Question

I need to create instances of a custom object (Bar in the example below) based on a given string. If I do not change the type to Bar and run the below code:

import argparse

VALID_BAR_NAMES = ['alfa', 'beta', 'gamma', 'delta']


class Bar:

    def __init__(self, name):
        if not name in VALID_BAR_NAMES:
            raise RuntimeError('Bar can not be {n}, '
                               'it must be one of {m}'.format(
                                    n=name, m=', '.join(VALID_BAR_NAMES)))
        self.name = name


if __name__ == '__main__':
    parser = argparse.ArgumentParser()

    parser.add_argument('foo', help='Specify the foo!')

    parser.add_argument('-b', '--bar', nargs='*',
                        choices=VALID_BAR_NAMES,
                        type=str,  # SELECTED TYPE
                        help=('Specify one or many valid bar(s)'))
    parsed_arguments = parser.parse_args()

I get this rather nice output when passing the invalid argment hello to -b:

usage: Example.py [-h]
                  [-b [{alfa,beta,gamma,delta} [{alfa,beta,gamma,delta} ...]]]
                  foo
Example.py: error: argument -b/--bar: invalid choice: 'hello' (choose from 'alfa', 'beta', 'gamma', 'delta')

However, if I change type=str to type=Bar and run the example again I get this output:

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "C:\PyTest\Example.py", line 25, in <module>
    parsed_arguments = parser.parse_args()
  File "C:\Python27\lib\argparse.py", line 1688, in parse_args
    args, argv = self.parse_known_args(args, namespace)
  File "C:\Python27\lib\argparse.py", line 1720, in parse_known_args
    namespace, args = self._parse_known_args(args, namespace)
  File "C:\Python27\lib\argparse.py", line 1926, in _parse_known_args
    start_index = consume_optional(start_index)
  File "C:\Python27\lib\argparse.py", line 1866, in consume_optional
    take_action(action, args, option_string)
  File "C:\Python27\lib\argparse.py", line 1778, in take_action
    argument_values = self._get_values(action, argument_strings)
  File "C:\Python27\lib\argparse.py", line 2218, in _get_values
    value = [self._get_value(action, v) for v in arg_strings]
  File "C:\Python27\lib\argparse.py", line 2233, in _get_value
    result = type_func(arg_string)
  File "C:\PyTest\Example.py", line 12, in __init__
    n=name, m=', '.join(VALID_BAR_NAMES)))
RuntimeError: Bar can not be hello, it must be one of alfa, beta, gamma, delta

Which looks pretty bad. I understand that this is due to type conversion occuring before check against available choices is done. What would be the best way to handle this be?

Answer 1

You need to create a custom action (untested):

class Bar: 
    ...


class BarAction(argparse.Action):
    def __call__(self,parser,namespace,values,option_string=None):
        try:  #Catch the runtime error if it occures.
           l=[Bar(v) for v in values] #Create Bars, raise RuntimeError if bad arg passed.
        except RuntimeError as E:
           #Optional:  Print some other error here.  for example: `print E; exit(1)`  
           parser.error()

        setattr(namespace,self.dest,l) #add the list to the namespace

...
parser.add_argument('-b', '--bar', nargs='*',
                    choices=VALID_BAR_NAMES,
                    action=BarAction,  # SELECTED TYPE -- The action does all the type conversion instead of the type keyword.
                    help=('Specify one or many valid bar(s)'))

...