PrettyConsoleHelper

A small and quickly made Library for Console apps that provides a prettier and easier experience with output and input parsing/validating while helping beginners avoid tedious tasks

Includes a InputHelper, ConsoleTable and ConsoleOutput

https://www.nuget.org/packages/PrettyConsoleHelper/ Install-Package PrettyConsoleHelper

How to use

Static classes

I have wrapped the former PrettyConsole and InputHelper in a static class. Simply add this on top of your usings

using static PrettyConsoleHelper.PrettyStatic;

now you can directly access ConsolePretty. and PrettyInputHelper. Or access the items using PrettyStatic..

ConsolePretty

• You can still customize it by simply doing ConsolePretty.Options = new PrettyConsoleOptions(prompt:"->"); in this case i just changed the default prompt
• Write and WriteLine methods with overloads for printing a char multiple times, printing any type and color output aswell. Default values are provided
• You can also log an Error or Warning which will print the time, message and exception (if provied) ConsolePretty.LogError("Bad input", new ArgumentException());
• If you want your prompt with your choosen color to popup simply add true like this ConsolePretty.Write("Whats your name?", true);
  

InputHelper with methods for validation and parsing

• Use the Validate method in order to use attributes which you have probably seen before as data annotations. Theres also a generic overload in case you would like to parse in to a specific type. The input message is optional.

var email = PrettyInputHelper.Validate(new EmailAddressAttribute(), "Enter email: ");

• Having troubles parsing enums? Use the GetEnumInput() method.var season = PrettyInputHelper.GetEnumInput<Season>();

Non static classes

Console table - fluent api style

• Options: HeaderColor (default orange), Column Separator (default " | ")
• Expect any values being null? No worries! You can even add headers and rows with null values if you wanted to test the table format

1. Different ways of creating a table

We have a list of person

var people = new List<Person>
            {
                new Person { Age = 50, Name = "Chris" },
                new Person { Age = 15, Name = "NotChris" }
            };

Fastest approach: Adds rows, headers, writes to console without storing the table in a variable

new PrettyTable()
                .AddRowsWithDefaultHeaders(people)
                .Write();

I recommend storing it in a variable because then you can reuse it with the ResetTable method.

Fastest Approach:

var tbl = new PrettyTable()
                .AddRowsWithDefaultHeaders(people);

Fast approach:

var table = new PrettyTable()
                .AddDefaultHeaders<Person>()
                .AddRows(people)

Another fast Approach:

            var tbl = new PrettyTable()
                .AddHeaders("Name", "Age")
                .AddRows(people);

Traditional approach

var table = new PrettyTable("Id", "Name", "Age");

foreach (var person in people)
            {
                table.AddRow(person.Id, person.Name, person);
            }

1. Print table.Write();
   
   

if you would like to view the current headers in a comma separated string tbl.Headers

PrettyConsole

Options: You can choose default coloring for lots of stuff by passing down PrettyConsoleOptions

var console = new PrettyConsole(new PrettyConsoleOptions(numberColor: ConsoleColor.Red));

InputHelper

Options: This can take in a PrettyConsole so that you are able to control the coloring and prompting!

var console = new PrettyConsole(new PrettyConsoleOptions(numberColor: ConsoleColor.Red));
            var inputHelper = new InputHelper(console);

• Contains methods for taking in int input, confirming, enums, datetime input, validating input

Parse multiple arguments directly from the console using ParseOptions()

//If we have a Todo class we can do this:

  var inputHelper = new InputHelper();
            string[] options = { "-title", "-description" };
            string[] inputs = Console.ReadLine().Split(' ');

            var optionsValues = inputHelper.ParseOptions(options, inputs, "-");
            optionsValues.TryGetValue(nameof(Todo.Title), out string title);
            optionsValues.TryGetValue(nameof(Todo.Description), out string description);

Dependency injection

Options: You can specify all the normal PrettyConsoleOptions

• InputHelper and IPrettyConsole can be dependency injected

class Menu
    {
        private readonly IPrettyConsole _console;
        private readonly InputHelper _input;

        public Menu(IPrettyConsole console, InputHelper input)
        {
            _console = console;
            _input = input;
        }
        public void Run()
        {
            _console.Write("y/n", true);
            _console.WriteLine("It works!");
            var num = _input.GetIntInput("Enter a num from 5 to 10", 5, 10);
        }
    }

    class Program
    {
        static IServiceCollection ConfigureServices()
        {
            var services = new ServiceCollection();
            services.AddPrettyConsoleHelper(opt =>
            {
                opt.PromptColor = ConsoleColor.DarkGreen;
                opt.Prompt = "   >";
            });

            services.AddSingleton<Menu>();
            return services;
        }

        static void Main()
        {
            var serviceProvider = ConfigureServices().BuildServiceProvider();
            serviceProvider.GetRequiredService<Menu>().Run();