7. Automated Option Processing

AutoOpts 27.4 is bundled with AutoGen. It is a tool that virtually eliminates the hassle of processing options and keeping man pages, info docs and usage text up to date. This package allows you to specify several program attributes, up to a hundred option types and many option attributes. From this, it then produces all the code necessary to parse and handle the command line and configuration file options, and the documentation that should go with your program as well. All the features notwithstanding, some applications simply have well-established command line interfaces. Even still, those programs may use the configuration file parsing portion of the library. See the "AutoOpts Features" and "Configuration File Format" sections.

7.1 AutoOpts Features

AutoOpts supports option processing; option state saving; and program documentation with innumerable features. Here, we list a few obvious ones and some important ones, but the full list is really defined by all the attributes defined in the Option Definitions section.

1. POSIX-compliant short (flag) option processing.
2. GNU-style long options processing. Long options are recognized without case sensitivity, and they may be abbreviated.
3. Environment variable initializations, See section environment variable presets.
4. Initialization from configuration files (aka RC or INI files), and saving the option state back into one, See section configuration file presets.
5. Config files may be partitioned. One config file may be used by several programs by partitioning it with lines containing, "[PROGRAM_NAME]", See section configuration file presets.
6. Options may be marked as dis-abled with a disablement prefix. Such options may default to either an enabled or a disabled state. You may also provide an enablement prefix, too, e.g., --allow-mumble and --prevent-mumble.
7. Verify that required options are present between the minimum and maximum number of times on the command line.
8. Verify that conflicting options do not appear together, and that options that require the presence of other options are, in fact, used in the presence of other options.
9. Provides a callable routine to parse a text string as if it were from one of the rc/ini/config files, hereafter referred to as a configuration file.
10. --help and --version are automatically supported. --more-help will page the generated help.
11. By adding a `doc' and `arg-name' attributes to each option, AutoGen will also be able to produce a man page and the `invoking' section of a texinfo document.
12. Insert the option processing state into Scheme-defined variables. Thus, Guile based applications that are linked with private main() routines can take advantage of all of AutoOpts' functionality.
13. Various forms of main procedures can be added to the output, See section Generating main procedures. There are four basic forms:
    1. A program that processes the arguments and writes to standard out portable shell commands containing the digested options.
    2. A program that will generate portable shell commands to parse the defined options. The expectation is that this result will be copied into a shell script and used there.
    3. A "for-each" main that will invoke a named function once for either each non-option argument on the command line or, if there are none, then once for each non-blank, non-comment input line read from stdin.
    4. A main procedure of your own design. Its code can be supplied in the option description template or by incorporating another template.
14. Library suppliers can specify command line options that their client programs will accept. They specify option definitions that get #include-d into the client option definitions and they specify an "anchor" option that has a callback and must be invoked. That will give the library access to the option state for their options.
15. The generated usage text can be emitted in either AutoOpts standard format (maximizing the information about each option), or GNU-ish normal form. The default form is selected by either specifying or not specifying the gnu-usage attribute (see section Program Information Attributes). This can be overridden by the user himself with the AUTOOPTS_USAGE environment variable. If it exists and is set to the string gnu, it will force GNU-ish style format; if it is set to the string autoopts, it will force AutoOpts standard format; otherwise, it will have no effect.
16. If you compile with ENABLE_NLS defined and _() defined to a localization function such as gettext(3GNU), then the option processing code will be localizable (see section Internationalizing AutoOpts).
17. Intermingled option processing. AutoOpts options may be intermingled with command line operands and options processed with other parsing techniques. This is accomplished by setting the allow-errors (see section Program Description Attributes) attribute. When processing reaches a point where optionProcess (see section optionProcess) needs to be called again, the current option can be set with RESTART_OPT(n) (see section RESTART_OPT( n ) - Resume Option Processing) before calling optionProcess.

    See: See section Options for Library Code.

18. library options. An AutoOpt-ed library may export its options for use in an AutoOpt-ed program. This is done by providing an option definition file that client programs #include into their own option definitions. See "AutoOpt-ed Library for AutoOpt-ed Program" (see section AutoOpt-ed Library for AutoOpt-ed Program) for more details.

7.2 AutoOpts Licensing

When AutoGen is installed, the AutoOpts project is installed with it. AutoOpts includes various AutoGen templates and a pair of shared libraries. These libraries may be used under the terms of the GNU Lesser General Public License (LGPL).

One of these libraries (libopts) is needed by programs that are built using AutoOpts generated code. This library is available as a separate "tear-off" source tarball. It is redistributable for use under either of two licenses: The GNU Lesser General Public License ("Lesser" meaning you have greater license with it and may link it into commercial programs), and the advertising-clause-free BSD license. Both of these license terms are incorporated into appropriate COPYING files included with the libopts source tarball. This source may be incorporated into your package with the following simple commands:

rm -rf libopts libopts-*
gunzip -c `autoopts-config libsrc` | \
   tar -xvf -
mv libopts-*.*.* libopts

View the `libopts/README' file for further integration information.

7.3 Quick Start

Since it is generally easier to start with a simple example than it is to look at the options that AutoGen uses itself, here is a very simple AutoOpts example. You can copy this example out of the Info file and into a source file to try it. You can then embellish it into what you really need. For more extensive examples, you can also examine the help output and option definitions for the commands columns, getdefs and autogen itself.

For our simple example, assume you have a program named check that takes two options:

1. A list of directories to check over for whatever it is check does. You want this option available as a POSIX-style flag option and a GNU long option. You want to allow as many of these as the user wishes.
2. An option to show or not show the definition tree being used. Only one occurrence is to be allowed, specifying one or the other.

First, specify your program attributes and its options to AutoOpts, as with the following example.

AutoGen Definitions options;
prog-name     = check;
prog-title    = "Checkout Automated Options";
long-opts;

main = { main-type = shell-process; };

flag = {
    name      = check-dirs;
    value     = L;        /* flag style option character */
    arg-type  = string;   /* option argument indication  */
    max       = NOLIMIT;  /* occurrence limit (none)     */
    stack-arg;            /* save opt args in a stack    */
    descrip   = "Checkout directory list";
};

flag = {
    name      = show_defs;
    descrip   = "Show the definition tree";
    disable   = dont;     /* mark as enable/disable type */
                          /* option.  Disable as `dont-' */
};

Then perform the following steps:

1. cflags="-DTEST_CHECK_OPTS `autoopts-config cflags`"
2. ldflags="`autoopts-config ldflags`"
3. autogen checkopt.def
4. cc -o check -g ${cflags} checkopt.c ${ldflags}
5. ./check --help

Running those commands yields:

check - Checkout Automated Options
USAGE:  check [ -<flag> [<val>] | --<name>[{=| }<val>] ]...
  Flg Arg Option-Name    Description
   -L Str check-dirs     Checkout directory list
                                - may appear multiple times
      no  show-defs      Show the definition tree
                                - disabled as --dont-show-defs
   -? no  help           Display usage information and exit
   -! no  more-help      Extended usage information passed thru pager

Options are specified by doubled hyphens and their name
or by a single hyphen and the flag character.

Normally, however, you would compile `checkopt.c' as in:

cc -o checkopt.o -I$prefix/include -c checkopt.c

and link `checkopt.o' with the rest of your program. The main program causes the options to be processed by calling optionProcess (see section optionProcess):

main( int argc, char** argv )
{
  {
    int optct = optionProcess( &checkOptions, argc, argv );
    argc -= optct;
    argv += optct;
  }

The options are tested and used as in the following fragment. "ENABLED_OPT" is used instead of "HAVE_OPT" for the show-defs option because it is an enabled/disabled option type:

  if (  ENABLED_OPT( SHOW_DEFS )
     && HAVE_OPT( CHECK_DIRS )) {
    int    dirct = STACKCT_OPT( CHECK_DIRS );
    char** dirs  = STACKLST_OPT( CHECK_DIRS );
    while (dirct-- > 0) {
      char* dir = *dirs++;
      ...

A lot of magic happens to make this happen. The rest of this chapter will describe the myriad of option attributes supported by AutoOpts. However, keep in mind that, in general, you won't need much more than what was described in this "quick start" section.

7.4 Multi-Threading

AutoOpts was designed to configure a program for running. This generally happens before much real work has been started. Consequently, it is expected to be run before multi-threaded applications have started multiple threads. However, this is not always the case. Some applications may need to reset and reload their running configuration, and some may use SET_OPT_xxx() macros during processing. If you need to dynamically change your option configuration in your multi-threaded application, it is your responsibility to prevent all threads from accessing the option configuration state, except the one altering the configuration.

The various accessor macros (HAVE_OPT(), etc.) do not modify state and are safe to use in a multi-threaded application. It is safe as long as no other thread is concurrently modifying state, of course.

7.5 Option Definitions

AutoOpts uses an AutoGen definitions file for the definitions of the program options and overall configuration attributes. The complete list of program and option attributes is quite extensive, so if you are reading to understand how to use AutoOpts, I recommend reading the "Quick Start" section (see section Quick Start) and paying attention to the following:

1. prog-name, prog-title, and argument, program attributes, See section Program Description Attributes.
2. name and descrip option attributes, See section Required Attributes.
3. value (flag character) and min (occurrence counts) option attributes, See section Common Option Attributes.
4. arg-type from the option argument specification section, See section Option Argument Specification.
5. Read the overall how to, See section Using AutoOpts.
6. Highly recommended, but not required, are the several "man" and "info" documentation attributes, See section Man and Info doc Attributes.

Keep in mind that the majority are rarely used and can be safely ignored. However, when you have special option processing requirements, the flexibility is there.

7.5.1 Program Description Attributes

The following global definitions are used to define attributes of the entire program. These generally alter the configuration or global behavior of the AutoOpts option parser. The first two are required of every program. The rest have been alphabetized. Except as noted, there may be only one copy of each of these definitions:

`prog-name'

This attribute is required. Variable names derived from this name are derived using string->c_name! (see section `string->c-name!' - map non-name chars to underscore).

`prog-title'

This attribute is required and may be any descriptive text.

`allow-errors'

The presence of this attribute indicates ignoring any command line option errors. This may also be turned on and off by invoking the macros ERRSKIP_OPTERR and ERRSTOP_OPTERR from the generated interface file.

`argument'

Specifies the syntax of the arguments that follow the options. It may not be empty, but if it is not supplied, then option processing must consume all the arguments. If it is supplied and starts with an open bracket ([), then there is no requirement on the presence or absence of command line arguments following the options. Lastly, if it is supplied and does not start with an open bracket, then option processing must not consume all of the command line arguments.

`environrc'

Indicates looking in the environment for values of variables named, PROGRAM_OPTNAME or PROGRAM, where PROGRAM is the upper cased C-name of the program and OPTNAME is the upper cased C-name of a specific option.

`export'

This string is inserted into the .h interface file. Generally used for global variables or #include directives required by flag_code text and shared with other program text. Do not specify your configuration header (`config.h') in this attribute or the include attribute, however. Instead, use config-header, below.

`config-header'

The contents of this attribute should be just the name of the configuration file. A "#include" naming this file will be inserted at the top of the generated header.

`homerc'

Specifies either a directory or a file using a specific path (like . or `/usr/local/share/progname') or an environment variable (like `$HOME/rc/' or `$PREFIX/share/progname') or the directory where the executable was found (`$$[/...]') to use to try to find the rcfile. Use as many as you like. The presence of this attribute activates the --save-opts and --load-opts options. See section configuration file presets.

`include'

This string is inserted into the .c file. Generally used for global variables required only by flag_code program text.

`long-opts'

Presence indicates GNU-standard long option processing. If any options do not have an option value (flag character) specified, and least one does specify such a value, then you must specify long-opts. If none of your options specify an option value (flag character) and you do not specify long-opts, then command line arguments are processed in "named option mode". This means that:

• Every command line argument must be a long option.
• The flag markers - and -- are completely optional.
• The argument program attribute is disallowed.
• One of the options may be specified as the default (as long as it has a required option argument).

`prefix'

This value is inserted into all global names. This will disambiguate them if more than one set of options are to be compiled into a single program.

`rcfile'

Specifies the configuration file name. This is only useful if you have provided at least one homerc attribute. default: .<prog-name>rc

`version'

Specifies the program version and activates the VERSION option, See section Automatically Supported Options.

`guard-option-names'

AutoOpts generates macros that presume that there are no cpp macros with the same name as the option name. For example, if you have an option named, debug, then you must not use #ifdef DEBUG in your code. If you specify this attribute, every option name will be guarded. If the name is #define-d, then a warning will be issued and the name undefined. If you do not specify this and there is a conflict, you will get strange error messages.

This will produce code that will warn you when conflicts get hidden. The builder of your program may suppress these warnings by adding this define to the compile command line:

-DNO_OPTION_NAME_WARNINGS

7.5.2 Options for Library Code

Some libraries provide their own code for processing command line options, and this may be used by programs that utilize AutoOpts. You may also wish to write a library that gets configured with AutoOpts options and config files. Such a library may either supply its own configury routine and process its own options, or it may export its option descriptions to programs that also use AutoOpts. This section will describe how to do all of these different things.

7.5.2.1 AutoOpt-ed Library for AutoOpt-ed Program

The library source code must provide an option definition file that consists of only the flag entries. The first flag entry must contain the following attributes:

`name'

This name is used in the construction of a global pointer of type tOptDesc const*. It is always required.

`documentation'

It tells AutoOpts that this option serves no normal purpose. It will be used to add usage clarity and to locate option descriptors in the library code.

`descrip'

This is a string that is inserted in the extended usage display before the options specific to the current library. It is always required.

`lib-name'

This should match the name of the library. This string is also used in the construction of the option descriptor pointer name. In the end, it looks like this:

extern tOptDesc const* <<lib-name>>_<<name>>_optDesc_p;

and is used in the macros generated for the library's .h file.

In order to compile this AutoOpts using library, you must create a special header that is not used by the client program. This is accomplished by creating an option definition file that contains essentially exactly the following:

AutoGen definitions options;
prog-name  = does-not-matter;  // but is always required
prog-title = 'also does not matter';  // also required
config-header = 'config.h'; // optional, but common
library;
#include library-options-only.def

and nothing else. AutoGen will produce only the .h file. You may now compile your library, referencing just this .h file. The macros it creates will utilize a global variable that will be defined by the AutoOpts-using client program. That program will need to have the following #include in its option definition file:

#include library-options-only.def

All the right things will magically happen so that the global variables named <<lib-name>>_<<name>>_optDesc_p are initialized correctly. For an example, please see the AutoOpts test script: `autoopts/test/library.test'.

7.5.2.2 AutoOpt-ed Library for Regular Program

In this case, your library must provide an option processing function to a calling program. This is accomplished by setting the allow-errors global option attribute. Each time your option handling function is called, you must determine where your scan is to resume and tell the AutoOpts library by invoking:

RESTART_OPT(next_arg_index);

and then invoke not_opt_index = optionProcess(...). The not_opt_index value can be used to set optind, if that is the global being used to scan the program argument array.

In this method, do NOT utilize the global library attribute. Your library must specify its options as if it were a complete program. You may choose to specify an alternate usage() function so that usage for other parts of the option interface may be displayed as well. See "Program Information Attributes" (see section Program Information Attributes).

