AutoCompletion Support #2

[JKamsker]

Base stolen from #727 . fixed & extended

I know there is alot going on there and i wasn't always sure if i was doing it in the right way. Comments&Changes welcome!

Status:

• Static Command-Tree-based Completion
• Static Property-Attribute-based Completion
• Dynamic Handler-based Completion
• Powershell Integration

Non-Goal:

• Other integrations than Powershell for now.

Edit:
The powershell integration seems to have turned out a bit wonky. Maybe we want to extract it into a pre-release library until its stable enough

---

Please upvote 👍 this pull request if you are interested in it.

[JKamsker]

@microsoft-github-policy-service agree

[JKamsker]

I am going to mention the people from the other pr and #267, they might be interested, otherwise: Sorry 😅

@Jawz84 @phil-scott-78 @FrankRay78 @OskarKlintrot

[JKamsker]

Commit JKamsker@a39517f implements static completions, attribute based

Objections? anyone?
@patriksvensson @phil-scott-78

[JKamsker]

@nils-a I apologize for the delay. I fell ill over the weekend and am still recovering. I'll address this pull request once I'm in better shape.

[JKamsker]

@FrankRay78

Ok, so you have my interest @JKamsker . I'm certainly no expert on this, so can you tell me if this is PowerShell specific? (ie. does the compiled command line application that uses spectre.console need to run in PowerShell) Or does it / can it with some kind of extension also support other shells?

The primary functionality of this PR isn't exclusive to PowerShell. It's a universal tab completion engine, with the PowerShell module serving as an example of how it can be utilized. In principle, any shell could leverage it with the appropriate wrapper code.

The command line interface for this is .\AutoCompletion.exe cli complete "WORDTOCOMPLETE" (--position NUMBER). You can find more details here.

I'm trying to understand the scope of the implementation ie. Win/Linux/Mac and also breadth of shell ie. cmd / PS / bash etc

The goal here is to introduce a universal tab completion engine that any shell can utilize. The PowerShell module is merely the first implementation, with more to follow in the future. Implementing such a completion feature isn't overly complex and it doesn't rely on any spectre.console internals, unlike the core command cli complete.

I ask, because whilst I can't find the link, I kind of remember seeing MS Terminal provide a number of different shims (?) for autocomplete across different shells (?). I wondered if this was similar.

UPDATE: here is the link: How to enable tab completion for the .NET CLI

Theoretically, the completion code provided should work with the shims you've mentioned, although I haven't personally tested these.

Whilst I'm not the maintainer of this sub-system @JKamsker so can't approve the PR, I am interested and plan to make time over the weekend to review the commits and test it locally.

Cool, i really appreciate some extra eyes on this. I'm happy to answer any questions you might have.
Did you already have time to look at the code? I'm curious to hear your thoughts.

Quick Reminder:

• Docs are here
• Sample app is here

[alex-fomin]

It would be so cool to have a pre-populated command settings in IAsyncCommandCompletable.GetSuggestionsAsync(https://github.com/spectreconsole/spectre.console/pull/1260/files#diff-62f314eab97b968fe2cd2edf30cbb3e1fb7f4f24ee5a26d306436f662e928063R14). Or, at least, the command line arguments themselves. Sometimes dynamic suggestions are depended from already entered parameters.

[JKamsker]

@alex-fomin Thanks for the suggestion! I'm a bit tied up at the moment and won't be able to get to it right away, but it's definitely on my radar to tackle as soon as I can.

In the meantime, if you're up for it, you're totally welcome to take a stab at it by forking my PR and adding the changes yourself. Cheers!

[JKamsker]

@alex-fomin I have added the functionality to
https://www.nuget.org/packages/JKToolKit.Spectre.AutoCompletion.Integrations and https://www.nuget.org/packages/JKToolKit.Spectre.AutoCompletion (Version 0.0.4)
It works almost the same, except u have to add it explicitly.

public static void Main(string[] args)
{
    var app = new CommandApp();
    app.Configure
    (
        config =>
        {
            config
                .AddAutoCompletion(x => x.AddPowershell())
                .AddCommand<LionCommand>("lion");
        }
    ) ;
}

Will port it to this pr when i got time.

[krisrok]

Heyo @JKamsker, great job so far. Subscribed to the discussion and eager to try it out as soon as I get the chance.
Just wanted to let you know the packages’ repos are private. If it‘s by choice don‘t mind me.

[JKamsker]

Now published as separate repo.
https://github.com/JKamsker/JKToolKit.Spectre.AutoCompletion

@krisrok

[Kissaki]

Is there a reason why cli complete was chosen?

dotnet (cli), winget, and System.CommandLine (Microsoft lib, and WIP scheduled for .NET 9) use a complete command for command line completion. Currently, their syntax differs though.

• winget: winget complete --commandline "winget upgr --word "upgr" --position 10
• dotnet/System.Commandline: exe complete args

[Kissaki]

Nushell can use value + description for auto-completion - listing not only the options but also describing them. It would be nice if command descriptions could be used too (they can already be described with attributes for the help text), and maybe even any suggestions (static and dynamic suggestions).

I guess not necessarily in this PR changeset so it is not blocked further.