zconfig 1.1.3

zconfig

zconfig is a library that easily serializes and deserializes config files or directly provide them through the command line based on a given annotated struct.

The library provides annotations which are used on plain old data structs which give them information such as descriptions or other shortnames.

The actual parsing is not done by this library but is directly feeded into D's getopt function. This library just parses a config file and generates arguments for getopt out of them.

The benefit by using getopt is that you essentially synchronize the command line arguments and the config file options with just one struct.

Annotations

API

Additional information is written inside the source. Run dub build docs to view them in html format.

Usage

Basic example

struct MyConfig
{
    @ConfigFile @Short("c") @Desc("Read this config file instead of the default.")
    string configFile;
    @Desc("My number.")
    int number;
    @Desc("My bool.")
    bool toggle;

    @Section("service")
    {
        @Required @Short("host") @Desc("Hostname of the service.")
        string hostname = "localhost";
        @Required @Short("p") @Desc("Port of the service.")
        int port = 1234;
    }
}

enum usage = "My program version 1.0 does things.";

int main(string[] args)
{
    string[] configArgs = getConfigArguments!MyConfig("myconf.conf", args);

    if (configArgs.length > 0)
    {
        import std.array : insertInPlace;

        // Prepend them into the command line args
        args.insertInPlace(1, configArgs);
    }

    MyConfig conf;
    bool helpWanted = false;

    import std.getopt : GetOptException;
    try
    {
        conf = initializeConfig!(MyConfig, usage)(args, helpWanted);
    }
    catch (GetOptException e)
    {
        import std.stdio : stderr;
        stderr.writefln("Invalid argument: %s", e.msg);
        return 1;
    }

    if (helpWanted)
    {
        return 0;
    }
}

Generate example config file

int main(string[] args)
{
    writeExampleConfigFile!MyConfig("myconf.conf");
    return 0;
}

myconf.conf will have the following content:

; My number.
; Default value: 0
;number=0

; My bool.
; Default value: false
;toggle=false

[service]
; Hostname of the service.
; Default value: localhost
;hostname=localhost

; Port of the service.
; Default value: 1234
;port=1234

Handler/Callback example

It is possible to define a custom handler to set a config struct member. The following restrictions apply on the handler function:

• Have two parameters.
• The first parameter is the string value as given through args and must therefore have type string.
• The second parameter must be declared ref or out and must have the same type as the config member. This is the config struct's variable the handler is supposed to set.

Here is an example that parses a string (provided through a config file or the CLI arguments) and extracts the x and y coordinate to set for the config struct.

struct Point
{
    int x;
    int y;
}

void pointHandler(string value, out Point confValue)
{
    import std.string : split;
    import std.conv : to;
    auto segments = value.split("x");

    confValue.x = segments[0].to!int;
    confValue.y = segments[1].to!int;
}

struct MyConfig
{
    @Desc("Defines a point") @Handler!pointHandler
    Point coordinate;
}

Calling the program with e.g. ./myapp --coordinate=20x62 will call the pointHandler with value="20x62". It will then get split and the respective fields are set with the resulting config file having MyConfig.coordinate.x = 20 and MyConfig.coordinate.y = 62.