At the moment, there is no method for calling optionUsage() telling it to produce just the information about the options and not the program as a whole. Some later revision after somebody asks.

7.5.2.3 AutoOpt-ed Program Calls Regular Library

As with providing an AutoOpt-ed library to a non-AutoOpt-ed program, you must write the option description file as if you were writing all the options for the program, but you should specify the allow-errors global option attribute and you will likely want an alternate usage() function (see "Program Information Attributes" see section Program Information Attributes). In this case, though, when optionProcess() returns, you need to test to see if there might be library options. If there might be, then call the library's exported routine for handling command line options, set the next-option-to-process with the RESTART_OPT() macro, and recall optionProcess(). Repeat until done.

7.5.3 Generating main procedures

When AutoOpts generates the code to parse the command line options, it has the ability to produce any of several types of main() procedures. This is done by specifying a global structured value for main. The values that it contains are dependent on the value set for the one value it must have: main-type.

The recognized values for main-type are:

Here is an example of an include variation:

main = {
  main-type = include;
  tpl       = "main-template.tpl";
};

7.5.3.1 guile: main and inner_main procedures

When the main-type is specified to be guile, a main() procedure is generated that calls gh_enter(), providing it with a generated inner_main() to invoke. If you must perform certain tasks before calling gh_enter(), you may specify such code in the value for the before-guile-boot attribute.

The inner_main() procedure itself will process the command line arguments (by calling optionProcess(), see section optionProcess), and then either invoke the code specified with the guile-main attribute, or else export the parsed options to Guile symbols and invoke the scm_shell() function from the Guile library. This latter will render the program nearly identical to the stock guile(1) program.

7.5.3.2 shell-process: emit Bourne shell results

This will produce a main() procedure that parses the command line options and emits to stdout Bourne shell commands that puts the option state into environment variables. This can be used within a shell script as follows:

unset OPTION_CT
eval "`opt_parser \"$@\"`"
test -z "${OPTION_CT}" && exit 1
test ${OPTION_CT} -gt 0 && shift ${OPTION_CT}

If the option parsing code detects an error or a request for usage, it will not emit an assignment to OPTION_CT and the script should just exit. If the options are set consistently, then something along the lines of the following will be written to stdout and evaled:

    OPTION_CT=4
    export OPTION_CT
    MYPROG_SECOND='first'
    export MYPROG_SECOND
    MYPROG_ANOTHER=1 # 0x1
    export MYPROG_ANOTHER

If the arguments are to be reordered, however, then the resulting set of operands will be emitted and OPTION_CT gets set to zero. For example, the following would be appended to the above:

    set -- 'operand1' 'operand2' 'operand3'
    OPTION_CT=0

OPTION_CT is set to zero since it is not necessary to shift off any options.

7.5.3.3 shell-parser: emit Bourne shell script

This will produce a main() procedure that emits a shell script that will parse the command line options. That script can be emitted to stdout or inserted or substituted into a pre-existing shell script file. Improbable markers are used to identify previously inserted parsing text:

# # # # # # # # # # -- do not modify this marker --

The program is also pretty insistent upon starting its parsing script on the second line.

7.5.3.4 main: user supplied main procedure

You must supply a value for the main-text attribute. You may also supply a value for option-code. If you do, then the optionProcess invocation will not be emitted into the code. AutoOpts will wrap the main-text inside of:

int
main( int argc, char** argv )
{
    {
        int ct = optionProcess( &<<prog-name>>Options, argc, argv );
        argc -= ct;
        argv += ct;
    }
<<your text goes here>>
}

so you can most conveniently set the value with a "here string" (see section A Here String):

code = <<- _EndOfMainProc_
	<<your text goes here>>
	_EndOfMainProc_;

7.5.3.5 include: code emitted from included template

You must write a template to produce your main procedure. You specify the name of the template with the tpl attribute and it will be incorporated at the point where AutoOpts is ready to emit the main() procedure.

This can be very useful if, in your working environment, you have many programs with highly similar main() procedures. All you need to do is parameterize the variations and specify which variant is needed within the main AutoOpts specification. Since you are coding the template for this, the attributes needed for this variation would be dictated by your template.

7.5.3.6 invoke: code emitted from AutoGen macro

You must write a template to produce your main procedure. That template must contain a definition for the function specified with the func attribute to this main() procedure specification. Typically, this template will be incorporated by using the --lib-template option (see section lib-template option (-l)) in the AutoGen invocation. Otherwise, this variation operates in much the same way as "include" (see section include: code emitted from included template) method.

7.5.3.7 for-each: perform function on each argument

This produces a main procedure that invokes a procedure once for each operand on the command line (non-option arguments), OR once for each non-blank, non-comment stdin input line. Leading and trailing white space is trimmed from the input line and comment lines are lines that are empty or begin with a comment character, defaulting to a hash ('#') character.

NB: The argument program attribute (see section Program Description Attributes) must begin with the [ character, to indicate that there are command operands, but that they are optional.

There are a number of attributes to main that may be used:

handler-proc

This attribute is required. It is used to name the procedure to call. That procedure is presumed to be external, but if you provide the code for it, then the procedure is emitted as a static procedure in the generated code.

This procedure should return 0 on success, a cumulative error code on warning and exit without returning on an unrecoverable error. As the cumulative warning codes are or-ed together, the codes should be some sort of bit mask in order to be ultimately decipherable (if you need to do that).

If the called procedure needs to cause a fail-exit, it is expected to call exit(3) directly. If you want to cause a warning exit code, then this handler function should return a non-zero status. That value will be OR-ed into a result integer for computing the final exit code. E.g., here is part of the emitted code:

int res = 0; if (argc > 0) { do { res |= my_handler( *(argv++) ); } while (--argc > 0); } else { ...

handler-type

If you do not supply this attribute, your handler procedure must be the default type. The profile of the procedure must be:

int my_handler( char const *pz_entry );

However, if you do supply this attribute, you may select any of three alternate flavors:

`name-of-file'

This is essentially the same as the default handler type, except that before your procedure is invoked, the generated code has verified that the string names an existing file. The profile is unchanged.

`file-X'

Before calling your procedure, the file is f-opened according to the "X", where "X" may be any of the legal modes for fopen(3C). In this case, the profile for your procedure must be:

int my_handler( char const* pz_fname, FILE* entry_fp );

`text-of-file'

`some-text-of-file'

Before calling your procedure, the contents of the file are read into memory. (Excessively large files may cause problems.) The "`some-text-of-file'" disallows empty files. Both require regular files. In this case, the profile for your procedure must be:

int my_handler( char const* pz_fname, char* file_text, size_t text_size );

Note that though the file_text is not const, any changes made to it are not written back to the original file. It is merely a memory image of the file contents. Also, the memory allocated to hold the text is text_size + 1 bytes long and the final byte is always NUL. The file contents need not be text, as the data are read with the read(2) system call.

my_handler-code

With this attribute, you provide the code for your handler procedure in the option definition file. In this case, your main() procedure specification might look something like this:

main = { main-type = for-each; handler-proc = my_handler; my_handler-code = <<- EndOfMyCode /* whatever you want to do */ EndOfMyCode; };

and instead of an emitted external reference, a procedure will be emitted that looks like this:

static int my_handler( char const* pz_entry ) { int res = 0; <<my_handler-code goes here>> return res; }

main-init

This is code that gets inserted after the options have been processed, but before the handler procs get invoked.

main-fini

This is code that gets inserted after all the entries have been processed, just before returning from main().

comment-char

If you wish comment lines to start with a character other than a hash (#) character, then specify one character with this attribute. If that character is the NUL byte, then only blank lines will be considered comments.

7.5.4 Program Information Attributes

These attributes are used to define how and what information is displayed to the user of the program.

`copyright'

The copyright is a structured value containing three to five values. If copyright is used, then the first three are required.

1. `date' - the list of applicable dates for the copyright.
2. `owner' - the name of the copyright holder.
3. `type' - specifies the type of distribution license. AutoOpts/AutoGen will automatically support the text of the GNU Public License (`GPL'), the GNU General Public License with Library extensions (`LGPL'), the Free BSD license (`BSD'), and a write-it-yourself copyright notice (`NOTE'). Only these values are recognized.
4. `text' - the text of the copyright notice. It is only needed if `type' is set to `NOTE'.
5. `author' - in case the author name is to appear in the documentation and is different from the copyright owner.
6. `eaddr' - email address for receiving praises and complaints. Typically that of the author or copyright holder.

An example of this might be:

copyright = { date = "1992-2004"; owner = "Bruce Korb"; eaddr = 'bkorb@gnu.org'; type = GPL; };

`detail'

This string is added to the usage output when the HELP option is selected.

`explain'

Gives additional information whenever the usage routine is invoked..

`package'

The name of the package the program belongs to. This will appear parenthetically after the program name in the version and usage output, e.g.: autogen (GNU autogen) - The Automated Program Generator.

`preserve-case'

This attribute will not change anything except appearance. Normally, the option names are all documented in lower case. However, if you specify this attribute, then they will display in the case used in their specification. Command line options will still be matched without case sensitivity.

`prog-desc and'

`opts-ptr'

These define global pointer variables that point to the program descriptor and the first option descriptor for a library option. This is intended for use by certain libraries that need command line and/or initialization file option processing. These definitions have no effect on the option template output, but are used for creating a library interface file. Normally, the first "option" for a library will be a documentation option that cannot be specified on the command line, but is marked as settable. The library client program will invoke the SET_OPTION macro which will invoke a handler function that will finally set these global variables.

`usage'

Optionally names the usage procedure, if the library routine optionUsage() does not work for you. If you specify my_usage as the value of this attribute, for example, you will use a procedure by that name for displaying usage. Of course, you will need to provide that procedure and it must conform to this profile:

void my_usage( tOptions* pOptions, int exitCode )

`gnu-usage'

Normally, the default format produced by the optionUsage procedure is AutoOpts Standard. By specifying this attribute, the default format will be GNU-ish style. Either default may be overridden by the user with the AUTOOPTS_USAGE environment variable. If it is set to gnu or autoopts, it will alter the style appropriately. This attribute will conflict with the usage attribute.

`reorder-args'

Some applications traditionally require that the command operands be intermixed with the command options. In order to handle that, the arguments must be reordered. If you are writing such an application, specify this global option. All of the options (and any associated option arguments) will be brought to the beginning of the argument list. New applications should not use this feature, if at all possible. This feature is disabled if POSIXLY_CORRECT is defined in the environment.

7.5.5 Option Attributes

For each option you wish to specify, you must have a block macro named flag defined. There are two required attributes: name and descrip. If any options do not have a value (traditional flag character) attribute, then the long-opts program attribute must also be defined. As a special exception, if no options have a value and long-opts is not defined and argument is not defined, then all arguments to the program are named options. In this case, the - and -- command line option markers are optional.

7.5.5.1 Required Attributes

Every option must have exactly one copy of both of these attributes.

`name'

Long name for the option. Even if you are not accepting long options and are only accepting flags, it must be provided. AutoOpts generates private, named storage that requires this name. This name also causes a #define-d name to be emitted. It must not conflict with any other names you may be using in your program.

For example, if your option name is, debug or munged-up, you must not use the #define names DEBUG (or MUNGED_UP) in your program for non-AutoOpts related purposes. They are now used by AutoOpts.

Sometimes (most especially under Windows), you may get a surprise. For example, INTERFACE is apparently a user space name that one should be free to use. Windows usurps this name. To solve this, you must do one of the following:

1. Change the name of your option
2. add the program attribute (see section Program Description Attributes):

   export = '#undef INTERFACE';

3. add the program attribute:

   guard-option-names;

`descrip'

Except for documentation options, a very brief description of the option. About 40 characters on one line, maximum. It appears on the usage() output next to the option name. If, however, the option is a documentation option, it will appear on one or more lines by itself. It is thus used to visually separate and comment upon groups of options in the usage text.

7.5.5.2 Common Option Attributes

These option attributes are optional. Any that do appear in the definition of a flag, may appear only once.

`value'

The flag character to specify for traditional option flags, e.g., -L.

`max'

Maximum occurrence count (invalid if disable present). The default maximum is 1. NOLIMIT can be used for the value, otherwise it must be a number or a #define that evaluates to a number.

`min'

Minimum occurrence count. If present, then the option must appear on the command line. Do not define it with the value zero (0).

`must-set'

If an option must be specified, but it need not be specified on the command line, then specify this attribute for the option.

`enable'

Long-name prefix for enabling the option (invalid if disable not present). Only useful if long option names are being processed.

`disable'

Prefix for disabling (inverting sense of) the option. Only useful if long option names are being processed.

`enabled'

If default is for option being enabled. (Otherwise, the OPTST_DISABLED bit is set at compile time.) Only useful if the option can be disabled.

`ifdef'

`ifndef'

If an option is relevant on certain platforms or when certain features are enabled or disabled, you can specify the compile time flag used to indicate when the option should be compiled in or out. For example, if you have a configurable feature, mumble that is indicated with the compile time define, WITH_MUMBLING, then add:

ifdef = WITH_MUMBLING;

Take care when using these. There are several caveats:

• The case and spelling must match whatever is specified.
• Do not confuse these attributes with the AutoGen directives of the same names, See section Controlling What Gets Processed. These cause C preprocessing directives to be inserted into the generated C text.
• Only one of these attributes may apply to any given option.
• The VALUE_OPT_ values are #define-d. If WITH_MUMBLING is not defined, then the associated VALUE_OPT_ value will not be #define-d either. So, if you have an option named, MUMBLING that is active only if WITH_MUMBLING is #define-d, then VALUE_OPT_MUMBLING will be #define-d iff WITH_MUMBLING is #define-d. Watch those switch statements.

7.5.5.3 Special Option Handling

These option attributes do not fit well with other categories.

`no-preset'

If presetting this option is not allowed. (Thus, environment variables and values set in configuration files will be ignored.)

`settable'

If the option can be set outside of option processing. If this attribute is defined, special macros for setting this particular option will be inserted into the interface file. For example, TEMPL_DIRS is a settable option for AutoGen, so a macro named SET_OPT_TEMPL_DIRS(a) appears in the interface file. This attribute interacts with the documentation attribute.

`equivalence'

Generally, when several options are mutually exclusive and basically serve the purpose of selecting one of several processing modes, these options can be considered an equivalence class. Sometimes, it is just easier to deal with them as such. All members of the equivalence class must contain the same equivalenced-to option, including the equivalenced-to option itself. Thus, it must be a class member.

For an option equivalence class, there is a single occurrence counter for the class. It can be referenced with the interface macro, COUNT_OPT(BASE_OPTION), where "BASE_OPTION" is the equivalenced-to option name.

Also, please take careful note: since the options are mapped to the equivalenced-to option descriptor, any option argument values are mapped to that descriptor also. Be sure you know which "equivalent option" was selected before getting an option argument value!

During the presetting phase of option processing (see section Configuring your program), equivalenced options may be specified. However, if different equivalenced members are specified, only the last instance will be recognized and the others will be discarded. A conflict error is indicated only when multiple different members appear on the command line itself.

