Hi all, I tried with the example Peter gave me, and it works. But only when the options are boolean. At least, that is my conclusion with experimenting. I'll elaborate:
The code to create 'mutually exclusive options': option_names = [ "l", "o" , "s" ] toggled_options = [name for name in option_names if getattr(opts, name)] if len(toggled_options) > 1: s = repr(toggled_options).strip("[]") parser.error("options %s are mutually exclusive" % s) The options: parser = optparse.OptionParser() parser.add_option('-l', help='Show optionset list', dest='l', action='store_true' ) parser.add_option('-o', help='Show content of optionset ', dest='o', action='store') parser.add_option('-s', help='Set optionset for a host', dest='s', action='store' , nargs=2) The first option, -l, doesn't require an argument The second option, -o, does require one argument. The third option, -s does require 2 arguments. I need to add 4 more options, which all need one or more arguments. Now, when I run the program with the options defined as above, everything works, except, the 'mutually exclusive' part. Because only the -l option is set to 'true' when selected. When I modify the options to this: parser = optparse.OptionParser() parser.add_option('-l', help='Show optionset list', dest='l', action='store_true' ) parser.add_option('-o', help='Show content of optionset ', dest='o', action='store_true') parser.add_option('-s', help='Set optionset for a host', dest='s', action='store_true' , nargs=2) I get this error: # ./listopt3.py -o -l Traceback (most recent call last): File "./listopt3.py", line 8, in <module> parser.add_option('-s', help='Set optionset for a host', dest='s', action='store_true' , nargs=2) File "/usr/lib64/python2.6/optparse.py", line 1012, in add_option option = self.option_class(*args, **kwargs) File "/usr/lib64/python2.6/optparse.py", line 577, in __init__ checker(self) File "/usr/lib64/python2.6/optparse.py", line 706, in _check_nargs self) optparse.OptionError: option -s: 'nargs' must not be supplied for action 'store_true' So, apparanly, using boolean AND arguments isn't allowed. I'm still learning Python, so if someone can point me in the right direction would be great! cheers, Andy 2013/8/27 Andy Kannberg <andy.kannb...@gmail.com> > Hello Peter, > > Thanks for the example. For now I am restricted to Python 2.6, so no > argparse for me at the moment. > > cheers, > Andy > > > 2013/8/26 Peter Otten <__pete...@web.de> > >> Andy Kannberg wrote: >> >> > Hi python-guru's, >> > >> > I am new to Python, coming from a long history of Unix/linux shell >> > programming. >> > I am creating a Python script (In Python 2.6) which should be able to >> > read command line options and arguments. >> > So far, I figured out how to do that with optparse. I can add options >> (and >> > arguments ) . >> > There are about 7 options that can be selected. >> > >> > However, I can't seem to figure out how to force that only one option is >> > allowed when the script is invoked. In other words: How to restrict the >> > script to accept only one of the available options ? >> >> You have to do it manually, like in the example >> >> >> http://docs.python.org/2.6/library/optparse.html#how-optparse-handles-errors >> >> if options.a and options.b: >> parser.error("options -a and -b are mutually exclusive") >> >> which could be generalized to (untested) >> >> option_names = ["foo", "bar", "baz", ...] >> toggled_options = [name for name in option_names if getattr(options, >> name)] >> if len(toggled_options) > 1: >> s = repr(toggled_options).strip("[]") >> parser.error("options %s are mutually exclusive" % s) >> >> If you are not restricted to the standard library use >> >> https://pypi.python.org/pypi/argparse >> >> which was added to the stdlib in 2.7 and has "mutually exclusive groups", >> see >> >> http://docs.python.org/2/library/argparse.html#mutual-exclusion >> >> -- >> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list >> > >
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