[Python-Dev] argparse ambiguity handling

[Neal Becker]

Steven Bethard wrote:

> On Tue, Apr 20, 2010 at 11:55 AM, Neal Becker <ndbecker2 at gmail.com> wrote:
>> I've noticed argparse ambiguity handling has changed a bit over last few
>> revisions.
>>
>> I have cases where 1 valid input is a prefix of another:
>>
>> e.g.:
>> '--string'
>> '--string2'
>>
>> With the most recent 1.1, the behavior is:
>>
>> --string=hello
>>
>> is accepted, while:
>>
>> --strin=hello
>>
>> is marked as ambiguous.
>>
>> I'm OK with this, but just want to know if there is agreement that this
>> is the behavior we want.
> 
> I don't have a strong feeling about this. What was the behavior before?
> 
> Steve

At least 1 earlier version said that even exact match was ambiguous.

I have a preference to allow at least exact matches to succeed even in the 
case of ambiguity - mainly because I accidentally created this already once, 
and I feel it's better to at least work somewhat.  Not sure if there is any 
more elegant solution.  OTOH, I feel this is somewhat inelegant, as it 
appears to treat exact match as a special case.