As an example of where equivalenced options might be useful, cpio(1) has three options -o, -i, and -p that define the operational mode of the program (create, extract and pass-through, respectively). They form an equivalence class from which one and only one member must appear on the command line. If cpio were an AutoOpt-ed program, then each of these option definitions would contain:

equivalence = create;

and the program would be able to determine the operating mode with code that worked something like this:

switch (WHICH_IDX_CREATE) { case INDEX_OPT_CREATE: ... case INDEX_OPT_EXTRACT: ... case INDEX_OPT_PASS_THROUGH: ... default: /* cannot happen */ }

`documentation'

This attribute means the option exists for the purpose of separating option description text in the usage output. Libraries may choose to make it settable so that the library can determine which command line option is the first one that pertains to the library.

If present, this option disables all other attributes except settable, call-proc and flag_-ode. settable must be and is only specified if call-proc, extract-code or flag-code has been specified. When present, the descrip attribute will be displayed only when the --help option has been specified. It will be displayed flush to the left hand margin and may consist of one or more lines of text. The name of the option will not be printed.

Documentation options are for clarifying the usage text and will not appear in generated man pages or in the generated invoking texinfo doc.

7.5.5.4 Immediate Action Attributes

Certain options may need to be processed early. For example, in order to suppress the processing of configuration files, it is necessary to process the command line option --no-load-opts before the config files are processed. To accommodate this, certain options may have their enabled or disabled forms marked for immediate processing. The consequence of this is that they are processed ahead of all other options in the reverse of normal order.

Normally, the first options processed are the options specified in the first homerc file, followed by then next homerc file through to the end of config file processing. Next, environment variables are processed and finally, the command line options. The later options override settings processed earlier. That actually gives them higher priority. Command line immediate action options actually have the lowest priority of all. They would be used only if they are to have an effect on the processing of subsequent options.

`immediate'

Use this option attribute to specify that the enabled form of the option is to be processed immediately. The help and more-help options are so specified. They will also call exit() upon completion, so they do have an effect on the processing of the remaining options :-).

`immed-disable'

Use this option attribute to specify that the disabled form of the option is to be processed immediately. The load-opts option is so specified. The --no-load-opts command line option will suppress the processing of config files and environment variables. Contrariwise, the --load-opts command line option is processed normally. That means that the options specified in that file will be processed after all the homerc files and, in fact, after options that precede it on the command line.

`also'

If either the immediate or the immed-disable attributes are set to the string, "also", then the option will actually be processed twice: first at the immediate processing phase and again at the "normal" time.

7.5.5.5 Option Conflict Attributes

These attributes may be used as many times as you need. They are used at the end of the option processing to verify that the context within which each option is found does not conflict with the presence or absence of other options.

This is not a complete cover of all possible conflicts and requirements, but it simple to implement and covers the more common situations.

`flags-must'

one entry for every option that must be present when this option is present

`flags-cant'

one entry for every option that cannot be present when this option is present

7.5.5.6 Option Argument Specification

Command line options come in three flavors: options that do not take arguments, those that do and those that may. Without an "arg-type" attribute, AutoOpts will not process an argument to an option. If "arg-type" is specified and "arg-optional" is also specified, then the next command line token will be taken to be an argument, unless it looks like the name of another option.

If the argument type is specified to be anything other than "str[ing]", then AutoOpts will specify a callback procedure to handle the argument. Some of these procedures will be created and inserted into the generated .c file, and others are already built into the `libopts' library. Therefore, if you write your own callback procedure (see section Option Argument Handling), then you must either not specify an "arg-type" attribute, or else specify it to be of type "str[ing]". Your callback function will be able to place its own restrictions on what that string may contain or represent.

`arg-type'

This specifies the type of argument the option will take. If not present, the option cannot take an argument. If present, it must be one of the following five. The bracketed part of each name is optional.

`str[ing]'

The argument may be any arbitrary string, though your program or option callback procedure may place additional constraints upon it.

`num[ber]'

The argument must be a correctly formed integer, without any trailing U's or L's. AutoOpts contains a library procedure to convert the string to a number. If you specify range checking with arg-range, then AutoOpts produces a special purpose procedure for this option.

`bool[ean]'

The argument will be interpreted and always yield either AG_TRUE or AG_FALSE. False values are the empty string, the number zero, or a string that starts with f, F, n or N (representing False or No). Anything else will be interpreted as True.

`key[word]'

The argument must match a specified list of strings. Assuming you have named the option, optn-name, the strings will be converted into an enumeration of type te_Optn_Name with the values OPTN_NAME_KEYWORD. If you have not specified a default value, the value OPTN_NAME_UNDEFINED will be inserted with the value zero. The option will be initialized to that value. You may now use this in your code as follows:

te_Optn_Name opt = OPT_VALUE_OPTN_NAME; switch (opt) { case OPTN_NAME_UNDEFINED: /* undefined things */ break; case OPTN_NAME_KEYWORD: /* `keyword' things */ break; default: /* utterly impossible */ ; }

AutoOpts produces a special purpose procedure for this option.

If you have need for the string name of the selected keyword, you may obtain this with the macro, OPT_OPTN_NAME_VAL2STR(val). The value you pass would normally be OPT_VALUE_OPTN_NAME, but anything with numeric value that is legal for te_Optn_Name may be passed. Anything out of range will result in the string, "*INVALID*" being returned. The strings are read only. It may be used as in:

te_Optn_Name opt = OPT_VALUE_OPTN_NAME; printf( "you selected the %s keyword\n", OPT_OPTN_NAME_VAL2STR(opt) );

`set[-membership]'

The argument must be a list of names each of which must match the strings "all", "none" or one of the keywords specified for this option. all will turn on all membership bits and none will turn them all off. Specifying one of the keywords will turn on the corresponding set membership bit. Literal numbers may also be used and may, thereby, set or clear more than one bit. Preceding a keyword or literal number with a bang (! - exclamation point) will turn the bit(s) off. The number of keywords allowed is constrained by the number of bits in a pointer, as the bit set is kept in a void*.

If, for example, you specified first in your list of keywords, then you can use the following code to test to see if either first or all was specified:

uintptr_t opt = OPT_VALUE_OPTN_NAME; if (opt & OPTN_NAME_FIRST) /* OPTN_NAME_FIRST bit was set */ ;

AutoOpts produces a special purpose procedure for this option.

`keyword'

If the arg-type is keyword or set-membership, then you must specify the list of keywords by a series of keyword entries. The interface file will contain values for <OPTN_NAME>_<KEYWORD> for each keyword entry. keyword option types will have an enumeration and set-membership option types will have a set of unsigned long bits #define-d. If there are more than 32 bits defined, the #define will set unsigned long long values and you best be running on a 64 bit platform.

`arg-optional'

This attribute indicates that the user does not have to supply an argument for the option. This is only valid if the arg-type is string or keyword. If it is keyword, then this attribute may also specify the default keyword to assume when the argument is not supplied. If left empty, arg-default or the zero-valued keyword will be used.

`arg-default'

This specifies the default value to be used when the option is not specified or preset.

`default'

If your program processes its arguments in named option mode (See "long-opts" in Program Description Attributes), then you may select one of your options to be the default option. Do so with this attribute. The option so specified must have an arg-type specified, but not the arg-optional attribute. That is to say, the option argument must be required.

If you have done this, then any arguments that do not match an option name and do not contain an equal sign (=) will be interpreted as an option argument to the default option.

`arg-range'

If the arg-type is number, then arg-ranges may be specified, too. If you specify one or more of these option attributes, then AutoOpts will create a callback procedure for handling it. The argument value supplied for the option must match one of the range entries. Each arg-range should consist of either an integer by itself or an integer range. The integer range is specified by one or two integers separated by the two character sequence, ->. Be sure to quote the entire range string. The definitions parser will not accept the range syntax as a single string token.

The generated procedure imposes the range constraints as follows:

• A number by itself will match that one value.
• The high end of the range may not be INT_MIN, both for obvious reasons and because that value is used to indicate a single-valued match.
• An omitted lower value implies a lower bound of INT_MIN.
• An omitted upper value implies a upper bound of INT_MAX.
• The argument value is required. It may not be optional.
• The value must match one of the entries. If it can match more than one, then you have redundancies, but no harm will come of it.

7.5.5.7 Option Argument Handling

AutoOpts will either specify or automatically generate callback procedures for options that take specialized arguments. The only option argument types that are not specialized are plain string arguments and no argument at all. For options that fall into one of those two categories, you may specify your own callback function, as specified below. If the option takes a string argument, then you may specify that the option is to be handled by the libopts library procedures stackOptArg() or unstackOptArg() (see below). Finally, documentation options (Special Option Handling) may also be marked as settable and have special callback functions (either flag-code, extract-code, or call-proc).

`flag-code'

statements to execute when the option is encountered. The generated procedure will look like this:

static void doOpt<name>( tOptions* pOptions, tOptDesc* pOptDesc ) { <flag_code> }

Only certain fields within the tOptions and tOptDesc structures may be accessed. See section Data for Option Processing.

`extract-code'

This is effectively identical to flag_code, except that the source is kept in the output file instead of the definitions file. A long comment is used to demarcate the code. You must not modify that marker. Before regenerating the option code file, the old file is renamed from MUMBLE.c to MUMBLE.c.save. The template will be looking there for the text to copy into the new output file.

`call-proc'

external procedure to call when option is encountered. The calling sequence must conform to the sequence defined above for the generated procedure, doOpt<name>. It has the same restrictions regarding the fields within the structures passed in as arguments. See section Data for Option Processing.

`flag-proc'

Name of another option whose flag_code can be executed when this option is encountered.

`stack-arg'

Call a special library routine to stack the option's arguments. Special macros in the interface file are provided for determining how many of the options were found (STACKCT_OPT(NAME)) and to obtain a pointer to a list of pointers to the argument values (STACKLST_OPT(NAME)). Obviously, for a stackable argument, the max attribute needs to be set higher than 1.

If this stacked argument option has a disablement prefix, then the entire stack of arguments will be cleared by specifying the option with that disablement prefix.

`unstack-arg'

Call a special library routine to remove ("unstack") strings from a stack-arg option stack. This attribute must name the option that is to be "unstacked". Neither this option nor the stacked argument option it references may be equivalenced to another option.

7.5.6 Man and Info doc Attributes

AutoOpts includes AutoGen templates for producing abbreviated man pages and for producing the invoking section of an info document. To take advantage of these templates, you must add several attributes to your option definitions.

`doc'

First, every flag definition other than "documentation" definitions, must have a doc attribute defined. If the option takes an argument, then it will need an arg-name attribute as well. The doc text should be in plain sentences with minimal formatting. The Texinfo commands @code, and @var will have its enclosed text made into \fB entries in the man page, and the @file text will be made into \fI entries. The arg-name attribute is used to display the option's argument in the man page.

Options marked with the "documentation" attribute are for documenting the usage text. All other options should have the "doc" attribute in order to document the usage of the option in the generated man pages.

`arg-name'

If an option has an argument, the argument should have a name for documentation purposes. It will default to arg-type, but it will likely be clearer with something else like, file-name instead of string (the type).

`prog-man-descrip'

`prog-info-descrip'

Then, you need to supply a brief description of what your program does. If you already have a detail definition, this may be sufficient. If not, or if you need special formatting for one of the manual formats, then you will need either a definition for prog-man-descrip or prog-info-descrip or both. These will be inserted verbatim in the man page document and the info document, respectively.

`man-doc'

Finally, if you need to add man page sections like SEE ALSO or USAGE or other, put that text in a man-doc definition. This text will be inserted verbatim in the man page after the OPTIONS section and before the AUTHOR section.

7.5.7 Automatically Supported Options

AutoOpts provides automated support for five options. help and more-help are always provided. version is provided if version is defined in the option definitions See section Program Description Attributes. save-opts and load-opts are provided if at least one homerc is defined See section Program Description Attributes.

Below are the option names and flag values. The flags are activated if and only if at least one user-defined option also uses a flag value. These flags may be deleted or changed to characters of your choosing by specifying xxx-value = "y";, where xxx is one of the five names below and y is either empty or the character of your choice. For example, to change the help flag from ? to h, specify help-value = "h";; and to require that save-opts be specified only with its long option name, specify save-opts-value = "";.

`help -?'

This option will immediately invoke the USAGE() procedure and display the usage line, a description of each option with its description and option usage information. This is followed by the contents of the definition of the detail text macro.

`more-help -!'

This option is identical to the help option, except that the output is passed through a pager program. (more by default, or the program identified by the PAGER environment variable.)

`version -v'

This will print the program name, title and version. If it is followed by the letter c and a value for copyright and owner have been provided, then the copyright will be printed, too. If it is followed by the letter n, then the full copyright notice (if available) will be printed.

`save-opts ->'

This option will cause the option state to be printed in the configuration file format when option processing is done but not yet verified for consistency. The program will terminate successfully without running when this has completed. Note that for most shells you will have to quote or escape the flag character to restrict special meanings to the shell.

The output file will be the configuration file name (default or provided by rcfile) in the last directory named in a homerc definition.

This option may be set from within your program by invoking the "SET_OPT_SAVE_OPTS(filename)" macro (see section SET_OPT_name - Force an option to be set). Invoking this macro will set the file name for saving the option processing state, but the state will not actually be saved. You must call optionSaveFile to do that (see section optionSaveFile). CAVEAT: if, after invoking this macro, you call optionProcess, the option processing state will be saved to this file and optionProcess will not return. You may wish to invoke CLEAR_OPT( SAVE_OPTS ) (see section CLEAR_OPT( <NAME> ) - Clear Option Markings) beforehand.

`load-opts -<'

This option will load options from the named file. They will be treated exactly as if they were loaded from the normally found configuration files, but will not be loaded until the option is actually processed. This can also be used within another configuration file, causing them to nest.

It is ultimately intended that specifying the option, no-load-opts will suppress the processing of configuration files and environment variables. To do this, AutoOpts must first implement pre-scanning of the options, environment and config files.

7.5.8 Library of Standard Options

AutoOpts has developed a set of standardized options. You may incorporate these options in your program simply by first adding a #define for the options you want, and then the line,

#include stdoptions.def

in your option definitions. The supported options are specified thus:

#define DEBUG
#define DIRECTORY
#define DRY_RUN
#define INPUT
#define INTERACTIVE
#define OUTPUT
#define WARN

#define SILENT
#define QUIET
#define BRIEF
#define VERBOSE

By default, only the long form of the option will be available. To specify the short (flag) form, suffix these names with _FLAG. e.g.,

#define DEBUG_FLAG

--silent, --quiet, --brief and --verbose are related in that they all indicate some level of diagnostic output. These options are all designed to conflict with each other. Instead of four different options, however, several levels can be incorporated by #define-ing VERBOSE_ENUM. In conjunction with VERBOSE, it incorporates the notion of 5 levels in an enumeration: silent, quiet, brief, informative and verbose; with the default being brief.

Here is an example program that uses the following set of definitions:

AutoGen Definitions options;

prog-name  = default-test;
prog-title = 'Default Option Example';
homerc     = '$$/../share/default-test', '$HOME', '.';
environrc;
long-opts;
gnu-usage;
version    = '1.0';
main = {
  main-type = shell-process;
};
#define DEBUG_FLAG
#define WARN_FLAG
#define WARN_LEVEL
#define VERBOSE_FLAG
#define VERBOSE_ENUM
#define DRY_RUN_FLAG
#define OUTPUT_FLAG
#define INPUT_FLAG
#define DIRECTORY_FLAG
#define INTERACTIVE_FLAG
#include stdoptions.def

Running a few simple commands on that definition file:

autogen default-test.def
copts="-DTEST_DEFAULT_TEST_OPTS `autoopts-config cflags`"
lopts="`autoopts-config ldflags`"
cc -o default-test ${copts} default-test.c ${lopts}

Yields a program which, when run with `--help', prints out:

default-test - Default Option Example - Ver. 1.0
USAGE:  default-test [ -<flag> [<val>] | --<name>[{=| }<val>] ]...


