Add support for groups of options and commands in the help #2328
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abetomo
reviewed
Feb 27, 2025
shadowspawn
changed the title
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If we decide to land this, might wait for the major version when we drop Node.js 18. |
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This has had some small support with likes on the issue and the PR. Help groups are a common feature in full-featured CLI parsing libraries. I am leaning towards including it in Commander, but happy to leave it out if you have concerns @abetomo . |
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Sorry for the delay in reviewing! |
abetomo
approved these changes
May 8, 2025
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No problem, I left it is draft for months. Only just marked it for review. 😄 |
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Oops, I didn't add typings for the new methods. I will open a PR for those. |
Blankll
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Oct 9, 2025
 <h3>Snyk has created this PR to upgrade commander from 14.0.0 to 14.0.1.</h3> :information_source: Keep your dependencies up-to-date. This makes it easier to fix existing vulnerabilities and to more quickly identify and fix newly disclosed vulnerabilities when they affect your project. <hr/> - The recommended version is **1 version** ahead of your current version. - The recommended version was released **24 days ago**. <details> <summary><b>Release notes</b></summary> <br/> <details> <summary>Package name: <b>commander</b></summary> <ul> <li> <b>14.0.1</b> - <a href="https://github.com/tj/commander.js/releases/tag/v14.0.1">2025-09-12</a></br><h3>Fixed</h3> <ul> <li>broken markdown link in README (<a class="issue-link js-issue-link" data-error-text="Failed to load title" data-id="3085867003" data-permission-text="Title is private" data-url="tj/commander.js#2369" data-hovercard-type="pull_request" data-hovercard-url="/tj/commander.js/pull/2369/hovercard" href="https://github.com/tj/commander.js/pull/2369">#2369</a>)</li> </ul> <h3>Changed</h3> <ul> <li>improve code readability by using optional chaining (<a class="issue-link js-issue-link" data-error-text="Failed to load title" data-id="3203289052" data-permission-text="Title is private" data-url="tj/commander.js#2394" data-hovercard-type="pull_request" data-hovercard-url="/tj/commander.js/pull/2394/hovercard" href="https://github.com/tj/commander.js/pull/2394">#2394</a>)</li> <li>use more idiomatic code with object spread instead of <code>Object.assign()</code> (<a class="issue-link js-issue-link" data-error-text="Failed to load title" data-id="3204494758" data-permission-text="Title is private" data-url="tj/commander.js#2395" data-hovercard-type="pull_request" data-hovercard-url="/tj/commander.js/pull/2395/hovercard" href="https://github.com/tj/commander.js/pull/2395">#2395</a>)</li> <li>improve code readability using <code>string.endsWith()</code> instead of <code>string.slice()</code> (<a class="issue-link js-issue-link" data-error-text="Failed to load title" data-id="3209103795" data-permission-text="Title is private" data-url="tj/commander.js#2396" data-hovercard-type="pull_request" data-hovercard-url="/tj/commander.js/pull/2396/hovercard" href="https://github.com/tj/commander.js/pull/2396">#2396</a>)</li> <li>refactor <code>.parseOptions()</code> to process args array in-place (<a class="issue-link js-issue-link" data-error-text="Failed to load title" data-id="3324072148" data-permission-text="Title is private" data-url="tj/commander.js#2409" data-hovercard-type="pull_request" data-hovercard-url="/tj/commander.js/pull/2409/hovercard" href="https://github.com/tj/commander.js/pull/2409">#2409</a>)</li> <li>change private variadic support routines from <code>._concatValue()</code> to <code>._collectValue()</code> (change code from <code>array.concat()</code> to <code>array.push()</code>) (<a class="issue-link js-issue-link" data-error-text="Failed to load title" data-id="3327764465" data-permission-text="Title