User-friendly parameter definitions and named arguments for rake tasks.

To define required parameters for a task, pass each parameter name as a symbol to the "params" method immediately before the task definition (similar to the way the "desc" method can be used to set the task description).

desc "Just a test task, nothing to see here..."
params :first_name, :last_name
task :testing_leaves do |task|

end

Optional parameters can be passed as a hash to the "optional_params" method. The hash keys are the parameter names and the hash values are the default arguments.

params :first_name, :last_name
optional_params hair_color: 'purple', date_of_birth: nil
task :testing_leaves do |task|

end

Arguments are sent as "name=value" pairs following the rake call.

rake testing_leaves first_name=Bob last_name=Saggit

Arguments are available via the Task.args instance method.

params :first_name, :last_name
task :testing_leaves do |task|
	puts task.args # {first_name: 'value', last_name: 'something'}
end

Because arguments are passed to the entire rake process instead of to each task individually, tasks that share parameter names will always receive the same argument values for those parameters if run in the same process.