Howto do python command-line autocompletion but NOT only at the beginning of a string

Question

Python, through it\'s readline bindings allows for great command-line autocompletion (as described in here).

But, the completion only seems to work at the beginning

Answer 1

I'm not sure I understand the problem. You could use readline.clear_history and readline.add_history to set up the completable strings you want, then control-r to search backword in the history (just as if you were at a shell prompt). For example:

#!/usr/bin/env python

import readline

readline.clear_history()
readline.add_history('foo')
readline.add_history('bar')

while 1:
    print raw_input('> ')

Alternatively, you could write your own completer version and bind the appropriate key to it. This version uses caching in case your match list is huge:

#!/usr/bin/env python

import readline

values = ['Paul Eden <paul@domain.com>', 
          'Eden Jones <ejones@domain.com>', 
          'Somebody Else <somebody@domain.com>']
completions = {}

def completer(text, state):
    try:
        matches = completions[text]
    except KeyError:
        matches = [value for value in values
                   if text.upper() in value.upper()]
        completions[text] = matches
    try:
        return matches[state]
    except IndexError:
        return None

readline.set_completer(completer)
readline.parse_and_bind('tab: menu-complete')

while 1:
    a = raw_input('> ')
    print 'said:', a