The following options are commonly used and are provided and supported
by AutoOpts:

   -D, --debug                run program with debugging info
   -V, --verbose=KWd          run program with progress info
   -w, --warn=num             specify a warning-level threshhold
                                - disabled as --no-warn
   -d, --dry-run              program will make no changes
   -I, --interactive=str      prompt for confirmation
   -i, --input=str            redirect input from file
   -o, --output=str           redirect output to file
   -d, --directory=str        use specified dir for I/O

version and help options:

   -v, --version[=arg]        Output version information and exit
   -?, --help                 Display usage information and exit
   -!, --more-help            Extended usage information passed thru pager
   ->, --save-opts[=arg]      Save the option state to a config file
   -<, --load-opts=str        Load options from a config file
                                - disabled as --no-load-opts
                                - may appear multiple times

Options are specified by doubled hyphens and their name
or by a single hyphen and the flag character.

The following option preset mechanisms are supported:
 - reading file $$/../share/default-test
 - reading file $HOME
 - reading file /home/bkorb/ag/ag/doc/.default_testrc
 - examining environment variables named DEFAULT_TEST_*

The valid "verbose" option keywords are:
  silent quiet brief informative verbose

7.6 Programmatic Interface

The user interface for access to the argument information is completely defined in the generated header file and in the portions of the distributed file "options.h" that are marked "public".

In the following macros, text marked <NAME> or name is the name of the option in upper case and segmented with underscores _. The macros and enumerations defined in the options header (interface) file are used as follows:

To see how these #define macros are used in a program, the reader is referred to the several `opts.h' files included with the AutoGen sources.

7.6.1 Data for Option Processing

This section describes the data that may be accessed from within the option processing callback routines. The following fields may be used in the following ways and may be used for read only. The first set is addressed from the tOptDesc* pointer:

`optIndex'

`optValue'

These may be used by option procedures to determine which option they are working on (in case they handle several options).

`optActualIndex'

`optActualValue'

These may be used by option procedures to determine which option was used to set the current option. This may be different from the above if the options are members of an equivalence class.

`optOccCt'

If AutoOpts is processing command line arguments, then this value will contain the current occurrence count. During the option preset phase (reading configuration files and examining environment variables), the value is zero.

`fOptState'

The field may be tested for the following bit values (prefix each name with OPTST_, e.g. OPTST_INIT):

`INIT'

Initial compiled value. As a bit test, it will always yield FALSE.

`SET'

The option was set via the SET_OPT() macro.

`PRESET'

The option was set via a configuration file.

`DEFINED'

The option was set via a command line option.

`SET_MASK'

This is a mask of flags that show the set state, one of the above four values.

`EQUIVALENCE'

This bit is set when the option was selected by an equivalenced option.

`DISABLED'

This bit is set if the option is to be disabled. (Meaning it was a long option prefixed by the disablement prefix, or the option has not been specified yet and initializes as disabled.)

As an example of how this might be used, in AutoGen I want to allow template writers to specify that the template output can be left in a writable or read-only state. To support this, there is a Guile function named set-writable (see section `set-writable' - Make the output file be writable). Also, I provide for command options --writable and --not-writable. I give precedence to command line and RC file options, thus:

switch (STATE_OPT( WRITABLE )) { case OPTST_DEFINED: case OPTST_PRESET: fprintf( stderr, zOverrideWarn, pCurTemplate->pzFileName, pCurMacro->lineNo ); break; default: if (gh_boolean_p( set ) && (set == SCM_BOOL_F)) CLEAR_OPT( WRITABLE ); else SET_OPT_WRITABLE; }

`pzLastArg'

Pointer to the latest argument string. BEWARE If the argument type is numeric, an enumeration or a bit mask, then this will be the argument value and not a pointer to a string.

The following two fields are addressed from the tOptions* pointer:

`pzProgName'

Points to a NUL-terminated string containing the current program name, as retrieved from the argument vector.

`pzProgPath'

Points to a NUL-terminated string containing the full path of the current program, as retrieved from the argument vector. (If available on your system.)

Note these fields get filled in during the first call to optionProcess(). All other fields are private, for the exclusive use of AutoOpts code and are subject to change.

7.6.2 CLEAR_OPT( <NAME> ) - Clear Option Markings

Make as if the option had never been specified. HAVE_OPT(<NAME>) will yield FALSE after invoking this macro.

7.6.3 COUNT_OPT( <NAME> ) - Definition Count

This macro will tell you how many times the option was specified on the command line. It does not include counts of preset options.

if (COUNT_OPT( NAME ) != desired-count) {
    make-an-undesirable-message.
}

7.6.4 DESC( <NAME> ) - Option Descriptor

This macro is used internally by other AutoOpt macros. It is not for general use. It is used to obtain the option description corresponding to its UPPER CASED option name argument. This is primarily used in other macro definitions.

7.6.5 DISABLE_OPT_name - Disable an option

This macro is emitted if it is both settable and it can be disabled. If it cannot be disabled, it may always be CLEAR-ed (see above).

The form of the macro will actually depend on whether the option is equivalenced to another, and/or has an assigned handler procedure. Unlike the SET_OPT macro, this macro does not allow an option argument.

DISABLE_OPT_NAME;

7.6.6 ENABLED_OPT( <NAME> ) - Is Option Enabled?

Yields true if the option defaults to disabled and ISUNUSED_OPT() would yield true. It also yields true if the option has been specified with a disablement prefix, disablement value or the DISABLE_OPT_NAME macro was invoked.

7.6.7 ERRSKIP_OPTERR - Ignore Option Errors

When it is necessary to continue (return to caller) on option errors, invoke this option. It is reversible. See section ERRSTOP_OPTERR - Stop on Errors.

7.6.8 ERRSTOP_OPTERR - Stop on Errors

After invoking this macro, if optionProcess() encounters an error, it will call exit(1) rather than return. This is the default processing mode. It can be overridden by specifying allow-errors in the definitions file, or invoking the macro See section ERRSKIP_OPTERR - Ignore Option Errors.

7.6.9 HAVE_OPT( <NAME> ) - Have this option?

This macro yields true if the option has been specified in any fashion at all. It is used thus:

if (HAVE_OPT( NAME )) {
    <do-things-associated-with-opt-name>;
}

7.6.10 ISSEL_OPT( <NAME> ) - Is Option Selected?

This macro yields true if the option has been specified either on the command line or via a SET/DISABLE macro.

7.6.11 ISUNUSED_OPT( <NAME> ) - Never Specified?

This macro yields true if the option has never been specified, or has been cleared via the CLEAR_OPT() macro.

7.6.12 OPTION_CT - Full Count of Options

The full count of all options, both those defined and those generated automatically by AutoOpts. This is primarily used to initialize the program option descriptor structure.

7.6.13 OPT_ARG( <NAME> ) - Option Argument String

The option argument value as a pointer to string. Note that argument values that have been specified as numbers are stored as numbers or keywords. For such options, use instead the OPT_VALUE_name define. It is used thus:

if (HAVE_OPT( NAME )) {
    char* p = OPT_ARG( NAME );
    <do-things-with-opt-name-argument-string>;
}

7.6.14 OPT_VALUE_name - Option Argument Value

This macro gets emitted only for options that take numeric, keyword or set membership arguments. The macro yields a word-sized integer containing the enumeration or numeric value of the option argument.

int opt_val = OPT_VALUE_NAME;

7.6.15 RESTART_OPT( n ) - Resume Option Processing

If option processing has stopped (either because of an error or something was encountered that looked like a program argument), it can be resumed by providing this macro with the index n of the next option to process and calling optionProcess() again.

7.6.16 SET_OPT_name - Force an option to be set

This macro gets emitted only when the given option has the settable attribute specified.

The form of the macro will actually depend on whether the option is equivalenced to another, has an option argument and/or has an assigned handler procedure. If the option has an argument, then this macro will too. Beware that the argument is not reallocated, so the value must not be on the stack or deallocated in any other way for as long as the value might get referenced.

If you have supplied at least one `homerc' file (see section Program Description Attributes), this macro will be emitted for the --save-opts option.

SET_OPT_SAVE_OPTS( "filename" );

See section Automatically Supported Options, for a discussion of the implications of using this particular example.

7.6.17 STACKCT_OPT( <NAME> ) - Stacked Arg Count

When the option handling attribute is specified as stack_arg, this macro may be used to determine how many of them actually got stacked.

Do not use this on options that have not been stacked or has not been specified (the stack_arg attribute must have been specified, and HAVE_OPT(<NAME>) must yield TRUE). Otherwise, you will likely seg fault.

if (HAVE_OPT( NAME )) {
    int     ct = STACKCT_OPT(  NAME );
    char**  pp = STACKLST_OPT( NAME );

    do  {
        char* p = *pp++;
        do-things-with-p;
    } while (--ct > 0);
}

7.6.18 STACKLST_OPT( <NAME> ) - Argument Stack

The address of the list of pointers to the option arguments. The pointers are ordered by the order in which they were encountered in the option presets and command line processing.

Do not use this on options that have not been stacked or has not been specified (the stack_arg attribute must have been specified, and HAVE_OPT(<OPTION>) must yield TRUE). Otherwise, you will likely seg fault.

if (HAVE_OPT( NAME )) {
    int     ct = STACKCT_OPT(  NAME );
    char**  pp = STACKLST_OPT( NAME );

    do  {
        char* p = *pp++;
        do-things-with-p;
    } while (--ct > 0);
}

7.6.19 START_OPT - Restart Option Processing

This is just a shortcut for RESTART_OPT(1) (See section RESTART_OPT( n ) - Resume Option Processing.)

7.6.20 STATE_OPT( <NAME> ) - Option State

If you need to know if an option was set because of presetting actions (configuration file processing or environment variables), versus a command line entry versus one of the SET/DISABLE macros, then use this macro. It will yield one of four values: OPTST_INIT, OPTST_SET, OPTST_PRESET or OPTST_DEFINED. It is used thus:

switch (STATE_OPT( NAME )) {
    case OPTST_INIT:
        not-preset, set or on the command line.  (unless CLEAR-ed)

    case OPTST_SET:
        option set via the SET_OPT_NAME() macro.

    case OPTST_PRESET:
        option set via an configuration file or environment variable

    case OPTST_DEFINED:
        option set via a command line option.

    default:
        cannot happen :)
}

7.6.21 USAGE( exit-code ) - Usage invocation macro

This macro invokes the procedure registered to display the usage text. Normally, this will be optionUsage from the AutoOpts library, but you may select another procedure by specifying usage = "proc_name" program attribute. This procedure must take two arguments first, a pointer to the option descriptor, and second the exit code. The macro supplies the option descriptor automatically. This routine is expected to call exit(3) with the provided exit code.

The optionUsage routine also behaves differently depending on the exit code. If the exit code is zero, it is assumed that assistance has been requested. Consequently, a little more information is provided than when displaying usage and exiting with a non-zero exit code.

7.6.22 VALUE_OPT_name - Option Flag Value

This is a #define for the flag character used to specify an option on the command line. If value was not specified for the option, then it is a unique number associated with the option. option value refers to this value, option argument refers to the (optional) argument to the option.

switch (WHICH_OPT_OTHER_OPT) {
case VALUE_OPT_NAME:
    this-option-was-really-opt-name;
case VALUE_OPT_OTHER_OPT:
    this-option-was-really-other-opt;
}

7.6.23 VERSION - Version and Full Version

If the version attribute is defined for the program, then a stringified version will be #defined as PROGRAM_VERSION and PROGRAM_FULL_VERSION. PROGRAM_FULL_VERSION is used for printing the program version in response to the version option. The version option is automatically supplied in response to this attribute, too.

You may access PROGRAM_VERSION via programOptions.pzFullVersion.

7.6.24 WHICH_IDX_name - Which Equivalenced Index

This macro gets emitted only for equivalenced-to options. It is used to obtain the index for the one of the several equivalence class members set the equivalenced-to option.

switch (WHICH_IDX_OTHER_OPT) {
case INDEX_OPT_NAME:
    this-option-was-really-opt-name;
case INDEX_OPT_OTHER_OPT:
    this-option-was-really-other-opt;
}

7.6.25 WHICH_OPT_name - Which Equivalenced Option

This macro gets emitted only for equivalenced-to options. It is used to obtain the value code for the one of the several equivalence class members set the equivalenced-to option.

switch (WHICH_OPT_OTHER_OPT) {
case VALUE_OPT_NAME:
    this-option-was-really-opt-name;
case VALUE_OPT_OTHER_OPT:
    this-option-was-really-other-opt;
}

7.6.26 teOptIndex - Option Index and Enumeration

This enum defines the complete set of options, both user specified and automatically provided. This can be used, for example, to distinguish which of the equivalenced options was actually used.

switch (pOptDesc->optActualIndex) {
case INDEX_OPT_FIRST:
    stuff;
case INDEX_OPT_DIFFERENT:
    different-stuff;
default:
    unknown-things;
}

7.6.27 OPTIONS_STRUCT_VERSION - active version

You will not actually need to reference this value, but you need to be aware that it is there. It is the first value in the option descriptor that you pass to optionProcess. It contains a magic number and version information. Normally, you should be able to work with a more recent option library than the one you compiled with. However, if the library is changed incompatibly, then the library will detect the out of date magic marker, explain the difficulty and exit. You will then need to rebuild and recompile your option definitions. This has rarely been necessary.

7.6.28 libopts External Procedures

These are the routines that libopts users may call directly from their code. There are several other routines that can be called by code generated by the libopts option templates, but they are not to be called from any other user code. The `options.h' header is fairly clear about this, too.

This subsection was automatically generated by AutoGen using extracted information and the aginfo3.tpl template.

7.6.28.1 ao_string_tokenize

tokenize an input string

Usage:

token_list_t* res = ao_string_tokenize( string );

Where the arguments are:

This function will convert one input string into a list of strings. The list of strings is derived by separating the input based on white space separation. However, if the input contains either single or double quote characters, then the text after that character up to a matching quote will become the string in the list.

The returned pointer should be deallocated with free(3C) when are done using the data. The data are placed in a single block of allocated memory. Do not deallocate individual token/strings.

The structure pointed to will contain at least these two fields:

`tkn_ct'

The number of tokens found in the input string.

`tok_list'

An array of tkn_ct + 1 pointers to substring tokens, with the last pointer set to NULL.

There are two types of quoted strings: single quoted (') and double quoted ("). Singly quoted strings are fairly raw in that escape characters (\\) are simply another character, except when preceding the following characters:

\\  double backslashes reduce to one
'   incorporates the single quote into the string
\n  suppresses both the backslash and newline character

Double quote strings are formed according to the rules of string constants in ANSI-C programs.

