prompt

What is prompt?

The 'prompt' npm package is a powerful tool for creating command-line interfaces (CLI) that can interact with users by asking questions and receiving input. It supports various types of prompts, validation, and asynchronous operations.

What are prompt's main functionalities?

Basic Prompt

This feature allows you to prompt the user for basic input. The example code asks for a username and email, then logs the input to the console.

const prompt = require('prompt');
prompt.start();
prompt.get(['username', 'email'], function (err, result) {
  if (err) { return onErr(err); }
  console.log('Command-line input received:');
  console.log('  Username: ' + result.username);
  console.log('  Email: ' + result.email);
});
function onErr(err) {
  console.log(err);
  return 1;
}

Validation

This feature allows you to validate user input based on a schema. The example code ensures that the age input is a number.

const prompt = require('prompt');
prompt.start();
const schema = {
  properties: {
    age: {
      pattern: /^[0-9]+$/,
      message: 'Age must be a number',
      required: true
    }
  }
};
prompt.get(schema, function (err, result) {
  if (err) { return onErr(err); }
  console.log('Command-line input received:');
  console.log('  Age: ' + result.age);
});
function onErr(err) {
  console.log(err);
  return 1;
}

Asynchronous Prompts

This feature allows you to handle prompts asynchronously using async/await. The example code prompts for a username and email, then logs the input.

const prompt = require('prompt');
prompt.start();
async function getUserInput() {
  try {
    const result = await prompt.get(['username', 'email']);
    console.log('Command-line input received:');
    console.log('  Username: ' + result.username);
    console.log('  Email: ' + result.email);
  } catch (err) {
    console.error(err);
  }
}
getUserInput();

Other packages similar to prompt

inquirer

Inquirer.js is a collection of common interactive command-line user interfaces. It provides a more extensive set of features compared to 'prompt', including support for different types of prompts (e.g., list, checkbox), better handling of nested prompts, and more customization options.

readline-sync

Readline-sync is a synchronous library for reading user input from the command line. Unlike 'prompt', it does not support asynchronous operations but is simpler to use for straightforward input tasks.

enquirer

Enquirer is a stylish, user-friendly library for creating interactive CLI prompts. It offers a rich set of features similar to 'inquirer' but focuses more on customization and aesthetics.

README

PROMPT

What:

A way to request information from the user while a node.js script is running, on the command line, without invoking a REPL. Many languages have something very simple for this sort of thing built-in--for instance, you may have something like this in an early BASIC-ish program:

r = input( 'Give me a radius: ' );
print( 'Your area is '+ pi*r**2  + '!');

To my surprise, node.js didn't have anything quite like this, though it had the tools (process.openStdin) to make something like it. So, with a lot of help, I did.

Install:

npm install prompt

Usage:

While this module was originally inspired by BASIC-style prompts, the current api is quite a bit different, but much more useful in an asynchronous context.

Prompt() is an object with the methods .ask, .tap and .end. Chain these methods together to ask questions and do things to them, then call .end() to cap the chain.

It's probably easiest to follow from example:

var Prompt = require('./prompt');

Prompt()
    .ask('What is your name?', 'name')
    .tap(function (vars) {
        console.log('You said: ' + vars.name);
    })
    .ask('What is your quest?', 'quest')
    .tap(function (vars) {
        console.log('You said: ' + vars.quest);
    })
    .ask('What is your favorite color?', 'color')
    .tap(function (vars) {
        console.log('You said: ' + vars.color);
        console.log('Okay, off you go!');
    })
    .end();

Asking for passwords and stuff:

Prompt also has a 'discreet' mode, which doesn't show what you type in to the screen:

var Prompt = require('prompt');

Prompt()
    .ask('Username: ', 'user')
    .discreet('Password: ', 'pass')
    .tap(function (vars) {
        spawn('mutt', ['-s', 'Some pwned guy: '+vars.user+':'+vars.pass, '[e-mail]']);
  }).end();

But would I actually do that to you? No. ;)

Bone-Picking:

Make a github issue and/or pull, write something (even a test that breaks Prompt) and request that I pull.

Authors:

• Joshua Holbrook ( http://jesusabdullah.github.com/ )
• Peteris Krumins ( http://catonmat.net )

Licensing:

            DO WHAT THE FUCK YOU WANT TO PUBLIC LICENSE
                    Version 2, December 2004

 Copyright (C) 2004 Sam Hocevar <[e-mail]>

 Everyone is permitted to copy and distribute verbatim or modified
 copies of this license document, and changing it is allowed as long
 as the name is changed.

            DO WHAT THE FUCK YOU WANT TO PUBLIC LICENSE
   TERMS AND CONDITIONS FOR COPYING, DISTRIBUTION AND MODIFICATION

  0. You just DO WHAT THE FUCK YOU WANT TO.