Hacenada

Write do-nothing scripts in a declarative (ini) syntax

Installation

pip install hacenada

Usage

hacenada start example/release.toml
... interact with the first step

hacenada next
... interact with the second step

Quick syntax reference

You must include a [hacenada] section at the top, with name and optional description.

Then create as many [[step]] sections as you want.

The minimum for a step is a single message = "the message" entry under each [[step]].

Example

(Save this as install-hacenada.toml.)

[hacenada]
name = "Install hacenada"
description = """
This will walk you through the installation of Hacenada. Installing hacenada is fun to do!
"""

[[step]]
message = """
First, use pip to install hacenada from pypi.

`pip install hacenada`
"""


[[step]]
message = "that was it, you're done"

Then run it:

hacenada start install-hacenada.toml

You will be shown the first step. To continue:

hacenada next

You will be shown the second step.

After the second step, since there are no more steps, Hacenada saves a log of the whole session to install-hacenada.log.d/.

Command reference

• hacenada start <filename.toml>

  Start running a Hacenada script. Hacenada checks to see if you have previously started running this script. If so, you will see an error.

  You may add --start-over to restart the script fresh.

• hacenada next [optional filename.toml]

  Continue running a script at the next step.

  The filename is usually optional here. (If the directory contains multiple scripts and you have previously started more than one of them, you will see an error and you should specify which script you meant.)

• hacenada print [--format=...] [optional filename.toml]

  Print the script and optionally the answers to each step, in one of three formats: json, toml (the default), or markdown. If any steps have been answered, hacenada print will include those answers by default.

  The filename is optional and works the same way as with hacenada next.

Syntax reference

Top level sections

• [hacenada]

  • name =

    The name of the script, which will be shown at each step.

  • description =

    A longer description of the script.

• [step] or [[step]]

  (NOTE: You will almost always see the second form, with two brackets, for readability's sake.)

  The list of steps that will be shown one after the other.

  The two bracket [[step]] form is TOML syntax; the contents of the [step] section is actually a list. In TOML, [[step]] just adds one item to that list. Just follow the examples, and use [[step]] if this seems confusing.

Properties of [[step]]

• message =

  The text that will be displayed for the step. You may make this multiline by using TOML """ syntax, see examples.

• type = (optional; default "message")

  The step question type. Valid types are:

  • message: displays the message, with a confirmation prompt. confirm is an alias for the same type, and may be used interchangeably.
  • input: ask the user to type in some free text
  • description: asks for the user to type in a description. This is saved like input, but the description is also displayed before each step (after this one), and also used as part of the log file name.
  • TODO: editor, choice, run, password, others.

  It is recommended that you include a type="description" step somewhere near the beginning.

• label = (optional; default is autogenerated)

  Assign a label id to this step. If not specified, the step is given a label which includes the type and the step number, for example, message-11.

• stop = (optional; default true)

  Whether to stop the script after this step. By default, hacenada shows one step and then stop. You are expected to run hacenada next to see the next step.

  If you set stop = false on a step, hacenada will show the next step without exiting.

Roadmap

• Steps:

  • Add support for running bash (or python?) code, with answer=stdout/stderr
  • Add support for input via choice inputs, text editor inputs

• Rendering options:

  • ipynb rendering support
  • Display markdown more prettily in a text terminal

• Backend options:

  • cloud service for storage backend

Change Log

0.1.3 - 2022.06.07

Changed:

• State and configuration (not logs) are now stored according to the XDG Base Directory Spec and generally live in ~/.config/hacenada
• Switch to pyproject.toml & poetry for maintenance

Fixed:

• Tests

0.1.2 - 2021.01.14

• First numbered release.
• Current features:
  • Parse a toml script (only type=description and type=message for now)
  • Display questions and save answers in a tinydb
  • Recover state between runs, or start over
  • After the last step, write a log with what happened
  • Markdown, TOML and JSON print output of the script+answers
  • Python 3.7, 3.8, 3.9 support