NULL is returned and errno will be set to indicate the problem:

• EINVAL - There was an unterminated quoted string.
• ENOENT - The input string was empty.
• ENOMEM - There is not enough memory.

7.6.28.2 configFileLoad

parse a configuration file

Usage:

const tOptionValue* res = configFileLoad( pzFile );

Where the arguments are:

This routine will load a named configuration file and parse the text as a hierarchically valued option. The option descriptor created from an option definition file is not used via this interface. The returned value is "named" with the input file name and is of type "OPARG_TYPE_HIERARCHY". It may be used in calls to optionGetValue(), optionNextValue() and optionUnloadNested().

If the file cannot be loaded or processed, NULL is returned and errno is set. It may be set by a call to either open(2) mmap(2) or other file system calls, or it may be:

• ENOENT - the file was empty.
• EINVAL - the file contents are invalid - not properly formed.
• ENOMEM - not enough memory to allocate the needed structures.

7.6.28.3 optionFileLoad

Load the locatable config files, in order

Usage:

int res = optionFileLoad( pOpts, pzProg );

Where the arguments are:

This function looks in all the specified directories for a configuration file ("rc" file or "ini" file) and processes any found twice. The first time through, they are processed in reverse order (last file first). At that time, only "immediate action" configurables are processed. For example, if the last named file specifies not processing any more configuration files, then no more configuration files will be processed. Such an option in the first named directory will have no effect.

Once the immediate action configurables have been handled, then the directories are handled in normal, forward order. In that way, later config files can override the settings of earlier config files.

See the AutoOpts documentation for a thorough discussion of the config file format.

Configuration files not found or not decipherable are simply ignored.

Returns the value, "-1" if the program options descriptor is out of date or indecipherable. Otherwise, the value "0" will always be returned.

7.6.28.4 optionFindNextValue

find a hierarcicaly valued option instance

Usage:

const tOptionValue* res = optionFindNextValue( pOptDesc, pPrevVal, name, value );

Where the arguments are:

This routine will find the next entry in a nested value option or configurable. It will search through the list and return the next entry that matches the criteria.

The returned result is NULL and errno is set:

• EINVAL - the pOptValue does not point to a valid hierarchical option value.
• ENOENT - no entry matched the given name.

7.6.28.5 optionFindValue

find a hierarcicaly valued option instance

Usage:

const tOptionValue* res = optionFindValue( pOptDesc, name, value );

Where the arguments are:

This routine will find an entry in a nested value option or configurable. It will search through the list and return a matching entry.

The returned result is NULL and errno is set:

• EINVAL - the pOptValue does not point to a valid hierarchical option value.
• ENOENT - no entry matched the given name.

7.6.28.6 optionFree

free allocated option processing memory

Usage:

optionFree( pOpts );

Where the arguments are:

AutoOpts sometimes allocates memory and puts pointers to it in the option state structures. This routine deallocates all such memory.

As long as memory has not been corrupted, this routine is always successful.

7.6.28.7 optionGetValue

get a specific value from a hierarcical list

Usage:

const tOptionValue* res = optionGetValue( pOptValue, valueName );

Where the arguments are:

This routine will find an entry in a nested value option or configurable. If "valueName" is NULL, then the first entry is returned. Otherwise, the first entry with a name that exactly matches the argument will be returned.

The returned result is NULL and errno is set:

• EINVAL - the pOptValue does not point to a valid hierarchical option value.
• ENOENT - no entry matched the given name.

7.6.28.8 optionLoadLine

process a string for an option name and value

Usage:

optionLoadLine( pOpts, pzLine );

Where the arguments are:

This is a client program callable routine for setting options from, for example, the contents of a file that they read in. Only one option may appear in the text. It will be treated as a normal (non-preset) option.

When passed a pointer to the option struct and a string, it will find the option named by the first token on the string and set the option argument to the remainder of the string. The caller must NUL terminate the string. Any embedded new lines will be included in the option argument. If the input looks like one or more quoted strings, then the input will be "cooked". The "cooking" is identical to the string formation used in AutoGen definition files (see section Basic Expression), except that you may not use backquotes.

Invalid options are silently ignored. Invalid option arguments will cause a warning to print, but the function should return.

7.6.28.9 optionNextValue

get the next value from a hierarchical list

Usage:

const tOptionValue* res = optionNextValue( pOptValue, pOldValue );

Where the arguments are:

This routine will return the next entry after the entry passed in. At the end of the list, NULL will be returned. If the entry is not found on the list, NULL will be returned and "errno" will be set to EINVAL. The "pOldValue" must have been gotten from a prior call to this routine or to "opitonGetValue()".

The returned result is NULL and errno is set:

• EINVAL - the pOptValue does not point to a valid hierarchical option value or pOldValue does not point to a member of that option value.
• ENOENT - the supplied pOldValue pointed to the last entry.

7.6.28.10 optionOnlyUsage

Print usage text for just the options

Usage:

optionOnlyUsage( pOpts, ex_code );

Where the arguments are:

This routine will print only the usage for each option. This function may be used when the emitted usage must incorporate information not available to AutoOpts.

7.6.28.11 optionProcess

this is the main option processing routine

Usage:

int res = optionProcess( pOpts, argc, argv );

Where the arguments are:

This is the main entry point for processing options. It is intended that this procedure be called once at the beginning of the execution of a program. Depending on options selected earlier, it is sometimes necessary to stop and restart option processing, or to select completely different sets of options. This can be done easily, but you generally do not want to do this.

The number of arguments processed always includes the program name. If one of the arguments is "-", then it is counted and the processing stops. If an error was encountered and errors are to be tolerated, then the returned value is the index of the argument causing the error. A hyphen by itself ("-") will also cause processing to stop and will not be counted among the processed arguments. A hyphen by itself is treated as an operand. Encountering an operand stops option processing.

Errors will cause diagnostics to be printed. exit(3) may or may not be called. It depends upon whether or not the options were generated with the "allow-errors" attribute, or if the ERRSKIP_OPTERR or ERRSTOP_OPTERR macros were invoked.

7.6.28.12 optionRestore

restore option state from memory copy

Usage:

optionRestore( pOpts );

Where the arguments are:

Copy back the option state from saved memory. The allocated memory is left intact, so this routine can be called repeatedly without having to call optionSaveState again. If you are restoring a state that was saved before the first call to optionProcess(3AO), then you may change the contents of the argc/argv parameters to optionProcess.

If you have not called optionSaveState before, a diagnostic is printed to stderr and exit is called.

7.6.28.13 optionSaveFile

saves the option state to a file

Usage:

optionSaveFile( pOpts );

Where the arguments are:

This routine will save the state of option processing to a file. The name of that file can be specified with the argument to the --save-opts option, or by appending the rcfile attribute to the last homerc attribute. If no rcfile attribute was specified, it will default to .programnamerc. If you wish to specify another file, you should invoke the SET_OPT_SAVE_OPTS( filename ) macro.

If no homerc file was specified, this routine will silently return and do nothing. If the output file cannot be created or updated, a message will be printed to stderr and the routine will return.

7.6.28.14 optionSaveState

saves the option state to memory

Usage:

optionSaveState( pOpts );

Where the arguments are:

This routine will allocate enough memory to save the current option processing state. If this routine has been called before, that memory will be reused. You may only save one copy of the option state. This routine may be called before optionProcess(3AO). If you do call it before the first call to optionProcess, then you may also change the contents of argc/argv after you call optionRestore(3AO)

If it fails to allocate the memory, it will print a message to stderr and exit. Otherwise, it will always succeed.

7.6.28.15 optionUnloadNested

Deallocate the memory for a nested value

Usage:

optionUnloadNested( pOptVal );

Where the arguments are:

A nested value needs to be deallocated. The pointer passed in should have been gotten from a call to configFileLoad() (See see section configFileLoad).

7.6.28.16 optionVersion

return the compiled AutoOpts version number

Usage:

char const* res = optionVersion();

Where the arguments are:

Returns the full version string compiled into the library. The returned string cannot be modified.

7.6.28.17 pathfind

fild a file in a list of directories

Usage:

char* res = pathfind( path, file, mode );

Where the arguments are:

pathfind looks for a a file with name "FILE" and "MODE" access along colon delimited "PATH", and returns the full pathname as a string, or NULL if not found. If "FILE" contains a slash, then it is treated as a relative or absolute path and "PATH" is ignored.

NOTE: this function is compiled into `libopts' only if it is not natively supplied.

The "MODE" argument is a string of option letters chosen from the list below:

Letter    Meaning
r         readable
w         writable
x         executable
f         normal file       (NOT IMPLEMENTED)
b         block special     (NOT IMPLEMENTED)
c         character special (NOT IMPLEMENTED)
d         directory         (NOT IMPLEMENTED)
p         FIFO (pipe)       (NOT IMPLEMENTED)
u         set user ID bit   (NOT IMPLEMENTED)
g         set group ID bit  (NOT IMPLEMENTED)
k         sticky bit        (NOT IMPLEMENTED)
s         size nonzero      (NOT IMPLEMENTED)

returns NULL if the file is not found.

7.6.28.18 strequate

map a list of characters to the same value

Usage:

strequate( ch_list );

Where the arguments are:

Each character in the input string get mapped to the first character in the string. This function name is mapped to option_strequate so as to not conflict with the POSIX name space.

none.

7.6.28.19 streqvcmp

compare two strings with an equivalence mapping

Usage:

int res = streqvcmp( str1, str2 );

Where the arguments are:

Using a character mapping, two strings are compared for "equivalence". Each input character is mapped to a comparison character and the mapped-to characters are compared for the two NUL terminated input strings. This function name is mapped to option_streqvcmp so as to not conflict with the POSIX name space.

none checked. Caller responsible for seg faults.

7.6.28.20 streqvmap

Set the character mappings for the streqv functions

Usage:

streqvmap( From, To, ct );

Where the arguments are:

Set the character mapping. If the count (ct) is set to zero, then the map is cleared by setting all entries in the map to their index value. Otherwise, the "From" character is mapped to the "To" character. If ct is greater than 1, then From and To are incremented and the process repeated until ct entries have been set. For example,

streqvmap( 'a', 'A', 26 );

will alter the mapping so that all English lower case letters will map to upper case.

This function name is mapped to option_streqvmap so as to not conflict with the POSIX name space.

none.

7.6.28.21 strneqvcmp

compare two strings with an equivalence mapping

Usage:

int res = strneqvcmp( str1, str2, ct );

Where the arguments are:

Using a character mapping, two strings are compared for "equivalence". Each input character is mapped to a comparison character and the mapped-to characters are compared for the two NUL terminated input strings. The comparison is limited to ct bytes. This function name is mapped to option_strneqvcmp so as to not conflict with the POSIX name space.

none checked. Caller responsible for seg faults.

7.6.28.22 strtransform

convert a string into its mapped-to value

Usage:

strtransform( dest, src );

Where the arguments are:

Each character in the input string is mapped and the mapped-to character is put into the output. This function name is mapped to option_strtransform so as to not conflict with the POSIX name space.

none.

7.7 Option Descriptor File

This is the module that is to be compiled and linked with your program. It contains internal data and procedures subject to change. Basically, it contains a single global data structure containing all the information provided in the option definitions, plus a number of static strings and any callout procedures that are specified or required. You should never have need for looking at this, except, perhaps, to examine the code generated for implementing the flag_code construct.

7.8 Using AutoOpts

There are actually several levels of "using" autoopts. Which you choose depends upon how you plan to distribute (or not) your application.

7.8.1 local-only use

To use AutoOpts in your application where you do not have to worry about distribution issues, your issues are simple and few.

• Create a file `myopts.def', according to the documentation above. It is probably easiest to start with the example in Quick Start and edit it into the form you need.
• Run AutoGen to create the option interface file (myopts.h) and the option descriptor code (myopts.c):

  autogen myopts.def

• In all your source files where you need to refer to option state, #include "myopts.h".
• In your main routine, code something along the lines of:

  #define ARGC_MIN some-lower-limit #define ARGC_MAX some-upper-limit main( int argc, char** argv ) { { int arg_ct = optionProcess( &myprogOptions, argc, argv ); argc -= arg_ct; if ((argc < ARGC_MIN) || (argc > ARGC_MAX)) { fprintf( stderr, "%s ERROR: remaining args (%d) " "out of range\n", myprogOptions.pzProgName, argc ); USAGE( EXIT_FAILURE ); } argv += arg_ct; } if (HAVE_OPT(OPTN_NAME)) respond_to_optn_name(); ... }

• Compile `myopts.c' and link your program with the following additional arguments:

  myopts.c -I$prefix/include -L $prefix/lib -lopts

  These values can be derived from the "autoopts-config" script:

  myopts.c `autoopts-config cflags` `autoopts-config ldflags`

7.8.2 binary distro, AutoOpts not installed

If you will be distributing (or copying) your project to a system that does not have AutoOpts installed, you will need to statically link the AutoOpts library, "libopts" into your program. Add the output from the following to your link command:

autoopts-config static-libs

7.8.3 binary distro, AutoOpts pre-installed

If you will be distributing (or copying) your project to a system that does have AutoOpts (or only "libopts") installed, you will still need to ensure that the library is findable at program load time, or you will still have to statically link. The former can be accomplished by linking your project with --rpath or by setting the LD_LIBRARY_PATH appropriately. Otherwise, See section binary distro, AutoOpts not installed.

7.8.4 source distro, AutoOpts pre-installed

If you will be distributing your project to a system that will build your product but it may not be pre-installed with AutoOpts, you will need to do some configuration checking before you start the build. Assuming you are willing to fail the build if AutoOpts has not been installed, you will still need to do a little work.

AutoOpts is distributed with a configuration check M4 script, `autoopts.m4'. It will add an autoconf macro named, AG_PATH_AUTOOPTS. Add this to your `configure.ac' script and use the following substitution values:

AUTOGEN

the name of the autogen executable

AUTOGEN_TPLIB

the directory where AutoGen template library is stored

AUTOOPTS_CFLAGS

the compile time options needed to find the AutoOpts headers

AUTOOPTS_LIBS

the link options required to access the libopts library

7.8.5 source distro, AutoOpts not installed

If you will be distributing your project to a system that will build your product but it may not be pre-installed with AutoOpts, you may wish to incorporate the sources for libopts in your project. To do this, I recommend reading the tear-off libopts library `README' that you can find in the `pkg/libopts' directory. You can also examine an example package (blocksort) that incorporates this tear off library in the autogen distribution directory. There is also a web page that describes what you need to do:

http://autogen.sourceforge.net/blocksort.html

Alternatively, you can pull the libopts library sources into a build directory and build it for installation along with your package. This can be done approximately as follows:

tar -xzvf `autoopts-config libsrc`
cd libopts-*
./bootstrap
configure
make
make install

That will install the library, but not the headers or anything else.

7.9 Configuring your program

AutoOpts supports the notion of "presetting" the value or state of an option. The values may be obtained either from environment variables or from configuration files (`rc' or `ini' files). In order to take advantage of this, the AutoOpts client program must specify these features in the option descriptor file (see section Program Description Attributes) with the rcfile or environrc attributes.

It is also possible to configure your program without using the command line option parsing code. This is done by using only the following four functions from the `libopts' library:

`configFileLoad'

(see section configFileLoad) will parse the contents of a config file and return a pointer to a structure representing the hierarchical value. The values are sorted alphabetically by the value name and all entries with the same name will retain their original order. Insertion sort is used.

