumentParser()
parser.add_argument(...)
args=parser.parse_args()
return args
If we are talking about argparse.parse_args from the standard library, just pass the list of arguments explicitly.
For example, if you call your program from the command line with these arguments:
program --verbose --mode=3 file1 file2
the shell splits the command line into five words, the program name and its four arguments. These are stored in sys.argv.
To achieve the same effect directly from Python:
args = parse_args(['--verbose', '--mode=3', 'file1' , 'file2'])
main_function(args)
UPDATE - parse_args modification:
def parse_args(arglist=None):
parser=argparse.ArgumentParser()
parser.add_argument(...)
args=parser.parse_args(arglist)
return args
Related
I have a function which requires command line arguments (with optparse), which looks something like this:
def foo():
parser = optparse.OptionParser()
parser.add_option("-i", dest="input")
parser.add_option("-o", dest="output")
(options, args) = parser.parse_args()
do_something(options.input, options.output)
return
I need to call this function from another Python script.
Does anyone know how to pass arguments to this without making use of os.system('foo -i input_path -o output_path')?
Is it possible to change your structure to incorporate function arguments? If you are calling it from another script it would make it easier.
def foo(input, output):
parser = optparse.OptionParser()
parser.add_option("-i", dest="input")
parser.add_option("-o", dest="output")
(options, args) = parser.parse_args()
if options.input:
input=options.input
if options.output:
output=options.output
do_something(input, output)
return
Otherwise you can try subprocess when calling from the other script, as that allows you to use args
I am in the bit of a weird situation where I need a Python function to run from within a script, with the script then called from my main code.
I wanted to use the subprocess module, and know how to use it to pass arguments to a pure script, but the thing is, I need to pass the arguments to the nested Python function within, most of which are optional and have default values.
I thought arparse would help me do this somehow.
Here is an example of what I am trying:
## Some Argparse, which will hopefully help
import argparse
parser = argparse.ArgumentParser()
## All arguments, with only "follow" being required
parser.add_argument('file_name', help='Name of resulting csv file')
parser.add_argument('sub_name', help='Sub-name of resulting csv file')
parser.add_argument('follow', help='Account(s) to follow', required=True)
parser.add_argument('locations', help='Locations')
parser.add_argument('languages', help='Languages')
parser.add_argument('time_limit', help='How long to keep stream open')
args = parser.parse_args()
## Actual Function
def twitter_stream_listener(file_name=None,
sub_name='stream_',
auth = api.auth,
filter_track=None,
follow=None,
locations=None,
languages=None,
time_limit=20):
... function code ...
... more function code ...
...
...
## End of script
If you are passing arguments to functions all you need to do is feed them into the function when you're executing them:
import argparse
parser = argparse.ArgumentParser()
parser.add_argument("-o", "--output_file_name", help="Name of resulting csv file")
parser.add_argument("-s", "--sub_name", default="stream_", help="Sub-name of resulting csv file")
parser.add_argument("-f", "--follow", help="Account(s) to follow", required=True)
parser.add_argument("-loc", "--locations", default=None, help="Locations")
parser.add_argument("-lan", "--languages", default=None, help="Languages")
parser.add_argument("-t", "--time_limit", default=20, help="How long to keep stream open")
options = parser.parse_args()
# then just pass in the arguments when you run the function
twitter_stream_listener(file_name=options.output_file_name,
sub_name=options.sub_name,
auth=api.auth,
filter_track=None,
follow=options.follow,
locations=options.locations,
languages=options.languages,
time_limit=options.time_limit)
# or, pass the arguments into the functions when defining your function
def twitter_stream_listener_with_args(file_name=options.output_file_name,
sub_name=options.sub_name,
auth=api.auth,
filter_track=None,
follow=options.follow,
locations=options.locations,
languages=options.languages,
time_limit=options.time_limit):
# does something
pass
# then run with default parameters
twitter_stream_listener_with_args()
You can specify defaults in the argparse section (if that is what you are trying to achieve):
#!/usr/bin/python
import argparse
parser = argparse.ArgumentParser()
parser.add_argument('--argument', default = 'something', type = str, help = 'not helpful')
parser.add_argument('--arg2', default = None, type = str, help = 'not helpful')
args = parser.parse_args()
def foo(arg , arg2 ):
print(arg)
if not arg2 is None:
print(arg2)
foo(args.argument, args.arg2)
Then calling:
$ ./test.py
something
$ ./test.py --argument='somethingelse'
somethingelse
$ ./test.py --arg2=123
something
123
$ ./test.py --arg2='ipsum' --argument='lorem'
lorem
ipsum
Is this helpful?
You can do it like that:
import argparse
## Actual Function
def twitter_stream_listener(file_name=None,
sub_name='stream_',
auth=api.auth,
filter_track=None,
follow=None,
locations=None,
languages=None,
time_limit=20):
# Your content here
if __name__ == '__main__':
parser = argparse.ArgumentParser()
## All arguments, with only "follow" being required
parser.add_argument('follow', help='Account(s) to follow')
parser.add_argument('--file_name', help='Name of resulting csv file')
parser.add_argument('--sub_name', help='Sub-name of resulting csv file')
parser.add_argument('--locations', help='Locations')
parser.add_argument('--languages', help='Languages')
parser.add_argument('--time_limit', help='How long to keep stream open')
args = parser.parse_args()
twitter_stream_listener(file_name=args.file_name, sub_name=args.sub_name, follow=args.follow,
locations=args.locations, languages=args.languages, time_limit=args.time_limit)
follow will be the only required argument and the rest optional. Optional ones have to be provided with -- at the beginning. You can easily use the module with subprocess if you need it.
Example call using command line:
python -m your_module_name follow_val --file_name sth1 --locations sth2
Is there a way to use argparse with any list of strings, instead of only with sys.argv?
