All CLI flags should be passed after subcommand

[jtcohen6]

Docs project

Contributions

• I have read the contribution docs, and understand what's expected of me.

Link to the page on docs.getdbt.com requiring updates

https://docs.getdbt.com/reference/global-configs/command-line-flags

What part(s) of the page would you like to see updated?

For better consistency, all flags should be passed after the subcommand.

dbt run --no-populate-cache

This includes "global" flags (supported for all commands) that have historically been passed before the subcommand:

dbt --no-populate-cache run

We could continue supporting the latter for backward compatibility, but make clear that it is legacy/deprecated functionality and liable to be removed in the future. It is not supported to pass the same flag before "before" and "after."

This should be much easier for everyone, as it doesn't require remembering which flags are "global" or "not global," and which ones are supported in both places for legacy reasons.

Additional information

Blocked by:

• [CT-1737] Support all "global" flags after all subcommands dbt-core#6497

[mirnawong1]

@jtcohen6 , confirming this is no longer blocked by dev, right?

[jtcohen6]

@mirnawong1 Correct! Thanks for being on top of it :)

Most of this has been updated in main / for dbt Core v1.7. The only outstanding things here are:

• Three flags that we still need to figure out how to support: [CT-3159] [spike] Globalize remaining Click flags dbt-core#8715
• Backporting this to dbt Core v1.5 + v1.6:
  • [Backport 1.5.latest] Fix #6497: Support global flags passed in after subcommands dbt-core#8734
  • [Backport 1.6.latest] Fix #6497: Support global flags passed in after subcommands dbt-core#8732

[mirnawong1]

still monitoring this @jtcohen6 and @aranke - are the flagsp.warn_error, p.warn_error_options, and p.log_format still pending support?

so far this is how i've shaped the doc for this page:

[mirnawong1]

Hey @jtcohen6 @aranke ! Looks like the 3 flags are still being worked on so I'm going to leave them out until the docs team is informed otherwise 🙏