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Remko Popma edited this page Oct 5, 2017 · 36 revisions

3 Reasons to Use picocli

picocli is designed to be included as source

...because your users don't want the extra jar file just to parse command line options.

picocli creates polished and easily tailored usage help with Ansi colors and styles

...because the usage help is the face of your command line interface.

picocli gives your command line application autocomplete

...so users of your application can just press <TAB> to see the available options and subcommands.

actually there are many reasons to use picocli

  • runs on Java 5 or higher
  • annotation-based - almost no code
  • git-style subcommands
  • nested sub-subcommands
  • strongly typed option parameters
  • strongly typed positional parameters
  • customizable type conversion
  • supports multi-value options
  • supports Maps for options and positional parameters (like -Dkey=value Java system properties)
  • intuitive model for how many arguments a field consumes
  • allows any option prefix
  • fluent API
  • convenience methods for Runnable and Callable commands
  • parser tracing to facilitate troubleshooting
  • POSIX-style clustered short options

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