Massive 0.2.1 Update to LuCLI

Tools and Libraries
1

I kinda forgot to do a release for a whole of LuCLI (as have been using and upgrading locally for a number of projects!)

You can check out the next alpha version here:

Some notable changes are:

  • URL rewriting overhaul (Tomcat RewriteValve): Replaced Tuckey UrlRewriteFilter (urlrewrite.xml) with Tomcat’s built-in RewriteValve (rewrite.config) to avoid servlet API compatibility issues and remove the external JAR dependency. Rewrite rules now use Apache mod_rewrite syntax and live at the Host level under conf/Catalina/<host>/rewrite.config.

  • Deprecations around rewriting: urlrewrite.xml is now deprecated (startup warning + migration guidance). Also URL rewriting is not supported on Jetty runtime.

  • New env var syntax + safer substitution rules: Introduced #env:VAR_NAME# (with default support like #env:PORT:-8080#), plus “protected zones” where only #env: substitution runs (preserving ${VAR} for Lucee/JVM runtime evaluation). Deprecated ${VAR} and bare #VAR# (still works but warns).

  • Runtime providers (big feature): New runtime support in lucee.json for pluggable runtimes:

    • Lucee Express (default)
    • Vendor Tomcat (point at existing Tomcat via catalinaHome / CATALINA_HOME)
    • Docker (experimental) with lifecycle managed via LuCLI (server stop / server status / server list work with containers)
    • Jetty (experimental) added experimental Jetty runtime

  • Better server control options: Added --config / -c to server stop and server restart so you can target servers by config file (no need to know --name).

  • .lucli scripting improvements:

    • New source directive to load .env-style files inside .lucli scripts
    • New CLI --envfile <path> to preload env vars before running a script

  • UX/terminal improvements:

    • New reusable Table UI component for consistent CLI tables
    • Emoji handling refactor with centralized EmojiSupport + one global showEmojis setting
    • Multiple completion fixes (file-path completion after trailing space, ~/ completion preserved, external command file completion fallback)
    • REPL loop now catches exceptions so the terminal doesn’t crash

  • Config quality-of-life:

    • lucee.json now supports // and /* */ comments
    • Relative paths in envVars are resolved to absolute paths against the project directory
    • server run --dry-run parity with server start --dry-run, plus --include-env for showing env vars passed through

  • Module/help improvements: Modules now support --help that prints subcommands + args/types/defaults sourced from module.json; plus new plural aliases (server→servers, module→modules, secret→secrets).

  • Bug fixes: Shebang handling for .cfs / .cfm, server status for vendor Tomcat PID overwrite issue, environment merge bug, output capture issues in .lucli scripts, prompt path stripping bug.

  • Tooling: Added SpotBugs Maven integration + docs.

Phew! And loads more to come as I work on the runtimes!

Would love your feeback and if you find bugs/issues let me in in the github repo

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