`optionGetValue'

(see section optionGetValue) will find the first value within the hierarchy with a name that matches the name passed in.

`optionNextValue'

(see section optionNextValue) will return the next value that follows the value passed in as an argument. If you wish to get all the values for a particular name, you must take note when the name changes.

`optionUnloadNested'

(see section optionUnloadNested). The pointer passed in must be of type, OPARG_TYPE_HIERARCHY (see the autoopts/options.h header file). configFileLoad will return a tOptionValue pointer of that type. This function will release all the associated memory. AutoOpts generated code uses this function for its own needs. Client code should only call this function with pointers gotten from configFileLoad.

7.9.1 configuration file presets

Configuration files are enabled by specifying the program attribute homerc (see section Program Description Attributes). Any option not marked with the "no-preset" attribute may appear in a configuration file. The files loaded are selected both by the homerc entries and, optionally, via a command line option. The first component of the homerc entry may be an environment variable such as $HOME, or it may also be $$ (two dollar sign characters) to specify the directory of the executable. For example:

homerc = "$$/../share/autogen";

will cause the AutoOpts library to look in the normal autogen datadir relative to the current installation directory for autogen.

The configuration files are processed in the order they are specified by the homerc attribute, so that each new file will normally override the settings of the previous files. This may be overridden by marking some options for immediate action (see section Immediate Action Attributes). Any such options are acted upon in reverse order. The disabled load-opts (--no-load-opts) option, for example, is an immediate action option. Its presence in the last homerc file will prevent the processing of any prior homerc files because its effect is immediate.

Configuration file processing can be completely suppressed by specifying --no-load-opts on the command line, or PROGRAM_LOAD_OPTS=no in the environment (if environrc has been specified).

See the "Configuration File Format" section (see section Configuration File Format) for details on the format of the file.

7.9.2 Saving the presets into a configuration file

When configuration files are enabled for an application, the user is also provided with an automatically supplied --save-opts option. All of the known option state will be written to either the specified output file or, if it is not specified, then to the last specified homerc file.

7.9.3 Creating a sample configuration file

AutoOpts is shipped with a template named, `rc-sample.tpl'. If your option definition file specifies the homerc attribute, then you may invoke `autogen' thus:

autogen -Trc-sample <your-option-def-file>

This will, by default, produce a sample file named, `sample-<prog-name>rc'. It will be named differently if you specify your configuration (rc) file name with the rcfile attribute. In that case, the output file will be named, `sample-<rcfile-name>'. It will contain all of the program options not marked as no-preset. It will also include information about how they are handled and the text from the doc attribute.

7.9.4 environment variable presets

If the AutoOpts client program specifies environrc in its option descriptor file, then environment variables will be used for presetting option state. Variables will be looked for that are named, PROGRAM_OPTNAME and PROGRAM. PROGRAM is the upper cased C-name of the program, and OPTNAME is the upper cased C-name of a specific option. (The C-names are the regular names with all special characters converted to underscores (_).)

Option specific environment variables are processed after (and thus take precedence over) the contents of the PROGRAM environment variable. The option argument string for these options takes on the string value gotten from the environment. Consequently, you can only have one instance of the OPTNAME.

If a particular option may be disabled, then its disabled state is indicated by setting the PROGRAM_OPTNAME value to the disablement prefix. So, for example, if the disablement prefix were dont, then you can disable the optname option by setting the PROGRAM_OPTNAME' environment variable to `dont'. See section Common Option Attributes.

The PROGRAM environment string is tokenized and parsed much like a command line. Doubly quoted strings have backslash escapes processed the same way they are processed in C program constant strings. Singly quoted strings are "pretty raw" in that backslashes are honored before other backslashes, apostrophes, newlines and cr/newline pairs. The options must be introduced with hyphens in the same way as the command line.

Note that not all options may be preset. Options that are specified with the no-preset attribute and the --help, --more-help, and --save-opts auto-supported options may not be preset.

7.9.5 Config file only example

If for some reason it is difficult or unworkable to integrate configuration file processing with command line option parsing, the libopts (see section libopts External Procedures) library can still be used to process configuration files. Below is a "Hello, World!" greeting program that tries to load a configuration file `hello.conf' to see if it should use an alternate greeting or to personalize the salutation.

#include <sys/types.h>
#include <stdio.h>
#include <pwd.h>
#include <string.h>
#include <unistd.h>
#include <autoopts/options.h>
int main( int argc, char** argv ) {
  char const* greeting = "Hello";
  char const* greeted  = "World";
  const tOptionValue* pOV = configFileLoad( "hello.conf" );

  if (pOV != NULL) {
    const tOptionValue* pGetV = optionGetValue( pOV, "greeting" );

    if (  (pGetV != NULL)
       && (pGetV->valType == OPARG_TYPE_STRING))
      greeting = strdup( pGetV->v.strVal );

    pGetV = optionGetValue( pOV, "personalize" );
    if (pGetV != NULL) {
      struct passwd* pwe = getpwuid( getuid() );
      if (pwe != NULL)
        greeted = strdup( pwe->pw_gecos );
    }

    optionUnloadNested( pOV ); /* deallocate config data */
  }
  printf( "%s, %s!\n", greeting, greeted );
  return 0;
}

With that text in a file named "hello.c", this short script:

cc -o hello hello.c `autoopts-config cflags ldflags`
./hello
echo 'greeting Buzz off' > hello.conf
./hello
echo personalize > hello.conf
./hello

will produce the following output (for me):

Hello, World!
Buzz off, World!
Hello, Bruce Korb!

7.10 Configuration File Format

The configuration file is designed to associate names and values, much like an AutoGen Definition File (see section Definitions File). Unfortunately, the file formats are different. Specifically, AutoGen Definitions provide for simpler methods for the precise control of a value string and provides for dynamically computed content. Configuration files have some established traditions in their layout. So, they are different, even though they do both allow for a single name to be associated with multiple values and they both allow for hierarchical values.

7.10.1 assigning a string value to a configurable

The basic syntax is a name followed by a value on a single line. They are separated from each other by either white space, a colon (:) or an equal sign (=). The colon or equal sign may optionally be surrounded by additional white space. If more than one value line is needed, a backslash (\) may be used to continue the value. The backslash (but not the newline) will be erased. Leading and trailing white space is always stripped from the value.

Fundamentally, it looks like this:

name  value for that name
name = another \
     multi-line value \
     for that name.
name: a *third* value for ``name''

If you need more control over the content of the value, you may enclose the value in XML style brackets:

<name>value </name>

Within these brackets you need not (must not) continue the value data with backslashes. You may also select the string formation rules to use, just add the attribute after the name, thus: <name keep>.

`keep'

This mode will keep all text between the brackets and not strip any white space.

`uncooked'

This mode strips leading and trailing white space, but not do any quote processing. This is the default and need not be specified.

`cooked'

Strings are formed and concatenated if, after stripping leading and trailing white space, the text begins and ends with either single (') or double (") quote characters. That processing is identical to the string formation used in AutoGen definition files (see section Basic Expression), except that you may not use backquotes.

And here is an example of an XML-styled value:

<name cooked>
    "This is\n\tanother multi-line\n"
    "\tstring example."
</name>

The string value associated with "name" will be exactly the text enclosed in quotes with the escaped characters "cooked" as you would expect (three text lines with the last line not ending with a newline, but ending with a period).

7.10.2 integer values

A name can be specified as having an integer value. To do this, you must use the XML-ish format and specify a "type" attribute for the name:

<name type=integer> 1234 </name>

Boolean, enumeration and set membership types will be added as time allows. "type=string" is also supported, but also is the default.

7.10.3 hierarchical values

In order to specify a hierarchical value, you *must* use XML-styled formatting, specifying a type that is shorter and easier to spell:

<structured-name type=nested>
    [[....]]
</structured-name>

The ellipsis may be filled with any legal configuration file name/value assignments.

7.10.4 configuration file sections

Configuration files may be sectioned. If, for example, you have a collection of programs that work closely together and, likely, have a common set of options, these programs may use a single, sectioned, configuration file. The file may be sectioned in either of two ways. The two ways may not be intermixed in a single configuration file. All text before the first segmentation line is processed, then only the segment that applies:

`[PROG_NAME]'

The file is partitioned by lines that contains an square open bracket ([), the upper-cased c-variable-syntax program name and a square close bracket (]). For example, if the prog-name program had a sectioned configuration file, then a line containing exactly `[PROG_NAME]' would be processed.

`<?program prog-name>'

The <? marker indicates an XML directive. The program directive is interpreted by the configuration file processor to segment the file in the same way as the `[PROG_NAME]' sectioning is done. Any other XML directives are treated as comments.

Segmentation does not apply if the config file is being parsed with the configFileLoad(3AutoOpts) function.

7.10.5 comments in the configuration file

Comments are lines beginning with a hash mark (#), XML-style comments (<!-- arbitrary text -->), and unrecognized XML directives.

# this is a comment
<!-- this is also
     a comment -->
<?this is
  a bad comment ;->

7.11 AutoOpts for Shell Scripts

AutoOpts may be used with shell scripts either by automatically creating a complete program that will process command line options and pass back the results to the invoking shell by issuing shell variable assignment commands, or it may be used to generate portable shell code that can be inserted into your script.

The functionality of these features, of course, is somewhat constrained compared with the normal program facilities. Specifically, you cannot invoke callout procedures with either of these methods. Additionally, if you generate a shell script to do the parsing:

1. You cannot obtain options from configuration files.
2. You cannot obtain options from environment variables.
3. You cannot save the option state to an option file.
4. Option conflict/requirement verification is disabled.

Both of these methods are enabled by running AutoGen on the definitions file with the additional global attribute:

test-main [ = proc-to-call ] ;

If you do not supply a proc-to-call, it will default to optionPutShell. That will produce a program that will process the options and generate shell text for the invoking shell to interpret (see section Parsing with an Executable). If you supply the name, optionParseShell, then you will have a program that will generate a shell script that can parse the options (see section Parsing with a Portable Script). If you supply a different procedure name, you will have to provide that routine and it may do whatever you like.

7.11.1 Parsing with an Executable

The following commands are approximately all that is needed to build a shell script command line option parser from an option definition file:

autogen -L <opt-template-dir> test-errors.def
cc -o test-errors -L <opt-lib-dir> -I <opt-include-dir> \
        -DTEST_PROGRAM_OPTS test-errors.c -lopts

The resulting program can then be used within your shell script as follows:

eval `./test-errors "$@"`
if [ -z "${OPTION_CT}" ] ; then exit 1 ; fi
test ${OPTION_CT} -gt 0 && shift ${OPTION_CT}

Here is the usage output example from AutoOpts error handling tests. The option definition has argument reordering enabled:

test_errors - Test AutoOpts for errors
USAGE:  errors [ -<flag> [<val>] | --<name>[{=| }<val>] ]... arg ...
  Flg Arg Option-Name    Description
   -o no  option         The option option descrip
   -s Str second         The second option descrip
                                - may appear up to 10 times
   -X no  another        Another option descrip
                                - may appear up to 5 times
   -? no  help           Display usage information and exit
   -! no  more-help      Extended usage information passed thru pager
   -> opt save-opts      Save the option state to a config file
   -< Str load-opts      Load options from a config file
                                - disabled as --no-load-opts
                                - may appear multiple times

Options are specified by doubled hyphens and their name
or by a single hyphen and the flag character.
Operands and options may be intermixed.  They will be reordered.

The following option preset mechanisms are supported:
 - reading file errorsRC

Using the invocation,

  test-errors operand1 -s first operand2 -X -- -s operand3

you get the following output for your shell script to evaluate:

OPTION_CT=4
export OPTION_CT
TEST_ERRORS_SECOND='first'
export TEST_ERRORS_SECOND
TEST_ERRORS_ANOTHER=1 # 0x1
export TEST_ERRORS_ANOTHER
set -- 'operand1' 'operand2' '-s' 'operand3'
OPTION_CT=0

7.11.2 Parsing with a Portable Script

If you had used test-main = optionParseShell instead, then you can, at this point, merely run the program and it will write the parsing script to standard out. You may also provide this program with command line options to specify the shell script file to create or edit, and you may specify the shell program to use on the first shell script line. That program's usage text would look something like the following and the script parser itself would be very verbose:

genshellopt - Generate Shell Option Processing Script - Ver. 1
USAGE:  genshellopt [ -<flag> [<val>] | --<name>[{=| }<val>] ]...
  Flg Arg Option-Name    Description
   -o Str script         Output Script File
   -s Str shell          Shell name (follows "#!" magic)
                                - disabled as --no-shell
                                - enabled by default
   -v opt version        Output version information and exit
   -? no  help           Display usage information and exit
   -! no  more-help      Extended usage information passed thru pager

Options are specified by doubled hyphens and their name
or by a single hyphen and the flag character.

Note that `shell' is only useful if the output file does not already
exist.  If it does, then the shell name and optional first argument
will be extracted from the script file.

If the script file already exists and contains Automated Option Processing
text, the second line of the file through the ending tag will be replaced
by the newly generated text.  The first `#!' line will be regenerated.

please send bug reports to:  autogen-users@lists.sourceforge.net

= = = = = = = =

This incarnation of genshell will produce
a shell script to parse the options for getdefs:

getdefs (GNU AutoGen) - AutoGen Definition Extraction Tool - Ver. 1.4
USAGE:  getdefs [ <option-name>[{=| }<val>] ]...
   Arg Option-Name    Description
   Str defs-to-get    Regexp to look for after the "/*="
   opt ordering       Alphabetize or use named file
   Num first-index    The first index to apply to groups
   Str input          Input file to search for defs
   Str subblock       subblock definition names
   Str listattr       attribute with list of values
   opt filelist       Insert source file names into defs
   Str assign         Global assignments
   Str common-assign  Assignments common to all blocks
   Str copy           File(s) to copy into definitions
   opt srcfile        Insert source file name into each def
   opt linenum        Insert source line number into each def
   Str output         Output file to open
   opt autogen        Invoke AutoGen with defs
   Str template       Template Name
   Str agarg          AutoGen Argument
   Str base-name      Base name for output file(s)
   opt version        Output version information and exit
   no  help           Display usage information and exit
   no  more-help      Extended usage information passed thru pager
   opt save-opts      Save the option state to a config file
   Str load-opts      Load options from a config file

All arguments are named options.