is private" data-url="tj/commander.js#2410" data-hovercard-type="pull_request" data-hovercard-url="/tj/commander.js/pull/2410/hovercard" href="https://github.com/tj/commander.js/pull/2410">#2410</a>)</li> <li>update (dev) dependencies</li> </ul> </li> <li> <b>14.0.0</b> - <a href="https://github.com/tj/commander.js/releases/tag/v14.0.0">2025-05-18</a></br><h3>Added</h3> <ul> <li>support for groups of options and commands in the help using low-level <code>.helpGroup()</code> on <code>Option</code> and <code>Command</code>, and higher<br> -level <code>.optionsGroup()</code> and <code>.commandsGroup()</code> which can be used in chaining way to specify group title for following option<br> s/commands (<a class="issue-link js-issue-link" data-error-text="Failed to load title" data-id="2874409705" data-permission-text="Title is private" data-url="tj/commander.js#2328" data-hovercard-type="pull_request" data-hovercard-url="/tj/commander.js/pull/2328/hovercard" href="https://github.com/tj/commander.js/pull/2328">#2328</a>)</li> <li>support for unescaped negative numbers as option-arguments and command-arguments (<a class="issue-link js-issue-link" data-error-text="Failed to load title" data-id="2921957024" data-permission-text="Title is private" data-url="tj/commander.js#2339" data-hovercard-type="pull_request" data-hovercard-url="/tj/commander.js/pull/2339/hovercard" href="https://github.com/tj/commander.js/pull/2339">#2339</a>)</li> <li>TypeScript: add <code>parseArg</code> property to <code>Argument</code> class (<a class="issue-link js-issue-link" data-error-text="Failed to load title" data-id="3022955668" data-permission-text="Title is private" data-url="tj/commander.js#2359" data-hovercard-type="pull_request" data-hovercard-url="/tj/commander.js/pull/2359/hovercard" href="https://github.com/tj/commander.js/pull/2359">#2359</a>)</li> </ul> <h3>Fixed</h3> <ul> <li>remove bogus leading space in help when option has default value but not a description (<a class="issue-link js-issue-link" data-error-text="Failed to load title" data-id="2944505658" data-permission-text="Title is private" data-url="tj/commander.js#2348" data-hovercard-type="pull_request" data-hovercard-url="/tj/commander.js/pull/2348/hovercard" href="https://github.com/tj/commander.js/pull/2348">#2348</a>)</li> <li><code>.configureOutput()</code> now makes copy of settings instead of modifying in-place, fixing side-effects (<a class="issue-link js-issue-link" data-error-text="Failed to load title" data-id="2948403186" data-permission-text="Title is private" data-url="tj/commander.js#2350" data-hovercard-type="pull_request" data-hovercard-url="/tj/commander.js/pull/2350/hovercard" href="https://github.com/tj/commander.js/pull/2350">#2350</a>)</li> </ul> <h3>Changed</h3> <ul> <li><em>Breaking:</em> Commander 14 requires Node.js v20 or higher</li> <li>internal refactor of <code>Help</code> class adding <code>.formatItemList()</code> and <code>.groupItems()</code> methods (<a class="issue-link js-issue-link" data-error-text="Failed to load title" data-id="2874409705" data-permission-text="Title is private" data-url="tj/commander.js#2328" data-hovercard-type="pull_request" data-hovercard-url="/tj/commander.js/pull/2328/hovercard" href="https://github.com/tj/commander.js/pull/2328">#2328</a>)</li> </ul> </li> </ul> from <a href="https://github.com/tj/commander.js/releases">commander GitHub release notes</a> </details> </details> --- > [!IMPORTANT] > > - 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Problem
People would like to be able to group options and commands in the help, and a number of other libraries have support for this.
Requests:
Other libraries:
helpGroup: https://oclif.io/docs/flagslistGroup: https://github.com/voxpelli/peowlyPrevious exploration by me: #1908 #1910 #2176 #2248
Solution
Add low-level
.helpGroup()on Option and Command, and higher-level.optionsGroup()and.commandsGroup()which can be used in chaining way to specify group title for following options/commands.See the example file to see them in use.
ChangeLog