better-solution.py

import argparse
import sys


# Function to count the number of bytes for a given file
def countBytes(file):
    # In case we need to read the file from standard input
    if file == sys.stdin:
        return len(sys.stdin.read())
    else:
        return len(file.read().encode('utf-8'))


# Function to count the number of lines in a file
def countLines(file):
    num_lines = sum(1 for i in file)
    return num_lines


# Function to count the number of words in a file
def countWords(file):
    data = file.read()
    words = data.split()
    return len(words)


# Function to count the number of characters in the file
def countChar(file):
    chars = 0
    for line in file:
        chars += len(line) + 1
    return chars


# Function to handle the file processing depending on whether it's a given file or a standard input
def process_file(file):
    if file == '-':
        return sys.stdin
    else:
        return open(file, "r", encoding="utf8")


if __name__ == "__main__":
    # Initializing the parser
    parser = argparse.ArgumentParser(description="A simple word count tool using Python")

    # Adding different arguments
    # Note - Using "action" makes it a boolean determining the presence of the argument
    parser.add_argument("-c", help="Calculates the size of the file, in bytes", action="store_true")
    parser.add_argument("-l", help="Calculates the number of lines in the file", action="store_true")
    parser.add_argument("-w", help="Calculates the number of words in the file", action="store_true")
    parser.add_argument("-m", help="Calculates the number of characters in the file", action="store_true")

    # Adding the final argument of file name, and making it optional to allow reading from standard input
    parser.add_argument("fileName", nargs='?', default='-', help="The name of the file to process")

    # Parsing the arguments
    args = parser.parse_args()

    # Case wise handling of situations for different arguments
    if args.c:
        size = countBytes(process_file(args.fileName))
        print(size, args.fileName)

    if args.l:
        if args.fileName == '-':
            print(countLines(process_file(args.fileName)))
        else:
            print(countLines(process_file(args.fileName)), args.fileName)

    if args.w:
        if args.fileName == '-':
            print(countWords(process_file(args.fileName)))
        else:
            print(countWords(process_file(args.fileName)), args.fileName)

    if args.m:
        if args.fileName == '-':
            print(countChar(process_file(args.fileName)))
        else:
            print(countChar(process_file(args.fileName)), args.fileName)

    if not(args.m or args.w or args.l or args.c) and args.fileName:
        if args.fileName == '-':
            print(countChar(process_file(args.fileName)), countLines(process_file(args.fileName)), countWords(process_file(args.fileName)))
        else:
            print(countChar(process_file(args.fileName)), countLines(process_file(args.fileName)), countWords(process_file(args.fileName)), args.fileName)