If no ``input'' argument is provided or is set to simply "-", and if
``stdin'' is not a ``tty'', then the list of input files will be
read from ``stdin''.

please send bug reports to:  autogen-users@lists.sourceforge.net

Resulting in the following script:

#! /bin/sh
# # # # # # # # # # -- do not modify this marker --
#
#  DO NOT EDIT THIS SECTION OF ./.ag-qskc4F/genshellopt.sh
#
#  From here to the next `-- do not modify this marker --',
#  the text has been generated Saturday September 30, 2006 at 12:34:33 PM PDT
#  From the GETDEFS option definitions
#
GETDEFS_LONGUSAGE_TEXT='getdefs (GNU AutoGen) - AutoGen Definition Extraction Tool - Ver. 1.4
USAGE:  getdefs [ <option-name>[{=| }<val>] ]...
   Arg Option-Name    Description
   Str defs-to-get    Regexp to look for after the "/*="
   opt ordering       Alphabetize or use named file
                                - disabled as --no-ordering
                                - enabled by default
   Num first-index    The first index to apply to groups
   Str input          Input file to search for defs
                                - may appear multiple times
                                - default option for unnamed options
   Str subblock       subblock definition names
                                - may appear multiple times
   Str listattr       attribute with list of values
                                - may appear multiple times
   opt filelist       Insert source file names into defs

Definition insertion options

   Arg Option-Name    Description
   Str assign         Global assignments
                                - may appear multiple times
   Str common-assign  Assignments common to all blocks
                                - may appear multiple times
   Str copy           File(s) to copy into definitions
                                - may appear multiple times
   opt srcfile        Insert source file name into each def
   opt linenum        Insert source line number into each def

Definition output disposition options:

   Arg Option-Name    Description
   Str output         Output file to open
                                - an alternate for autogen
   opt autogen        Invoke AutoGen with defs
                                - disabled as --no-autogen
                                - enabled by default
   Str template       Template Name
   Str agarg          AutoGen Argument
                                - prohibits these options:
                                output
                                - may appear multiple times
   Str base-name      Base name for output file(s)
                                - prohibits these options:
                                output

version and help options:

   Arg Option-Name    Description
   opt version        Output version information and exit
   no  help           Display usage information and exit
   no  more-help      Extended usage information passed thru pager
   opt save-opts      Save the option state to a config file
   Str load-opts      Load options from a config file
                                - disabled as --no-load-opts
                                - may appear multiple times

All arguments are named options.

If no ``input'\'''\'' argument is provided or is set to simply "-", and if
``stdin'\'''\'' is not a ``tty'\'''\'', then the list of input files will be
read from ``stdin'\'''\''.

The following option preset mechanisms are supported:
 - reading file /dev/null

This program extracts AutoGen definitions from a list of source files.
Definitions are delimited by `/*=<entry-type> <entry-name>\n'\'' and
`=*/\n'\''.  From that, this program creates a definition of the
following form:

    #line nnn "source-file-name"
    entry_type = {
        name = entry_name;
        ...
    };

The ellipsis '\''...'\'' is filled in by text found between the two
delimiters, with everything up through the first sequence of
asterisks deleted on every line.

There are two special ``entry types'\'''\'':

*  The entry_type enclosure and the name entry will be omitted
   and the ellipsis will become top-level definitions.

-- The contents of the comment must be a single getdefs option.
   The option name must follow the double hyphen and its argument
   will be everything following the name.  This is intended for use
   with the ``subblock'\'''\'' and ``listattr'\'''\'' options.

please send bug reports to:  autogen-users@lists.sourceforge.net'

GETDEFS_USAGE_TEXT='getdefs (GNU AutoGen) - AutoGen Definition Extraction Tool - Ver. 1.4
USAGE:  getdefs [ <option-name>[{=| }<val>] ]...
   Arg Option-Name    Description
   Str defs-to-get    Regexp to look for after the "/*="
   opt ordering       Alphabetize or use named file
   Num first-index    The first index to apply to groups
   Str input          Input file to search for defs
   Str subblock       subblock definition names
   Str listattr       attribute with list of values
   opt filelist       Insert source file names into defs
   Str assign         Global assignments
   Str common-assign  Assignments common to all blocks
   Str copy           File(s) to copy into definitions
   opt srcfile        Insert source file name into each def
   opt linenum        Insert source line number into each def
   Str output         Output file to open
   opt autogen        Invoke AutoGen with defs
   Str template       Template Name
   Str agarg          AutoGen Argument
   Str base-name      Base name for output file(s)
   opt version        Output version information and exit
   no  help           Display usage information and exit
   no  more-help      Extended usage information passed thru pager
   opt save-opts      Save the option state to a config file
   Str load-opts      Load options from a config file

All arguments are named options.

If no ``input'\'''\'' argument is provided or is set to simply "-", and if
``stdin'\'''\'' is not a ``tty'\'''\'', then the list of input files will be
read from ``stdin'\'''\''.

please send bug reports to:  autogen-users@lists.sourceforge.net'


GETDEFS_DEFS_TO_GET="${GETDEFS_DEFS_TO_GET}"
GETDEFS_DEFS_TO_GET_set=false
export GETDEFS_DEFS_TO_GET

GETDEFS_ORDERING="${GETDEFS_ORDERING}"
GETDEFS_ORDERING_set=false
export GETDEFS_ORDERING

GETDEFS_FIRST_INDEX="${GETDEFS_FIRST_INDEX-'0'}"
GETDEFS_FIRST_INDEX_set=false
export GETDEFS_FIRST_INDEX

if test -z "${GETDEFS_INPUT}"
then
  GETDEFS_INPUT_CT=0
else
  GETDEFS_INPUT_CT=1
  GETDEFS_INPUT_1="${GETDEFS_INPUT}"
fi
export GETDEFS_INPUT_CT
if test -z "${GETDEFS_SUBBLOCK}"
then
  GETDEFS_SUBBLOCK_CT=0
else
  GETDEFS_SUBBLOCK_CT=1
  GETDEFS_SUBBLOCK_1="${GETDEFS_SUBBLOCK}"
fi
export GETDEFS_SUBBLOCK_CT
if test -z "${GETDEFS_LISTATTR}"
then
  GETDEFS_LISTATTR_CT=0
else
  GETDEFS_LISTATTR_CT=1
  GETDEFS_LISTATTR_1="${GETDEFS_LISTATTR}"
fi
export GETDEFS_LISTATTR_CT
GETDEFS_FILELIST="${GETDEFS_FILELIST}"
GETDEFS_FILELIST_set=false
export GETDEFS_FILELIST

if test -z "${GETDEFS_ASSIGN}"
then
  GETDEFS_ASSIGN_CT=0
else
  GETDEFS_ASSIGN_CT=1
  GETDEFS_ASSIGN_1="${GETDEFS_ASSIGN}"
fi
export GETDEFS_ASSIGN_CT
if test -z "${GETDEFS_COMMON_ASSIGN}"
then
  GETDEFS_COMMON_ASSIGN_CT=0
else
  GETDEFS_COMMON_ASSIGN_CT=1
  GETDEFS_COMMON_ASSIGN_1="${GETDEFS_COMMON_ASSIGN}"
fi
export GETDEFS_COMMON_ASSIGN_CT
if test -z "${GETDEFS_COPY}"
then
  GETDEFS_COPY_CT=0
else
  GETDEFS_COPY_CT=1
  GETDEFS_COPY_1="${GETDEFS_COPY}"
fi
export GETDEFS_COPY_CT
GETDEFS_SRCFILE="${GETDEFS_SRCFILE}"
GETDEFS_SRCFILE_set=false
export GETDEFS_SRCFILE

GETDEFS_LINENUM="${GETDEFS_LINENUM}"
GETDEFS_LINENUM_set=false
export GETDEFS_LINENUM

GETDEFS_OUTPUT="${GETDEFS_OUTPUT}"
GETDEFS_OUTPUT_set=false
export GETDEFS_OUTPUT

GETDEFS_AUTOGEN="${GETDEFS_AUTOGEN}"
GETDEFS_AUTOGEN_set=false
export GETDEFS_AUTOGEN

GETDEFS_TEMPLATE="${GETDEFS_TEMPLATE}"
GETDEFS_TEMPLATE_set=false
export GETDEFS_TEMPLATE

if test -z "${GETDEFS_AGARG}"
then
  GETDEFS_AGARG_CT=0
else
  GETDEFS_AGARG_CT=1
  GETDEFS_AGARG_1="${GETDEFS_AGARG}"
fi
export GETDEFS_AGARG_CT
GETDEFS_BASE_NAME="${GETDEFS_BASE_NAME}"
GETDEFS_BASE_NAME_set=false
export GETDEFS_BASE_NAME

OPT_ARG="$1"

while [ $# -gt 0 ]
do
    OPT_ELEMENT=''
    OPT_ARG_VAL=''

    OPT_ARG="${1}"
        OPT_CODE=`echo "X${OPT_ARG}"|sed 's/^X-*//'`
        shift
        OPT_ARG="$1"

        case "${OPT_CODE}" in *=* )
            OPT_ARG_VAL=`echo "${OPT_CODE}"|sed 's/^[^=]*=//'`
            OPT_CODE=`echo "${OPT_CODE}"|sed 's/=.*$//'` ;; esac

        case "${OPT_CODE}" in
        'de' | \
        'def' | \
        'defs' | \
        'defs-' | \
        'defs-t' | \
        'defs-to' | \
        'defs-to-' | \
        'defs-to-g' | \
        'defs-to-ge' | \
        'defs-to-get' )
            if [ -n "${GETDEFS_DEFS_TO_GET}" ] && ${GETDEFS_DEFS_TO_GET_set} ; then
                echo Error:  duplicate DEFS_TO_GET option >&2
                echo "$GETDEFS_USAGE_TEXT"
                exit 1 ; fi
            GETDEFS_DEFS_TO_GET_set=true
            OPT_NAME='DEFS_TO_GET'
            OPT_ARG_NEEDED=YES
            ;;

        'or' | \
        'ord' | \
        'orde' | \
        'order' | \
        'orderi' | \
        'orderin' | \
        'ordering' )
            if [ -n "${GETDEFS_ORDERING}" ] && ${GETDEFS_ORDERING_set} ; then
                echo Error:  duplicate ORDERING option >&2
                echo "$GETDEFS_USAGE_TEXT"
                exit 1 ; fi
            GETDEFS_ORDERING_set=true
            OPT_NAME='ORDERING'
            eval GETDEFS_ORDERING${OPT_ELEMENT}=true
            export GETDEFS_ORDERING${OPT_ELEMENT}
            OPT_ARG_NEEDED=OK
            ;;

        'no-o' | \
        'no-or' | \
        'no-ord' | \
        'no-orde' | \
        'no-order' | \
        'no-orderi' | \
        'no-orderin' | \
        'no-ordering' )
            if [ -n "${GETDEFS_ORDERING}" ] && ${GETDEFS_ORDERING_set} ; then
                echo Error:  duplicate ORDERING option >&2
                echo "$GETDEFS_USAGE_TEXT"
                exit 1 ; fi
            GETDEFS_ORDERING_set=true
            GETDEFS_ORDERING='no'
            export GETDEFS_ORDERING
            OPT_NAME='ORDERING'
            OPT_ARG_NEEDED=NO
            ;;

        'fir' | \
        'firs' | \
        'first' | \
        'first-' | \
        'first-i' | \
        'first-in' | \
        'first-ind' | \
        'first-inde' | \
        'first-index' )
            if [ -n "${GETDEFS_FIRST_INDEX}" ] && ${GETDEFS_FIRST_INDEX_set} ; then
                echo Error:  duplicate FIRST_INDEX option >&2
                echo "$GETDEFS_USAGE_TEXT"
                exit 1 ; fi
            GETDEFS_FIRST_INDEX_set=true
            OPT_NAME='FIRST_INDEX'
            OPT_ARG_NEEDED=YES
            ;;

        'in' | \
        'inp' | \
        'inpu' | \
        'input' )
            GETDEFS_INPUT_CT=`expr ${GETDEFS_INPUT_CT} + 1`
            OPT_ELEMENT="_${GETDEFS_INPUT_CT}"
            OPT_NAME='INPUT'
            OPT_ARG_NEEDED=YES
            ;;

        'su' | \
        'sub' | \
        'subb' | \
        'subbl' | \
        'subblo' | \
        'subbloc' | \
        'subblock' )
            GETDEFS_SUBBLOCK_CT=`expr ${GETDEFS_SUBBLOCK_CT} + 1`
            OPT_ELEMENT="_${GETDEFS_SUBBLOCK_CT}"
            OPT_NAME='SUBBLOCK'
            OPT_ARG_NEEDED=YES
            ;;

        'lis' | \
        'list' | \
        'lista' | \
        'listat' | \
        'listatt' | \
        'listattr' )
            GETDEFS_LISTATTR_CT=`expr ${GETDEFS_LISTATTR_CT} + 1`
            OPT_ELEMENT="_${GETDEFS_LISTATTR_CT}"
            OPT_NAME='LISTATTR'
            OPT_ARG_NEEDED=YES
            ;;

        'fil' | \
        'file' | \
        'filel' | \
        'fileli' | \
        'filelis' | \
        'filelist' )
            if [ -n "${GETDEFS_FILELIST}" ] && ${GETDEFS_FILELIST_set} ; then
                echo Error:  duplicate FILELIST option >&2
                echo "$GETDEFS_USAGE_TEXT"
                exit 1 ; fi
            GETDEFS_FILELIST_set=true
            OPT_NAME='FILELIST'
            eval GETDEFS_FILELIST${OPT_ELEMENT}=true
            export GETDEFS_FILELIST${OPT_ELEMENT}
            OPT_ARG_NEEDED=OK
            ;;

        'as' | \
        'ass' | \
        'assi' | \
        'assig' | \
        'assign' )
            GETDEFS_ASSIGN_CT=`expr ${GETDEFS_ASSIGN_CT} + 1`
            OPT_ELEMENT="_${GETDEFS_ASSIGN_CT}"
            OPT_NAME='ASSIGN'
            OPT_ARG_NEEDED=YES
            ;;

        'com' | \
        'comm' | \
        'commo' | \
        'common' | \
        'common-' | \
        'common-a' | \
        'common-as' | \
        'common-ass' | \
        'common-assi' | \
        'common-assig' | \
        'common-assign' )
            GETDEFS_COMMON_ASSIGN_CT=`expr ${GETDEFS_COMMON_ASSIGN_CT} + 1`
            OPT_ELEMENT="_${GETDEFS_COMMON_ASSIGN_CT}"
            OPT_NAME='COMMON_ASSIGN'
            OPT_ARG_NEEDED=YES
            ;;

        'cop' | \
        'copy' )
            GETDEFS_COPY_CT=`expr ${GETDEFS_COPY_CT} + 1`
            OPT_ELEMENT="_${GETDEFS_COPY_CT}"
            OPT_NAME='COPY'
            OPT_ARG_NEEDED=YES
            ;;

        'sr' | \
        'src' | \
        'srcf' | \
        'srcfi' | \
        'srcfil' | \
        'srcfile' )
            if [ -n "${GETDEFS_SRCFILE}" ] && ${GETDEFS_SRCFILE_set} ; then
                echo Error:  duplicate SRCFILE option >&2
                echo "$GETDEFS_USAGE_TEXT"
                exit 1 ; fi
            GETDEFS_SRCFILE_set=true
            OPT_NAME='SRCFILE'
            eval GETDEFS_SRCFILE${OPT_ELEMENT}=true
            export GETDEFS_SRCFILE${OPT_ELEMENT}
            OPT_ARG_NEEDED=OK
            ;;

        'lin' | \
        'line' | \
        'linen' | \
        'linenu' | \
        'linenum' )
            if [ -n "${GETDEFS_LINENUM}" ] && ${GETDEFS_LINENUM_set} ; then
                echo Error:  duplicate LINENUM option >&2
                echo "$GETDEFS_USAGE_TEXT"
                exit 1 ; fi
            GETDEFS_LINENUM_set=true
            OPT_NAME='LINENUM'
            eval GETDEFS_LINENUM${OPT_ELEMENT}=true
            export GETDEFS_LINENUM${OPT_ELEMENT}
            OPT_ARG_NEEDED=OK
            ;;