Here's my problem: I have a program which looks something like this:
# This file is program1.py
import argparse
def main(argv):
parser = argparse.ArgumentParser()
# Do some argument parsing
if __name__ == '__main__':
main(sys.argv)
This works fine when this program is called straight from the command line. However, I have another python script which runs batch versions of this script with different commandline arguments, which I'm using like this:
import program1
arguments = ['arg1', 'arg2', 'arg3']
program1.main(arguments)
I still want to be able to parse the arguments, but argparse automatically defaults to using sys.argv instead of the arguments that I give it. Is there a way to pass in the argument list instead of using sys.argv?
You can pass a list of strings to parse_args:
parser.parse_args(['--foo', 'FOO'])
Just change the script to default to sys.argv[1:] and parse arguments omitting the first one (which is the name of the invoked command)
import argparse,sys
def main(argv=sys.argv[1:]):
parser = argparse.ArgumentParser()
parser.add_argument("--level", type=int)
args = parser.parse_args(argv)
if __name__ == '__main__':
main()
Or, if you cannot omit the first argument:
import argparse,sys
def main(args=None):
# if None passed, uses sys.argv[1:], else use custom args
parser = argparse.ArgumentParser()
parser.add_argument("--level", type=int)
args = parser.parse_args(args)
# Do some argument parsing
if __name__ == '__main__':
main()
Last one: if you cannot change the called program, you can still do something
Let's suppose the program you cannot change is called argtest.py (I added a call to print arguments)
Then just change the local argv value of the argtest.sys module:
import argtest
argtest.sys.argv=["dummy","foo","bar"]
argtest.main()
output:
['dummy', 'foo', 'bar']
Python argparse now has a parameter nargs for add_argument (https://docs.python/3/library/argparse.html).
It allows us to have as many arguments as we want for a named parameter (here, alist)
import argparse
parser = argparse.ArgumentParser()
parser.add_argument("--alist", nargs="*")
args = parser.parse_args()
print(args.alist)
All command line values that follow --alist are added to a list.
Example:
$ python3 argparse-01.py --alist fred barney pebbles "bamm bamm"
['fred', 'barney', 'pebbles', 'bamm bamm']
As you see, it is allowed to quote the arguments, but not necessary unless you need to protect a space.
I am trying to make use of an argument handler that I wrote using argparse from within another python script. I would like to call it by passing it a list of arguments. Here is a simple example:
def argHandler(argv):
import argparse
parser = argparse.ArgumentParser(description='Test argument parser')
parser.add_argument('foo', action='store',type=str)
parser.add_argument('bar', action='store',type=str)
parser.add_argument('-nee','--knightssaynee',action='store',type=str)
args = parser.parse_args()
return args.foo, args.bar, args.nee
if __name__=='__main__':
argList = ['arg1','arg2','-nee','arg3']
print argHandler(argList)
This returns a:
usage: scratch.py [-h] [-nee KNIGHTSSAYNEE] foo bar
scratch.py: error: too few arguments
It seems to me that the function that I define should take a list of arguments and flags, and return a namespace. Am I wrong?
You need to pass those arguments to the parser.parse_args() method:
args = parser.parse_args(argv)
From the ArgumentParser.parse_args() documentation:
ArgumentParser.parse_args(args=None, namespace=None)
[...]
By default, the argument strings are taken from sys.argv [...]
Note the args argument there. You may want to make the argv argument to your argHandler() function default to None as well; that way you don't have to pass in an argument and end up with the same default None value:
def argHandler(argv=None):
another way i get input to program is from json file with key value pair and using json load library to load contents of file as json object.
I am using optparse to get command line input.
Lets say that I am running a script demo.py and it creates some output. But unless I specify the command line input, the output is not written to a file.
I am trying to do the following:
python demo.py in command line should run the script, but not write the output anywhere.
python demo.py -o in command line should write the output to my default file name output.txt.
python demo.py -o demooutput.txt in command line should write the output to file demooutput.txt.
PS: I would not prefer to switch to argparse from optparse.
You can use optparse-callbacks to achieve this.
Here is how it wiill work for your use case.
parser.add_option("-o", action="callback", dest="output", callback=my_callback)
def my_callback(option, opt, value, parser):
if len(parser.rargs) > 0:
next_arg = parser.rargs[0]
if not next_arg.startswith("-"):
# Next argument is not another option
del parser.rargs[0]
setattr(parser.values, option.dest, next_arg)
return
# If not processed, set the default value
setattr(parser.values, option.dest, "output.txt")
I don't think there is unfortunately - the only way I can think of is hacking around the problem by adding your own logic statements. The following code should do the trick.
import re, sys
import optparse from OptionParser
usage = "usage: %prog [options] arg"
parser = OptionParser(usage)
if '-f' in argv:
a = argv.index('-f')
if (a != len(argv)-1) and re.search('[.]txt', argv[a+1]):
parser.add_option("-f", "--foo", dest="foo")
else:
parser.add_option("-f", dest="foo", action="store_true")
This doesn't answer the direct question, 'how to define an Action...', but it handles the inputs in a simple way.
Set '-o' to be 'store_true'. If True check the 'args' variable for a file name.
(options, args) = parser.parse_args()
if options.o:
if args:
dest = args[0]
else:
dest = 'output.txt'
else:
dest = ''
(In argparse the equivalent would be to define a positional argument with nargs='?'.)
If these are the only arguments, you could also get by with checking for the filename without requiring the `-o'.
Another possibility - 'store_const', with the positional 'filename' having priority:
parser = optparse.OptionParser()
parser.add_option('-o',dest='dest',action='store_const', const='output.txt', default='')
(options, args) = parser.parse_args()
if args:
options.dest = args[0]
print options