DragonFruit-overview.md

What is DragonFruit?

The entry point for a normal .NET console application looks like this:

staticvoidMain(string[]args){Console.WriteLine("Hello World!");}

Interpreting the string[] arguments into behaviors has been left as a task for the developer. Did the user ask for help? Did they pass invalid input? Can the input be converted to the types that you need if they're not string? These problems are not solved for you.

What if you could declare a strongly-typed Main method? This was the question that led to the creation of the experimental app model called "DragonFruit", which allows you to create an entry point with multiple parameters of various types and using default values, like this:

staticvoidMain(intintOption=42,boolboolOption=false,FileInfofileOption=null){Console.WriteLine($"The value of intOption is: {intOption}");Console.WriteLine($"The value of boolOption is: {boolOption}");Console.WriteLine($"The value of fileOption is: {fileOption?.FullName??"null"}");}

DragonFruit handles help requests, parsing errors, argument binding, and more for you.

> ./myapp # or: > dotnet runThe value of intOption is: 42The value of boolOption is: FalseThe value of fileOption is: null 

You don't need to write any special code to get help support.

> ./myapp -h # or: dotnet run -- -hUsage: myapp [options]Options: --int-option intOption --bool-option boolOption --file-option fileOption

If you want more informative help, you can add it using standard XML comments:

/// <summary>/// My example app/// </summary>/// <param name="intOption">An option whose argument will bind to an int</param>/// <param name="boolOption">An option whose argument will bind to a bool</param>/// <param name="fileOption">An option whose argument will bind to a FileInfo</param>staticvoidMain(intintOption=42,boolboolOption=false,FileInfofileOption=null){Console.WriteLine($"The value of intOption is: {intOption}");Console.WriteLine($"The value of boolOption is: {boolOption}");Console.WriteLine($"The value of fileOption is: {fileOption?.FullName??"null"}");}

The text of those comments will be shown when a user requests help.

> dotnet run -- -hUsage: myapp [options]Options: --int-option An option whose argument will bind to an int --bool-option An option whose argument will bind to a bool --file-option An option whose argument will bind to a FileInfo

Arguments

In addition to options as shown in the examples above, DragonFruit also supports arguments. By convention, if you name a parameter in the Main method args, argument, or arguments, it will be exposed as an argument rather than an option.

staticvoidMain(intintOption=42,string[]args=null){Console.WriteLine($"The value of intOption is: {intOption}");foreach(vararginargs){Console.WriteLine(arg);}}

> myapp -hUsage: myapp [options] <args>Arguments: <args>Options: --int-option <INT-OPTION> intOption --version Display version information

The argument follows the same conventions for arity as described in arguments.

You can try out DragonFruit by installing the latest preview package.