Chris, Could you please give some info on this. I must say your answer perplexed me and I don't understand what you mean.
AppConfig has the ability to read configuration from the program, external .ini-style files, and the command line in a mostly uniform fashion. If you use it in a "use strict" sort of way you define all of the variables and it whines if any are missing. It allows types to be defined in classical getopt style or programatically. If you wanted to do a database lookup to verify a valid command line paramater it "could" be done. This is all very handy IMHO. We passed this paradigm along to one of my clients, the National Weather Service. One of their staff coders/weather doods (Mark Fenbers, cool guy) said "hey, why can't we print usage statements" based off what AppConfig was being told. Given how many options some of their scripts have and new ones being added regularly it was a hassle to maintain the usage output in coordination with the options spec'd and implemented for AppConfig. So I've been working on contacting Andy Lester to see if he'd approve of such a change, but Andy's apparently really slammed so the conversation hasn't made it too far yet.
Makes sense now? :)
-- </chris>
The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, and wiser people so full of doubts. -Bertrand Russell, philosopher, mathematician, author, Nobel laureate (1872-1970)
