perl placeholder-prompt.pl [-DdEehiKLlOoPpRsvYy] [long options...] <filename>
placeholder-prompt.pl - Interactively fill in placeholders in a text file
This program loops through all lines of an input file looking for
placeholders (by default of the form $<WORD>) prompting you for
a replacement text, optionally showing the previously given value,
if any, as a default answer, and optionally preloading defaults
from a YAML or JSON file and/or saving collected values to a YAML file.
You can override an existing default by prefixing your replacement value with a "+" at the prompt.
You can abort (leaving any files unchanged) by typing :a or
:q at the prompt.
-d --prompt-default Prompt for a replacement for known
keys.
(default value: 1)
-D --no-prompt-default Do not prompt for a replacement for
known keys.
-e STR --term-encoding STR Terminal encoding. (Usually found
automatically, i.e. the actual default
is system dependent.)
(default value: utf-8)
-h --help Show help text.
-i STR --input-file STR Path to the input file.
(default value: (undef))
-K STR --key-regex STR Perl regular expression to match key
between delimiters in placeholders.
(default value: \w+)
-l STR -y STR --load-data STR Path to YAML or JSON file to load
default data from.
(default value: (undef))
-L STR --left-delimiter STR Left delimiter for placeholders. NOT a
regular expression!
(default value: $<)
-o STR --output-file STR Path to the output file.
(default value: (undef))
-O --options Show options help only.
-p --prompt-echo Echo the line containing the
placeholder when prompting.
(default value: 1)
-P -E --no-prompt-echo Do not echo the line containing the
placeholder when prompting.
-R STR --right-delimiter STR Right delimiter for placeholders. NOT
a regular expression!
(default value: >)
-s STR -Y STR --save-data STR Path to YAML file to save data to.
(default value: (undef))
-v --version Show the program version.
Note that while the terminal encoding is queried from the system, and can be set explicitly with the -e option if the automation fails, input and output files as well as any data files are assumed to be UTF-8 encoded. If this is not the case use a tool like iconv, or (since you must have perl installed anyway to run placeholder-prompt.pl) the Perl implementation piconv https://perldoc.pl/piconv which comes bundled with perl, to convert your files to UTF-8.
You may specify the same path for input/output file and/or for load/save data file. If this is the case you will be prompted for confirmation before overwriting the existing file. However you will NOT be prompted for confirmation before overwriting an existing file if the real paths to the source and destination file are different!
You can set your own defaults for some options by defining the following enviroment variables (defaults shown in parentheses):
- PH_PROMPT_INPUT_FILE (undef)
- PH_PROMPT_KEY_REGEX (\w+)
- PH_PROMPT_LEFT_DELIMITER ($<)
- PH_PROMPT_LOAD_DATA (undef)
- PH_PROMPT_OUTPUT_FILE (undef)
- PH_PROMPT_PROMPT_DEFAULT (1)
- PH_PROMPT_PROMPT_ECHO (1)
- PH_PROMPT_RIGHT_DELIMITER (>)
- PH_PROMPT_SAVE_DATA (undef)
- PH_PROMPT_TERM_ENCODING (utf-8)
(The actual default is system dependent!)
perl >= 5.014
Getopt::Long::Descriptive
IO::Prompt::Tiny
Path::Tiny
Term::Encoding
YAML::PP
See:
http://www.cpan.org/modules/INSTALL.html
This software is Copyright (c) 2020 by Benct Philip Jonsson.
This is free software, licensed under:
The MIT (X11) License
http://www.opensource.org/licenses/mit-license.php
Please report any bugs or feature requests to: