Re: feature request #1055954: respect newlines in description

On 09 March 2005, Tomi Mickelsson said:
> In short, I would like to control the linefeeds in the description field. 
> I do not like the way everything in the description is jammed into a 
> single paragraph.
[...]
> To achieve this formatting, I have the following kludge in my code:
> ---
> import new
> 
> ....code omitted
> 
> # use my own description formatter method
> parser.format_description = new.instancemethod(lambda self,x : 
> self.description, parser, parser.__class__)

Blecchhh.  Just because you *can* rudely interfere in another class's
business does not mean that you should!  Why not just subclass
OptionParser?

  class MyOptionParser(OptionParser):
      def format_description(self, formatter):
          return self.get_description()

(You might need to add a leading or trailing newline to make it look
"just right".)  So your kludge is not a compelling argument for this
feature.  Anyone who wants their descriptions formatted "just so" can
just override format_description() as shown.  (Or provide a custom
HelpFormatter and do it there.)

A compelling argument would be if someone wanted multiple paragraphs in
the description.  My proposed interface for that would be

  parser = OptionParser(...,
                        description=[paragraph1,
                                     paragraph2,
                                     ...,
                                     paragraphN],
                        ...)

Passing a string X would be equivalent to passing the list [X].  Each
paragraph would be wrapped individually, and then they would be printed
*with a blank line between them*.

That's easy to implement, easy to explain, and easy to use.  Magic
tricks to split a single string into paragraphs are a non-starter for
me.  (Which is why textwrap.py resolutely refuses to consider its input
string as anything other than a single paragraph.  There was talk at one
point about adding a split-into-paragraphs function to textwrap.py, but
I guess it never happened.)

So: does anyone want this feature?  If so, I'll hijack Tomi's SF item
and implement it.  If not -- never mind.

        Greg
-- 
Greg Ward <[email protected]>                         http://www.gerg.ca/
Yield to temptation; it may not pass your way again.


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