Inquirer.js
A collection of common interactive command line user interfaces.
Goal and philosophy
We strive at providing easily embeddable and beautiful command line interface for Node.js; some hope in becoming the CLI Xanadu.
Inquirer should ease the process of asking end user questions, parsing, validating answers, managing hierarchical prompts and providing error feedback.
Inquirer provide the user interface, and the inquiry session flow. If you're searching for a full blown command line program utility, then check out Commander.js (inspired by) or cli-color (used internally).
Documentation
Installation
npm install inquirer
var inquirer = require("inquirer");
inquirer.prompt([], function( answers ) {
});
Examples (Run it and see it)
Checkout the examples/
folder for code and interface examples.
node examples/pizza.js
node examples/checkbox.js
# etc...
Methods
inquirer.prompt( questions, callback )
Launch the prompt interface (inquiry session)
Objects
Question
A question object is a hash
containing question related values:
- type: (String) Type of the prompt. Defaults:
input
- Possible values: input
, confirm
,
list
, rawlist
- name: (String) The name to use when storing the answer in the anwers hash.
- message: (String) The question to print.
- default: (String|Number|Array|Function) Default value(s) to use if nothing is entered, or a function that returns the default value(s). If defined as a function, the first parameter will be the current inquirer session answers.
- choices: (Array|Function) Choices array or a function returning a choices array. If defined as a function, the first parameter will be the current inquirer session answers.
Array values can be simple strings
, or objects
containing a name
(to display) and a value
properties (to save in the answers hash). Values can also be a Separator
. - validate: (Function) Receive the user input and should return
true
if the value is valid, and an error message (String
) otherwise. If false
is returned, a default error message is provided. - filter: (Function) Receive the user input and return the filtered value to be used inside the program. The value returned will be added to the Answers hash.
- when: (Function) Receive the current user answers hash and should return
true
or false
depending on whether or not this question should be asked.
default
(if defined as a function), validate
, filter
and when
functions can be asynchronously using this.async()
. You just have to pass the value you'd normally return to the callback option.
{
validate: function(input) {
var done = this.async();
setTimeout(function() {
if (typeof input !== "number") {
done("You need to provide a number");
return;
}
done(true);
}, 3000);
}
}
Answers
A key/value hash containing the client answers in each prompt.
- Key The
name
property of the question object - Value (Depends on the prompt)
confirm
: (Boolean)input
: User input (filtered if filter
is defined) (String)rawlist
, list
: Selected choice value (or name if no value specified) (String)
Separator
A separator can be added to any choices
array:
// In the question object
choices: [ "Choice A", new inquirer.Separator(), "choice B" ]
// Which'll be displayed this way
[?] What do you want to do?
> Order a pizza
Make a reservation
--------
Ask opening hours
Talk to the receptionnist
The constructor takes a facultative String
value that'll be use as the separator. If omitted, the separator will be --------
.
Separator instances have a property type
equal to separator
. This should allow tools façading Inquirer interface from detecting separator types in lists.
Prompts type
Note:: allowed options written inside square brackets ([]
) are optional. Others are required.
List - { type: "list" }
Take type
, name
, message
, choices
[, default
, filter
] properties. (Note that
default must be the choice index
in the array or a choice value
)
Raw List - { type: "rawlist" }
Take type
, name
, message
, choices
[, default
, filter
] properties. (Note that
default must the choice index
in the array)
Expand - { type: "expand" }
Take type
, name
, message
, choices
[, default
, filter
] properties. (Note that
default must be the choice index
in the array)
Note that the choice
object will take an extra parameter called key
for the expand
prompt. This parameter must be a single (lowercased) character. The h
option is added by the prompt and shouldn't be defined by the user.
See examples/expand.js
for a running example.
Checkbox - { type: "checkbox" }
Take type
, name
, message
, choices
[, filter
, validate
, default
] properties. default
is expected to be an Array of the checked choices value.
Choices marked as { checked: true }
will be checked by default.
Choices who're property disabled
is truthy will be unselectable. If disabled
is a string, then the string will be outputed next to the disabled choice, otherwise it'll default to "Disabled"
. The disabled
property can also be a synchronous function receiving the current answers as argument and returning a boolean or a string.
Confirm - { type: "confirm" }
Take type
, name
, message
[, default
] properties. default
is expected to be a boolean if used.
Input - { type: "input" }
Take type
, name
, message
[, default
, filter
, validate
] properties.
Password - { type: "password" }
Take type
, name
, message
[, default
, filter
, validate
] properties.
User Interfaces and layouts
Along with the prompts, Inquirer offers some basic text UI.
Bottom Bar - inquirer.ui.BottomBar
This UI present a fixed text at the bottom of a free text zone. This is useful to keep a message to the bottom of the screen while outputting command outputs on the higher section.
var ui = new inquirer.ui.BottomBar();
outputStream.pipe( ui.log );
ui.log.write("something just happened.");
ui.log.write("Almost over, standby!");
ui.updateBottomBar("new bottom bar content");
Prompt - inquirer.ui.Prompt
This is UI layout used to run prompt. This layout is returned by inquirer.prompt
and you should probably always use inquirer.prompt
to interface with this UI.
Reactive interface
Internally, Inquirer uses the JS reactive extension to handle events and async flows.
This mean you can take advantage of this feature to provide more advanced flows. For example, you can dynamically add questions to be asked:
var prompts = Rx.Observable.create(function( obs ) {
obs.onNext({ });
setTimeout(function () {
obs.onNext({ });
obs.onCompleted();
});
});
inquirer.prompt(prompts);
And using the process
property, you have access to more fine grained callbacks:
inquirer.prompts(prompts).process.subscribe(
onEachAnswer,
onError,
onComplete
);
Support (OS Terminals)
You should expect mostly good support for the CLI below. This does not mean we won't
look at issues found on other command line - feel free to report any!
News on the march (Release notes)
Please refer to the Github releases section for the changelog
Contributing
Style Guide
Please brief yourself on Idiomatic.js style guide with two space indent
Unit test
Unit test are written in Mocha. Please add a unit test for every new feature or bug fix. npm test
to run the test suite.
Documentation
Add documentation for every API change. Feel free to send corrections
or better docs!
Pull Requests
Send fixes PR on the master
branch. Any new features should be send on the wip
branch.
We're looking to offer good support for multiple prompts and environments. If you want to
help, we'd like to keep a list of testers for each terminal/OS so we can contact you and
get feedback before release. Let us know if you want to be added to the list (just tweet
to @vaxilart) or just add your name to the wiki
License
Copyright (c) 2012 Simon Boudrias (twitter: @vaxilart)
Licensed under the MIT license.