CLI scripts

CLI (command line interface) scripts can be executed from the command line (terminal) only.

Location

It is a convention in the Moodle code that all CLI scripts are put into the cli/ folder inside the component/plugin directory.

Examples: admin/cli/, enrol/ldap/cli/, admin/tool/task/cli/ and others

CLI_SCRIPT constant

All scripts must declare themselves as CLI scripts properly by setting the CLI_SCRIPT constant before loading the main config.php file.

define('CLI_SCRIPT', true); require(__DIR__.'/../../../config.php');

The path to the config.php must not use relative paths starting with ../. The best practise is to avoid dirname() function call and use the __DIR__ magic constant (this applies everywhere, not just for CLI scripts).

clilib.php

The library clilib.php provides useful functions for basic input/output operations in CLI scripts.

require_once($CFG->libdir . '/clilib.php');

cli_write()

Write a text to the given stream, defaults to the standard output (since Moodle 3.0)

cli_writeln()

Write a text followed by an end of line symbol to the given stream (since Moodle 3.0)

cli_input()

Prompt the user for an input value

cli_get_params()

Parse and return arguments passed to the script

cli_separator()

Print or return section separator string

cli_heading()

Print or return section heading string

cli_problem()

Print error notification

cli_error()

Print message to the standard error output and exit with the given code

cli_logo()

Prints ascii-graphics Moodle logo

Script parameters

The function cli_get_params() implements a basic cross-platform parser for the script parameters. It supports long options names (with double dashes like --version or --help) by default. Some of these long options can have short name aliases (single dashed, like -v or -h). The function does not support positional arguments for CLI scripts. Input data must be provided as a value of an option:

GOOD:

   $ php do_something_useful.php --file=/path/to/file.mbz --action=validate

BAD:

   $ php do_something_useful.php validate /path/to/file.mbz

It is a good practise that short names aliases should be used only for boolean options (flags). It is unusual in CLI environment to set values for short named options.

NICE:

   $ php do_something_useful.php -h

UGLY:

   $ php do_something_useful.php -f=/path/to/file.mbz

For documenting the expected usage of the script, you may want to use the same format and syntax as used by docopt.

Example

<?php // This file is part of Moodle - https://moodle.org/ // // Moodle is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify // it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by // the Free Software Foundation, either version 3 of the License, or // (at your option) any later version. // // Moodle is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, // but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of // MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the // GNU General Public License for more details. // // You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License // along with Moodle. If not, see <http://www.gnu.org/licenses/>.

/**

* Moodle CLI script - demo.php
*
* @package     plugintype_pluginname
* @copyright   2019 Your Name <email@example.com>
* @license     http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/gpl.html GNU GPL v3 or later
*/

define('CLI_SCRIPT', true);

require(__DIR__ . '/../../../config.php'); require_once($CFG->libdir . '/clilib.php');

$usage = "Put a one line summary of what the script does here.

Usage:

   # php demo --paramname=<value>
   # php demo.php [--help|-h]

Options:

   -h --help               Print this help.
   --paramname=<value>     Describe the parameter and the meaning of its values.

";

list($options, $unrecognised) = cli_get_params([

   'help' => false,
   'paramname' => null,

], [

   'h' => 'help'

]);

if ($unrecognised) {

   $unrecognised = implode(PHP_EOL . '  ', $unrecognised);
   cli_error(get_string('cliunknowoption', 'core_admin', $unrecognised));

}

if ($options['help']) {

   cli_writeln($usage);
   exit(2);

}

if (empty($options['paramname'])) {

   cli_error('Missing mandatory argument paramname.', 2);

}

// Do something useful here.