Getting help on Play Framework console commands

It took me a few minutes to figure out that when you want help on Play Framework console commands (i.e., the Play command line tool), you may get more useful help by typing help play instead of just help. Using the first command shows information on commands like clean, compile, console, etc., which is what I'm more interested in.

To take a quick look at this, here's what you get when you type help play:

[MyApp] $ help play

Welcome to Play 2.0!

These commands are available:
-----------------------------
classpath                  Display the project classpath.
clean                      Clean all generated files.
compile                    Compile the current application.
console                    Launch the interactive Scala console (use :quit to exit).
dependencies               Display the dependencies summary.
dist                       Construct standalone application package.
exit                       Exit the console.
h2-browser                 Launch the H2 Web browser.
license                    Display licensing informations.
package                    Package your application as a JAR.
play-version               Display the Play version.
publish                    Publish your application in a remote repository.
publish-local              Publish your application in the local repository.
reload                     Reload the current application build file.
run <port>                 Run the current application in DEV mode.
test                       Run Junit tests and/or Specs from the command line
eclipsify                  generate eclipse project file
idea                       generate Intellij IDEA project file
sh <command to run>        execute a shell command 
start <port>               Start the current application in another JVM in PROD mode.
update                     Update application dependencies.

Type `help` to get the standard sbt help.

Now that you've seen basic help on these commands, you can type 'help [command]' to show additional information about each command:

[MyApp] $ help clean

Deletes files produced by the build, such as generated sources, compiled classes, and task caches.

[MyApp] $ help console

Starts the Scala interpreter with the project classes on the classpath.

[MyApp] $ help package

Produces the main artifact, such as a binary jar.  This is typically an alias for the task that actually does the packaging.

Before I learned that you need to type help play to see those commands, I was just typing help. Here's what you get when you do that:

[MyApp] $ help

play                        Enter the play console
help command*               Displays this help message or prints detailed help on requested commands.
about                       Displays basic information about sbt and the build.
reboot [full]               Reboots sbt and then executes the remaining commands.
< file*                     Reads command lines from the provided files.
!!                          Execute the last command again
!:                          Show all previous commands
!:n                         Show the last n commands
!n                          Execute the command with index n, as shown by the !: command
!-n                         Execute the nth command before this one
!string                     Execute the most recent command starting with 'string'
!?string                    Execute the most recent command containing 'string'
~ <command>                 Executes the specified command whenever source files change.
exit                        Terminates the build.
reload                      Loads the project in the current directory
projects                    Displays the names of available projects.
project [project]           Displays the current project or changes to the provided `project`.
- command                   Registers 'command' to run if a command fails.
iflast command              If there are no more commands after this one, 'command' is run.
( ; command )+              Runs the provided semicolon-separated commands.
shell                       Provides an interactive prompt from which commands can be run.
set <setting-expression>    Evaluates the given Setting and applies to the current project.
tasks                       Displays the tasks defined for the current project.
inspect <key>               Prints the value for 'key', the defining scope, delegates, related definitions, and dependencies.
eval <expression>           Evaluates the given Scala expression and prints the result and type.
alias                       Adds, removes, or prints command aliases.
append command              Appends `command` to list of commands to run.
last <key>                  Prints the last output associated with 'key'.
last-grep <pattern> <key>   Shows lines from the last output for 'key' that match 'pattern'.
session ...                 Manipulates session settings.  For details, run 'help session'..
show <key>                  Displays the result of evaluating the setting or task associated with 'key'.

That's also useful, but typically I want to see the commands that are listed when I type help play, hence this short blog post.

The output shown comes from the Play Framework 2.0.4 command line. For more information and help on using the Play console, see the Play Console documentation.