Suggestion: show tidal models in help

[bjarnebuchmann]

This is a suggestion regarding the script-API, eg compute_tidal_elevations.py
It falls squarely in "nice-to-have", so no rush to implement. This is not a bug report.

The --help for --tide/-T does not show the (hard-coded) choices, which are available.

It is possible to get the list if a wrong value is given on purpose, for instance:

python3 compute_tidal_elevations.py . . . --tide=BUMMER . . 
. . .
usage: compute_tidal_elevations.py [-h] [--directory DIRECTORY] [--tide TIDE] [--atlas-format {OTIS,netcdf}]
                                   [--gzip] [--definition-file DEFINITION_FILE]
                                   [--format {csv,netCDF4,HDF5,geotiff}]
                                   [--variables VARIABLES [VARIABLES ...]] [--header HEADER]
                                   [--delimiter DELIMITER] [--type {drift,grid}] [--epoch EPOCH]
                                   [--deltatime DELTATIME [DELTATIME ...]]
                                   [--standard {UTC,GPS,TAI,LORAN,datetime}] [--projection PROJECTION]
                                   [--interpolate METHOD] [--extrapolate] [--cutoff CUTOFF]
                                   [--apply-flexure] [--verbose] [--mode MODE]
                                   [infile] [outfile]
compute_tidal_elevations.py: error: argument --tide/-T: invalid choice: 'BUMMER' (choose from 'AODTM-5', 'AOTIM-5', 'AOTIM-5-2018', 'Arc2kmTM', 'CATS0201', 'CATS2008', 'CATS2008_load', 'CATS2022', 'EOT20', 'EOT20_load', 'FES2014', 'FES2014_load', 'GOT4.10', 'GOT4.10_load', 'GOT4.7', 'GOT4.7_load', 'GOT4.8', 'GOT4.8_load', 'Gr1km-v2', 'Gr1kmTM', 'TPXO7.2', 'TPXO7.2_load', 'TPXO8-atlas', 'TPXO9-atlas', 'TPXO9-atlas-v2', 'TPXO9-atlas-v3', 'TPXO9-atlas-v4', 'TPXO9-atlas-v5', 'TPXO9.1')

I would find it helpful, if the choices were shown as part of the help.
One way to d it is to change the definition of the tide-option to eg:

    group.add_argument('--tide','-T',
                       metavar='TIDE', type=str,
                       choices=choices,
                       help=f'Tide model to use in correction. Choose from: {", ".join(choices)}')

It will then output (on --help) eg

  --tide TIDE, -T TIDE  Tide model to use in correction. Choose from: AODTM-5, AOTIM-5, AOTIM-5-2018,
                        Arc2kmTM, CATS0201, CATS2008, CATS2008_load, CATS2022, EOT20, EOT20_load, FES2014,
                        FES2014_load, GOT4.10, GOT4.10_load, GOT4.7, GOT4.7_load, GOT4.8, GOT4.8_load,
                        Gr1km-v2, Gr1kmTM, TPXO7.2, TPXO7.2_load, TPXO8-atlas, TPXO9-atlas, TPXO9-atlas-v2,
                        TPXO9-atlas-v3, TPXO9-atlas-v4, TPXO9-atlas-v5, TPXO9.1

Just a suggestion,
/Bajrne

[tsutterley]

I removed the metavar tags from the parser for the tide models. Should give you all the options now. 👍

[bjarnebuchmann]

Thank you for addressing this issue.
Just a comment.
Although removing the metavar does result in showing the options, they are now shown twice. Once for --tide and once for -T. I find that this adds unnecessary clutter: and it is easy to to miss that there is a short-option -T.
I'm not to say how you like your --help formatted, but personally, I would prefer a metavar, and then later a list of possibilities. Especially, as it is pretty simple to implement.
As long as you have taken an informed decision on this, I'll keep my trap shut.