NAIF CSPICE executable utilities made available within Python

cspice_exes.py

import os, sys, platform
import subprocess

CSPICE_dir = "/absolute/path/to/cspice/"
__doc__ = """
SPICE executables, made available from within Python.

Available executables:
""" + "\n".join([os.path.splitext(exe)[0] for exe in os.listdir(os.path.join(CSPICE_dir,"exe"))]) + """
"""

def _exe(util: str, args: list[str]): # general-purpose function to run any of the executables
    OS_name = platform.system()
    if OS_name == "Windows" or "CYGWIN" in OS_name:
        extension = ".exe"
    elif OS_name in ("Linux","Darwin"):
        extension = ""
    else:
        extension = ""
        print("Warning! Operating system not recognized. Extension may be incorrect.")
    executable = os.path.join(CSPICE_dir, "exe", util+extension)
    if isinstance(args, str):
        arguments = [args]
    elif isinstance(args, list):
        arguments = args
    else:
        raise TypeError("Single argument should be a str, multiple should be a list of str.")
    cmd = [executable]+[arguments]
    cmd_out = subprocess.check_output(cmd, text=True)
    return cmd_out

def _docs(util): # retrieve documentation contents from file
    with open(CSPICE_dir+f"/doc/{util}.ug","r") as ug:
        doc_contents = ug.read()
    return doc_contents

def _construct(util): # create a Python function for an executable and add it to the namespace
    func = lambda args : _exe(util,args)
    func.__doc__ = _docs(util)
    globals()[util] = func

for executable in os.listdir(CSPICE_dir+"/exe/"): # construct a function for all of the available exes
    _construct(os.path.splitext(executable)[0])

if __name__ == "__main__":
    util_to_run = sys.argv[1] # executable name
    arguments = sys.argv[2:] # arguments to pass
    func = globals()[util_to_run]
    print("Running",func,arguments)
    print(func(arguments))