CHEETAH(1)

💖 CHEETAH(1) — the cheetah manual, but make it a group chat 💖

okay bestie, sit down, hydrate, and let me tell you about cheetah — that's the Python template command-line tool, and this whole page is the Debian manual for it. Yes, the section header says General Commands Manual and yes I'm still gonna make it cute. 🌸

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✨ NAME ✨

cheetah — literally just a Python template command-line tool. that's the whole vibe. 🐆

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✨ SYNOPSIS ✨

so the two things you can run are cheetah and cheetah-compile, and here's exactly how you call them:

cheetah, cheetah-compile

cheetah COMMAND [options] FILE...
cheetah-compile [options] FILE...

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✨ DESCRIPTION ✨

okay so this manual page documents the cheetah command-line tool, but briefly — like a lil teaser. and fun fact: this page was written for the Debian distribution because the original program doesn't have a manual page at all. not one. we're the manual now. 💅

cheetah is a Python-powered template engine and code generator. it can be a standalone utility, or you can combine it with other tools, whatever your heart desires. Cheetah has many potential uses, but the people expected to be its principle user group are web developers looking for a viable alternative to ASP, JSP, PHP and PSP. so if that's you, welcome to the function, babe. 🫶

the cheetah command-line tool is the standalone utility portion of the software suite. cheetah-compile is a convenience script that's for the "cheetah compile ..." command. the utility accepts a single command, possible options, and a list of files. and if FILE is a single -, it reads standard input and writes standard output. iconic behaviour honestly. ✨

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✨ COMMANDS ✨

here are the possible cheetah commands, bestie. and good news: you may abbreviate the command to the first letter — e.g., 'h' == 'help'. we love a shortcut. 👑

• compile — compile template definitions
• fill — fill template definitions
• help — print commands help message
• options — print options help message for compile and fill commands
• test — run regression tests
• version — print version number

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✨ OPTIONS ✨

okay so these options apply to the compile and fill commands. a summary is included below, and yes, I'm giving you every single one because we don't gatekeep. 💖

• --idir DIR — input directories (default: current dir)
• --odir ODIR — output directories (default: current dir)
• --iext IEXT — input extension. the default input extension for both the compile and fill commands is "tmpl"
• --oext OEXT — output extension. the default output extension for the compile command is "py". the default output extension for fill is "html"
• -R — recurse subdirectories looking for input files 🔍
• --debug — print lots of diagnostic output to the standard error file descriptor
• --env — print the environment in the searchList
• --flat — no destination subdirectories
• --nobackup — do not make backups
• --pickle FILE — unpickle FILE and put that output in the searchList
• --stdout, -p — output to standard output file descriptor (pipe)

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✨ SEE ALSO ✨

• pydoc(1)

the programs are documented fully on the project website http://cheetahtemplate.sourceforge.net. you can also browse the Python library files and their docstring descriptions by using the standard pydoc utility. go read, bestie, it's giving ✨research✨.

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✨ AUTHOR ✨

this manual page was written by Chad C. Walstrom <chewie@debian.org>, for the Debian project, and is dedicated to the Public Domain. 🫡

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and that's the whole page, babe. 🎀 this manual is dated 2005 Apr 04, it's CHEETAH(1) from the General Commands Manual — so go forth, compile some templates, and remember: you're the main character of your own shell. no cap. 💅🦋🌈