Print tf command before download starts

[jpvelez]

What

tf can run in interactive mode, but it can also run in imperative mode, where you pass the arguments directly.

In interactive mode, after all the user inputs have been received (including whether they want to download a sample of the data or all the data), we should print out the imperative command that would recreate this download.

Why

• Downloads often have to be restarted or redone, so this would make it easier to reproduce downloads.

Deliverables

• Print imperative command in interactive flow after all user inputs are selected, but before download starts

[linear]

TF-13

[MeadBarrel]

Ok this may be a little problematic.

Right now the tool doesn't have many command-line arguments. The reason is that different providers require different inputs. One solution could be to split tariff-fetch into subcommands, like tariff-fetch genability but then we're losing the ability to choose multiple providers in one run. Another would be to introduce extra parameters and just ignore them if the provider using them wasn't selected. This is a… dirty option.

Another problem is how do we pass a utility via command-line. They can be quite verbose like "Lake Placid Village, Inc - (NY)" or "Central Hudson Gas & Elec Corp". Not a problem if i just copy&paste the command but i would personally hate passing it as a cli argument manually, most likely introducing typos. Maybe we could try fuzzy matching?

[jpvelez]

The verbosity of the utilities that you identified means it's just unlikely that people will use tf in imperative mode before using it in interactive mode first. That's fine, that's the nature of the beast.

That suggests that the point of having an imperative mode at all is reproducibility—how did I get these tariffs in the first place? How can my colleague get them too?

This suggests that we shouldn't sweat too much about whether to go with subcommands or extra parameters—whatever will let the user reproduce their download.