// You can use clap's value_t! macro with a custom enum by implementing the std::str::FromStr // trait which is very straight forward. There are three ways to do this, for simple enums // meaning those that don't require 'pub' or any '#[derive()]' directives you can use clap's // simple_enum! macro. For those that require 'pub' or any '#[derive()]'s you can use clap's // arg_enum! macro. The third way is to implement std::str::FromStr manually. // // In most circumstances using either simple_enum! or arg_enum! is fine. // // In the following example we will create two enums using macros, assign a positional argument // that accepts only one of those values, and use clap to parse the argument. // Add clap like normal #[macro_use] extern crate clap; use clap::{App, Arg}; // Using arg_enum! is more like traditional enum declarations // // **NOTE:** Only bare variants are supported arg_enum! { #[derive(Debug)] pub enum Oof { Rab, Zab, Xuq } } arg_enum! { #[derive(Debug)] enum Foo { Bar, Baz, Qux } } fn main() { // Create the application like normal let enum_vals = ["fast", "slow"]; let m = App::new("myapp") // Use a single positional argument that is required .arg(Arg::from(" 'The Foo to use'").possible_values(&Foo::variants())) .arg( Arg::from(" 'The speed to use'") // You can define a list of possible values if you want the values to be // displayed in the help information. Whether you use possible_values() or // not, the valid values will ALWAYS be displayed on a failed parse. .possible_values(&enum_vals), ) // For the second positional, lets not use possible_values() just to show the difference .arg(" 'The Oof to use'") .get_matches(); let t = value_t!(m.value_of("foo"), Foo).unwrap_or_else(|e| e.exit()); let t2 = value_t!(m.value_of("oof"), Oof).unwrap_or_else(|e| e.exit()); // Now we can use our enum like normal. match t { Foo::Bar => println!("Found a Bar"), Foo::Baz => println!("Found a Baz"), Foo::Qux => println!("Found a Qux"), } // Since our Oof derives Debug, we can do this: println!("Oof: {:?}", t2); }