Cligen 6.2.0: How to preserve order of OR-Group Options in CLI (Avoid Auto-Sorting)

[prahladlekhak]

I'm using Cligen version 6.2.0 and have a CLI defined with OR ex (login | shutdown | logout | reboot)
However, Cligen automatically sorts these values alphabetically, and when I check tab-completion or help output, it displays them as:
login logout reboot shutdown
I would like to preserve the original order as defined in the CLI.Is there any built-in way to prevent this automatic sorting, or a recommended workaround to maintain the specified order in Cligen?

Any suggestions or guidance would be appreciated.

Thanks!

[olofhagsand]

No, I dont see a way around that currently.
I see the need of having unsorted items, much as YANG sorted-by user construct in contrast with sorted-by system.
The code is pt_expand_choice() which calls co_insert1() which inserts them alphabetically.
A solution would be to just append them instead with some clispec keyword indicating to not sort these items alphabetically, someting like:

<operation:string choice:login | shutdown | logout | reboot>, sorted-by-user;

However, it is somewhat more intricate because a more elaborate syntax, such as:

<operation:string choice:login | shutdown | logout | reboot', sorted-by-user;
pause;

is currently displayed as:

  login                
  logout               
  pause          <---      
  reboot               
  shutdown  

That is, all, items are sorted together, not only the items of the choice type.
YANG does not do this, items are grouped according to YANG, which means that the pause item would always come after the operation elements.
And this seems a bigger thing to do.

[prahladlekhak]

@olofhagsand Thank you for the detailed explanation. That makes sense.

It would definitely be helpful to have a sorted-by-user-style option in the future, especially for commands where logical ordering matters more than alphabetical. I understand it's a bigger change, but I appreciate you considering it.