        'ou' | \
        'out' | \
        'outp' | \
        'outpu' | \
        'output' )
            if [ -n "${GETDEFS_OUTPUT}" ] && ${GETDEFS_OUTPUT_set} ; then
                echo Error:  duplicate OUTPUT option >&2
                echo "$GETDEFS_USAGE_TEXT"
                exit 1 ; fi
            GETDEFS_OUTPUT_set=true
            OPT_NAME='OUTPUT'
            OPT_ARG_NEEDED=YES
            ;;

        'au' | \
        'aut' | \
        'auto' | \
        'autog' | \
        'autoge' | \
        'autogen' )
            if [ -n "${GETDEFS_AUTOGEN}" ] && ${GETDEFS_AUTOGEN_set} ; then
                echo Error:  duplicate AUTOGEN option >&2
                echo "$GETDEFS_USAGE_TEXT"
                exit 1 ; fi
            GETDEFS_AUTOGEN_set=true
            OPT_NAME='AUTOGEN'
            eval GETDEFS_AUTOGEN${OPT_ELEMENT}=true
            export GETDEFS_AUTOGEN${OPT_ELEMENT}
            OPT_ARG_NEEDED=OK
            ;;

        'no-a' | \
        'no-au' | \
        'no-aut' | \
        'no-auto' | \
        'no-autog' | \
        'no-autoge' | \
        'no-autogen' )
            if [ -n "${GETDEFS_AUTOGEN}" ] && ${GETDEFS_AUTOGEN_set} ; then
                echo Error:  duplicate AUTOGEN option >&2
                echo "$GETDEFS_USAGE_TEXT"
                exit 1 ; fi
            GETDEFS_AUTOGEN_set=true
            GETDEFS_AUTOGEN='no'
            export GETDEFS_AUTOGEN
            OPT_NAME='AUTOGEN'
            OPT_ARG_NEEDED=NO
            ;;

        'te' | \
        'tem' | \
        'temp' | \
        'templ' | \
        'templa' | \
        'templat' | \
        'template' )
            if [ -n "${GETDEFS_TEMPLATE}" ] && ${GETDEFS_TEMPLATE_set} ; then
                echo Error:  duplicate TEMPLATE option >&2
                echo "$GETDEFS_USAGE_TEXT"
                exit 1 ; fi
            GETDEFS_TEMPLATE_set=true
            OPT_NAME='TEMPLATE'
            OPT_ARG_NEEDED=YES
            ;;

        'ag' | \
        'aga' | \
        'agar' | \
        'agarg' )
            GETDEFS_AGARG_CT=`expr ${GETDEFS_AGARG_CT} + 1`
            OPT_ELEMENT="_${GETDEFS_AGARG_CT}"
            OPT_NAME='AGARG'
            OPT_ARG_NEEDED=YES
            ;;

        'ba' | \
        'bas' | \
        'base' | \
        'base-' | \
        'base-n' | \
        'base-na' | \
        'base-nam' | \
        'base-name' )
            if [ -n "${GETDEFS_BASE_NAME}" ] && ${GETDEFS_BASE_NAME_set} ; then
                echo Error:  duplicate BASE_NAME option >&2
                echo "$GETDEFS_USAGE_TEXT"
                exit 1 ; fi
            GETDEFS_BASE_NAME_set=true
            OPT_NAME='BASE_NAME'
            OPT_ARG_NEEDED=YES
            ;;

        've' | \
        'ver' | \
        'vers' | \
        'versi' | \
        'versio' | \
        'version' )
            echo "$GETDEFS_LONGUSAGE_TEXT"
            exit 0
            ;;

        'he' | \
        'hel' | \
        'help' )
            echo "$GETDEFS_LONGUSAGE_TEXT"
            exit 0
            ;;

        'mo' | \
        'mor' | \
        'more' | \
        'more-' | \
        'more-h' | \
        'more-he' | \
        'more-hel' | \
        'more-help' )
            echo "$GETDEFS_LONGUSAGE_TEXT" | ${PAGER-more}
            exit 0
            ;;

        'sa' | \
        'sav' | \
        'save' | \
        'save-' | \
        'save-o' | \
        'save-op' | \
        'save-opt' | \
        'save-opts' )
            echo 'Warning:  Cannot save options files' >&2
            OPT_ARG_NEEDED=OK
            ;;

        'lo' | \
        'loa' | \
        'load' | \
        'load-' | \
        'load-o' | \
        'load-op' | \
        'load-opt' | \
        'load-opts' )
            echo 'Warning:  Cannot load options files' >&2
            OPT_ARG_NEEDED=YES
            ;;

        'no-l' | \
        'no-lo' | \
        'no-loa' | \
        'no-load' | \
        'no-load-' | \
        'no-load-o' | \
        'no-load-op' | \
        'no-load-opt' | \
        'no-load-opts' )
            echo 'Warning:  Cannot suppress the loading of options files' >&2
            OPT_ARG_NEEDED=NO
            ;;

        * )
            echo Unknown option: "${OPT_CODE}" >&2
            echo "$GETDEFS_USAGE_TEXT"
            exit 1
            ;;
        esac

        case "${OPT_ARG_NEEDED}" in
        NO )
            OPT_ARG_VAL=''
            ;;

        YES )
            if [ -z "${OPT_ARG_VAL}" ]
            then
                if [ $# -eq 0 ]
                then
                    echo No argument provided for ${OPT_NAME} option >&2
                    echo "$GETDEFS_USAGE_TEXT"
                    exit 1
                fi

                OPT_ARG_VAL="${OPT_ARG}"
                shift
                OPT_ARG="$1"
            fi
            ;;

        OK )
            if [ -z "${OPT_ARG_VAL}" ] && [ $# -gt 0 ]
            then
                case "${OPT_ARG}" in -* ) ;; * )
                    OPT_ARG_VAL="${OPT_ARG}"
                    shift
                    OPT_ARG="$1" ;; esac
            fi
            ;;
        esac
    if [ -n "${OPT_ARG_VAL}" ]
    then
        eval GETDEFS_${OPT_NAME}${OPT_ELEMENT}="'${OPT_ARG_VAL}'"
        export GETDEFS_${OPT_NAME}${OPT_ELEMENT}
    fi
done

unset OPT_PROCESS || :
unset OPT_ELEMENT || :
unset OPT_ARG || :
unset OPT_ARG_NEEDED || :
unset OPT_NAME || :
unset OPT_CODE || :
unset OPT_ARG_VAL || :

# # # # # # # # # #
#
#  END OF AUTOMATED OPTION PROCESSING
#
# # # # # # # # # # -- do not modify this marker --

env | egrep GETDEFS_

7.12 Automated Info Docs

AutoOpts provides two templates for producing `.texi' documentation. `aginfo.tpl' for the invoking section, and `aginfo3.tpl' for describing exported library functions and macros.

For both types of documents, the documentation level is selected by passing a `-DLEVEL=<level-name>' argument to AutoGen when you build the document. (See the example invocation below.)

Two files will be produced, a `.texi' file and a `.menu' file. You should include the `.menu' file in your document where you wish to reference the `invoking' chapter, section or subsection.

The `.texi' file will contain an introductory paragraph, a menu and a subordinate section for the invocation usage and for each documented option. The introductory paragraph is normally the boiler plate text, along the lines of:

This chapter documents the @file{AutoOpts} generated usage text
and option meanings for the @file{your-program} program.

or:

These are the publicly exported procedures from the libname library.
Any other functions mentioned in the header file are for the private use
of the library.

7.12.1 "invoking" info docs

Using the option definitions for an AutoOpt client program, the `aginfo.tpl' template will produce texinfo text that documents the invocation of your program. The text emitted is designed to be included in the full texinfo document for your product. It is not a stand-alone document. The usage text for the autogen usage help (-?), getdefs usage help and columns usage help (-?) programs, are included in this document and are all generated using this template.

If your program's option definitions include a `prog-info-descrip' section, then that text will replace the boilerplate introductory paragraph.

These files are produced by invoking the following command:

autogen -L ${prefix}/share/autogen -T aginfo.tpl \
        -DLEVEL=section your-opts.def

Where `${prefix}' is the AutoGen installation prefix and `your-opts.def' is the name of your product's option definition file.

7.12.2 library info docs

The `texinfo' doc for libraries is derived from mostly the same information as is used for producing man pages See section library man pages. The main difference is that there is only one output file and the individual functions are referenced from a .texi menu. There is also a small difference in the global attributes used:

These files are produced by invoking the following commands:

getdefs linenum srcfile template=aginfo3.tpl output=libexport.def \
       <source-file-list>

autogen -L ${prefix}/share/autogen -DLEVEL=section libexport.def

Where `${prefix}' is the AutoGen installation prefix and `libexport.def' is some name that suits you.

An example of this can be seen in this document, See section libopts External Procedures.

7.13 Automated Man Pages

AutoOpts provides two templates for producing man pages. The command (`man1') pages are derived from the options definition file, and the library (`man3') pages are derived from stylized comments (see section Invoking getdefs).

7.13.1 command line man pages

Using the option definitions for an AutoOpts client program, the `agman1.tpl' template will produce an nroff document suitable for use as a `man(1)' page document for a command line command. The description section of the document is either the `prog-man-descrip' text, if present, or the `detail' text.

Each option in the option definitions file is fully documented in its usage. This includes all the information documented above for each option (see section Option Attributes), plus the `doc' attribute is appended. Since the `doc' text is presumed to be designed for texinfo documentation, sed is used to convert some constructs from texi to nroff-for-man-pages. Specifically,

convert @code, @var and @samp into \fB...\fP phrases
convert @file into \fI...\fP phrases
Remove the '@' prefix from curly braces
Indent example regions
Delete the example commands
Replace `end example' command with ".br"
Replace the `@*' command with ".br"

This document is produced by invoking the following command:

autogen -L ${prefix}/share/autogen -T agman1.tpl options.def

Where `${prefix}' is the AutoGen installation prefix and `options.def' is the name of your product's option definition file. I do not use this very much, so any feedback or improvements would be greatly appreciated.

7.13.2 library man pages

Two global definitions are required, and then one library man page is produced for each export_func definition that is found. It is generally convenient to place these definitions as `getdefs' comments (see section Invoking getdefs) near the procedure definition, but they may also be a separate AutoGen definitions file (see section Definitions File). Each function will be cross referenced with their sister functions in a `SEE ALSO' section. A global see_also definition will be appended to this cross referencing text.

The two global definitions required are:

The export_func definition should contain the following attributes:

As a `getdefs' comment, this would appear something like this:

/*=--subblock=arg=arg_type,arg_name,arg_desc =*/
/*=*
 * library: opts
 * header:  your-opts.h
=*/
/*=export_func optionProcess
 *
 * what: this is the main option processing routine
 * arg:  + tOptions* + pOpts + program options descriptor +
 * arg:  + int       + argc  + program arg count  +
 * arg:  + char**    + argv  + program arg vector +
 * ret_type:  int
 * ret_desc:  the count of the arguments processed
 *
 * doc:  This is what it does.
 * err:  When it can't, it does this.
=*/

Note the subblock and library comments. subblock is an embedded `getdefs' option (see section subblock option) that tells it how to parse the arg attribute. The library and header entries are global definitions that apply to all the documented functions.

7.14 Using getopt(3C)

There is now a template named, "getopt.tpl" that is distributed with autoopts. With it, you will have another source file generated for you that will utilize either the standard getopt(3C) or the GNU getopt_long(3GNU) function for parsing the command line arguments. Which is used is selected by the presence or absence of the long-opts program attribute. It will save you from being dependent upon the libopts library and it produces code ready for internationalization. However, it also carries with it some limitations on the use of AutoOpts features:

1. You cannot automatically take advantage of environment variable options or rc (ini) files.
2. You cannot use set membership, enumerated, range checked or stacked argument type options. In fact, you cannot use anything that depends upon the libopts library. You are constrained to options that take "string" arguments, though you may handle the option argument with a callback procedure.
3. You must specify every option as "settable" because the emitted code depends upon the SET_OPT_XXX macros having been defined.
4. You must specify a main procedure of type "main". The `getopt.tpl' template depends upon being able to compile the traditional .c file into a program and get it to emit the usage text.
5. For the same reason, the traditional option parsing table code must be emitted before the `getopt.tpl' template gets expanded.
6. The usage text is, therefore, statically defined.
7. You must supply some compile and link options via environment variables.

   `srcdir'

   In case the option definition file lives in a different directory.

   `CFLAGS'

   Any special flags required to compile. This should minimally include the output from running the autoopts-config cflags script.

   `LDFLAGS'

   Any special flags required to link. This should minimally include the output from running the autoopts-config ldflags script.

   `CC'

   Set this only if "cc" cannot be found in $PATH (or it is not the one you want).

To use this, set the exported environment variables and then invoke autogen twice, in the following order:

autogen myprog-opts.def
autogen -T getopt.tpl myprog-opts.def

and you will have three new files: `myprog-opts.h', `myprog-opts.c', and `getopt-progname.c', where "progname" is the name specified with the global prog-name attribute in the option definition file.

7.15 Internationalizing AutoOpts

The generated code for AutoOpts will enable and disable the translation of AutoOpts run time messages. If ENABLE_NLS is defined at compile time, then the _() macro may be used to specify a translation function. If undefined, it will default to gettext(3GNU). This define will also enable a callback function that optionProcess invokes at the beginning of option processing. The AutoOpts libopts library will always check for this "compiled with NLS" flag, so libopts does not need to be specially compiled. The strings returned by the translation function will be strdup(3)-ed and kept. They will not be re-translated, even if the locale changes, but they will also not be dependent upon reused or unmappable memory.

To internationalize option processing, you should first internationalize your program. Then, the option processing strings can be added to your translation text by processing the AutoOpts-generated `my-opts.c' file and adding the distributed `po/usage-txt.pot' file. (Also by extracting the strings yourself from the `usage-txt.h' file.) When you call optionProcess, all of the user visible AutoOpts strings will be passed through the localization procedure established with the _() preprocessing macro.

7.16 Naming Conflicts

AutoOpts generates a header file that contains many C preprocessing macros and several external names. For the most part, they begin with either opt_ or option, or else they end with _opt. If this happens to conflict with other macros you are using, or if you are compiling multiple option sets in the same compilation unit, the conflicts can be avoided. You may specify an external name prefix (see section Program Description Attributes) for all of the names generated for each set of option definitions.

Among these macros, several take an option name as a macro argument. Sometimes, this will inconveniently conflict. For example, if you specify an option named, debug, the emitted code will presume that DEBUG is not a preprocessing name. Or also, if you are building on a Windows platform, you may find that MicroSoft has usurped a number of user space names in its header files. Consequently, you will get a preprocessing error if you use, for example, HAVE_OPT(DEBUG) or HAVE_OPT(INTERNAL) (see section HAVE_OPT( <NAME> ) - Have this option?) in your code. You may trigger an obvious warning for such conflicts by specifying the guard-option-names attribute (see section Program Description Attributes). That emitted code will also #undef-ine the conflicting name.

This document was generated by Bruce Korb on September, 30 2006 using texi2html 1.76.