Should I rewrite Chocolatey's warning messages in my wrapper script?

Question

I've bundled a Chocolatey installer into PowerShell: My script calls a function for the installation process. The user is supposed to run .\install.ps1 in PowerShell. If the package already is installed the output is similar to:

<Packagename> already installed.
Use --force to reinstall, specify a version to install, or try upgrade.

Ok, so the user should think that .\install.ps1 --force will do the trick. Unfortunately, I have found no way for PowerShell to accept double dashes (--), so I'm thinking about rewriting the warning message from Chocolatey so it outputs -force instead of --force:

<Packagename> already installed.
Use -force to reinstall, specify a version to install, or try upgrade.

My setup.ps1 file is similar to:

Install-App <Packagename + parameters>

The function my script is calling is similar to:

function Install-App
{
    //..code ommited..
    $chocoCommand = "choco install <Packagename + parameters>"
    iex $chocoCommand
}

I've been thinking about try/catch, but haven't figured it out quite yet.

Any suggestions?

Best regards

_Unfortunately, I have found no way for PowerShell to accept double dashes_ - What have you tried? — rrirower, Jul 19 '16 at 15:55
With some further investigation, I found this: foreach($arg in $args) { if($arg -Eq "--force") { $forceParameter = "--force" } } The question then arises: Is this a good solution? I can easily pass the $forceParameter to my function. — bpjohannessen, Jul 19 '16 at 16:16
If you _expect_ the user to retry, why not apply the `--force` flag in your wrapper by default? — Anthony Mastrean, Jul 25 '16 at 17:44
I want the user to be informed about what happens, and I will not force it by default. I expect the user to _maybe_ retry it. — bpjohannessen, Jul 25 '16 at 18:12

score 0 · Answer 1 · answered Jul 20 '16 at 17:39

0

You should try --% just before any arguments are passed.

Taken from https://chocolatey.org/docs/commands-reference#how-to-pass-options-switches

answered Jul 20 '16 at 17:39

ferventcoder

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I'm satisfied by foreaching $args and passing the argument further. Thanks for the help! – bpjohannessen Jul 25 '16 at 18:13

score 0 · Accepted Answer · answered Jul 25 '16 at 18:15

I solved this by doing a foreach on $args:

foreach($arg in $args)
{
    if($arg -eq "--force" -Or $arg -eq "-force")
    {
        $forceParameter = "--force"
    }
}

And further passing this to my PowerShell command

MyCustomCommand -forceParameter $forceParameter

Thanks for the help!

Should I rewrite Chocolatey's warning messages in my wrapper script?

2 Answers2