Sphinx CLI Help

Introduction

This project is a template for creating a command line interface for a Sphinx project.

Once a Sphinx project is built, the objects.inv file contains a list of all the objects in the project.

This project converts the objects.inv created by Sphinx Docs into a command line interface that allows for quick searching and launching the online help from the command line.

This project is designed as a template. Using this template for your own project means that you can create and publish CLI package for any Sphinx project with very little configuration and No coding necessary.

Getting Started

Create your own project by click the Use this template on GitHub.

The pyproject.toml file

Edit the pyproject.toml file and change the following:

See the Configure in the Wiki for more information

[tool.template.metadata]
pkg_out_name = "my_custom_help"
entry_point_name = "my-help"
build_dir = "build"
build_readme="sphinx_cli_help/README.md"
build_license=""

[tool.poetry]
name = "custom-sphinx-help"
version = "0.1.0"
description = "Command Line Help for my Custom Sphinx Project"
authors = ["Author Name <author@email.com>"]
license = "MIT"
readme = "README.md"

The config.json file

The file is found in the sphinx_cli_help folder.

There are many configuration options available in the config.json file. See the config.json in the Wiki for more information.

To get started just change the url_prefix to the URL of your Sphinx project. and the name to the name of your project. Keep then name short and simple as it is used in the command line search options.

{
  "url_prefix": [
        {
            "index": 0,
            "url": "https://python-ooo-dev-tools.readthedocs.io/en/latest/",
            "name": "OooDev"
        }
    ]
}

Database

Under the hood a SQLite database is used to store the data parsed from objects.inv file.

See the Import in the Wiki for more information.

To create the Database for your Sphinx project, run the following command:

python -m app data init -i

To import a objects.inv file into a database, run the following command:

python -m app data update -u https://www.example.com/objects.inv

Run the following command to see the options for the update command:

python -m app data update -h

Searching

To search the database, run the following command:

Note: The cli-hlp command name will change when your project is built. It is set by the entry_point_name in the pyproject.toml file.

cli-hlp hlp -s "search term"

Will give a result something like this:

$ cli-hlp hlp -s Write.append
Namespace(command='hlp', search=['Write.append'], leading=True, trailing=True, case_sensitive=False, limit=10, exclude=None, role='any')

Choose an option (default 1):
[0],  Cancel (or press q followed by enter)
[1],  ooodev.office.write.Write.append                                 - method     - py
[2],  ooodev.office.write.Write.append_date_time                       - method     - py
[3],  ooodev.office.write.Write.append_line                            - method     - py
[4],  ooodev.office.write.Write.append_para                            - method     - py

There are many options available for the hlp command.

Run the following command to see the options for the hlp command:

cli-hlp hlp -h

In this example, the Write.append method was found in the ooodev.office.write module. A list of matching results is displayed and the user is asked to choose an option.

Choosing 2 and pressing enter will display the URL and open it in default browser:

2
https://python-ooo-dev-tools.readthedocs.io/en/latest/src/office/write.html#ooodev.office.write.Write.append_date_time

Read the Wiki for the rest.

Example Project

For an example of a project that uses this template, see OooDev CLI Help

LICENSE

This project is Licensed under the MIT License.

The MIT License (MIT)

Copyright 2023 :Barry-Thomas-Paul: Moss

Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy of this software and associated documentation files (the “Software”), to deal in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions:

The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in all copies or substantial portions of the Software.

THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED “AS IS”, WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM, OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE SOFTWARE.